Paying the Piper

Aloha Westward Fans!

It's the middle of our third out here in the middle of the Pacific. We have had a busy few days aboard Westward, as the first days of Transpac tend to be.

We were sent off on Monday by about 15 family and friends and headed for the starting area. We got out there early and took some time to check in, get organized, and eat lunch. We had a great start and got around Catalina's West End around 4:30 or 5. We hit Catalina at about Starlight Beach and tacked a few times before getting around the West End. It was a beautiful afternoon of sailing.

As the day turned into night, things got bouncy and wet. A few sail changes and a few sacrifices to Neptune (mostly in the form of hats) later and we begun our watch rotation. Since we're sailing 24 hours a day, someone is always racing the boat. Our three-person watches are Sam, Graham, and Zack and Willie, Alli, and Mara. When there's something major to be done (like a sail change) all six of us are on deck.

For the first 48 hours or so, nobody was on deck longer than necessary as it was pretty wet and cold. It was also pretty wet down below, but at least there was a hope of warming up in your bunk. The sailing was fun, but still uncomfortable. We call this paying the piper. Yesterday, the wind backed behind us a little bit and the sun came out, so we've all been lingering on deck a little longer in the day time. It's finally started to dry out down below and, in the words of Graham "Transpac is starting to make a lot of sense."

One bit of bummer news out here is that we heard our friends on Picante had to retire. We all hope that everything is ok and we're thinking about you!

We're trying to get out west a little further (given the name of the boat, it's appropriate) before turining down towards Hawaii. According to our routing software, we think we should probably have about ten more days until Diamond Head.

Stay tuned for another post in the not to distant future!

-Westward and crew



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