Recap of Our Voyage

Now that we’ve had a few days to settle in to Ensenada, sleep, eat a few tacos, clean the boat and do some laundry (yay for clean sheets!), I’ve got some time to reflect on the voyage.  Overall, it was a great voyage, mainly because we had no major problems.  That seems pretty rare for a month long voyage.  There were challenges, mainly to do with dealing with the weather, and lack or abundance of wind and seas.  But  we feel fortunate to have made it here safely.  One of our world cruising books recommends that sailors only undertake to sail from Hawaii to Mexico ”in extremis” because it is against the tradewinds and ocean currents.   Making this passage at this time of year, you are really subject to the whims of the High Pressure system that moves around all over between Hawaii and the mainland.  In the center of this high pressure system, there is no wind! It did seem as though whenever we thought we might break free from the high and get some wind, it caught up with us again, until the very end of the voyage.  In any case, we made it!  And I was only seasick for the very first day at sea (probably because there were no seas to speak of for most of the trip!).  Here are some stats:

Distance sailed:  roughly 3,300 nautical miles (nm)

Distance from Waikiki to Ensenada (straight line) 2,293 nautical miles

Total travel time:  31 days 8 hours (May 12 – June 12)

Average Speed:  4.4 knots (this includes all the nights drifting!)

Number of nights becalmed or hove-to: 3 nights

Number of ships we passed: About 20? 

Number of Sails we used:  8 (all the sails we own!)

Total engine hours:  126 hours/ about 52 gallons of diesel fuel

# of fish caught:  2

Gotta love sailing.  We traveled an extra 1,100 nm to get here.  At our average speed of 4.4 knots that’s an extra 10 days at sea!  We can’t imagine what a different trip it might have been if we’d had wind, and if the wind had been from the right direction!  Here are a few pics from the passage, including the chart with our track highlighted.

Our track from Hawaii to Mexico.

Comfy seat for the person on watch in the cockpit.  This was before Tim put up even more tarps so you couldn't see out that side, but now wind or seas could get in either!

Rainbow!

Capt Tim tries to nap - often unsuccessfully.

Sunrise.

Got all my layers on - thank goodness we bought that long underwear at Patagonia in Hawaii!

Finally a nice warm sailing day, using the BIG jib.

Tim cleaned both fish, first the little Mahi, then the Albacore (below) a week or so later.

A nice albacore tuna!  Amazing how the canned stuff has the same flavor :-)

When the wind filled in we were sailing well!

As for wildlife, it was pretty quiet most of the way across, with the exception of one pod of dolphins that found us one day when we were motoring through some glassy water.  Throughout the trip we had a black-footed albatross that would show up and circle us for a while, and then reappear the next day; we named him Alby.  When we were 2 days out of port, we had 4 albatrosses following us!  And then we passed by several large (hundreds!) pods of dolphins – so cool when they surrounded the boat.  Neither pod stayed with us long, just stopped by to catch a quick bow ride and greet us.  And then coming in to Ensenada, we saw gray whales (close enough to make us change course!), flocks of pelicans and many sea lions!  The sea lions actually wake us up with their barking throughout the night here.  Here’s a few more pics. 

One of the several glass balls we passed.

A Huge school of dolphins and loads of birds greeted us on the way in to Ensenada.

Sea lions abound in the Ensenada harbor.

Entering Ensenada harbor.

We’ve started making our summer plans.  First it’s off to Vallarta to say hi to some friends, then we will make our way east – to see family in New York.  From New York it’s down to the St. John (Virgin Islands) where we’ll check on our rental homes and do lots of maintenance!  We’ll leave the boat in the marina here in Ensenada for the summer.  Luckily it seems like a pretty safe place overall, and we’ve got some friends that will be here and can keep an eye on things for us.

Day 32 - Land ho - From Aloha to Hola!

Just a quick note to let you all know we're safely in port tied to the dock at the Cruiseport Marina in Ensenada Mexico!  Now it's off to sleepyland...or maybe a few tacos and a beer first!

Day 30

More hard decisions today... a day or so after the decision was made to head to Cabo, we became aware that the tropics were not "all quiet" but things were starting to brew, and we would be under some definite time pressure to get to a safe port before a potential tropical storm might head our way. So today we again changed our destination - back to the safety of Ensenada, far enough north to be out of hurricane zone. Hopefully the weather gods will look favorably on us for the next few days!

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Day 28

We thought we might be there by now... But since "there" has just changed from Ensenada to Cabo San Lucas (or thereabouts) we still have another 800 miles to go. As we approached the coast, the winds picked up and so did the seas, making it hard for us to keep on course for Ensenada. We hove-to (drifted with sails set to keep us in place) one night, then decided to head SE to be more comfortable and keep making headway. So after two days of heavy winds and BIG frightening seas (not to mention COLD COLD weather in general) we are far enough south that it just makes sense to continue towards Cabo and not try to get back north to Ensenada. So the journey continues... this trip has been really trying. Just when the light (or Margarita/cold beer) at the end of the tunnel appeared, it was extinguished and replaced by fear of seas breaking in the cockpit during the cold dark night. We finally holed up down below at night, leaving our windvane to steer the boat which she did admirably. Having the new radar, and the AIS systems that alert us to ships nearby we felt ok to not be on deck for once. Things seem to be letting up today and we are able to head right at Cabo, so maybe we'll make landfall in a week? Stay tuned!

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Day 25

Well, this has definitely made it into the record books for the longest passage ever for both of us. The way over from Mexico took 24 days of sailing (but really the record was 21 days straight since we stopped at the Socorro Islands after 3 days). Anyhow, we're getting close now, less than 500 miles to go, and we've had plenty of cold north wind for the past two days. Those winds should take us all the way in to port. May get some heavyish winds to keep things exciting just when we're getting verrryyyy tired. We hope to make landfall in a couple of days.

Tim's been keeping busy with little projects of course, trying to keep us dry and warm in the cockpit where we sit for our watches. It's gotten a bit rough for cooking but i did manage a pan of brownies for watch treats last night. We've still got a bit of tuna left which may go into a thai curry if it gets calm enough later today. Other than a rolly boat which requires constant bracing and one hand to steady yourself, all's well on board.

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Day 21 - becalmed again last night!

Becalmed again last night, and sat drifting in big NW swells while Tim made a yummy dinner from our freshly caught Albacore Tuna! It was a beautiful fish. Tim had never caught one of these before. It definitely tasted different than the yellowfin we're used to eating. Didn't have the energy to roll sushi but had some sashimi. Raw, the meat was so melt in your mouth and silky, good dipped in wasabi and soy. Then Tim seared some, and cooked it reminded me of canned tuna! I plan to make fresh tuna salad today. We motored again yesterday, keeping a watch from the bow to ensure we didn't run over any large floating lines or nets. We're also keeping an eye out for the glass japanese fishing buoys... we passed a few earlier before we realized it might be cool to grab one to have as a keepsake of our time becalmed in the pacific! On bow watch we've both been enjoying sitting up there, perched on top of the overturned dinghy, listening to our favorite tunes on the earphones. It a sweet feeling to be cruising through the glassy ocean out here in the middle of it, but sad when you look around and see plastics floating. Some patches have lots of debris, but mostly we're just seeing the odd buoy or masses of line, or little bits of small plastic stuff. Don't think we're right in the pacific *gyre* where the bulk of the plastics are, but still sad to see what we've seen, and worrisome from the standpoint of motoring through it. That's why we chose to drift becalmed at night, since we can't keep a watch for the lines that could foul our prop and harm our engine.

Todays forecast sounds like we will hit the favorable westerly winds later today, the wind has already picked up again (in the middle of the night actually we got up and raised sail) so we're moving along towards Ensenada right now. If the winds pick up as forecast, we're going to have LOTS of wind to speed us along, maybe we can reach Ensenada in about a week. Been enjoying the solitude of the quiet moments when we're becalmed or sailing slowly along. It'll be quite a difference when we get back into heavy winds.

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