Alternate Blog Title: 'I've made a huge mistake.' - GOB BLUTH

If you are a fan of Arrested Development you know just the voice to read the above line in, as sun sets on our third day out, and we finally look at each other and break down how we've each been feeling inside. The realization we've come to is that this is not the time or the place for us to try our hand at long distance passagemaking. Acceptance of this reality is how we find ourselves here at 4:15AM, doing about 4.2kts (close hauled as we have been the last 70 something hours) headed back towards Mexico.

Let me start by saying that we are both really happy, and this decision sits much better than any of the quasi-decisions we've kicked around over the last month or so. Pisces is sailing great, we are having a great time, and are looking forward to the several days it will take for us to close back with land. So this is certainly not a story of regret, we are feeling great!

Unless you happen to have been in the La Cruz area over the last several weeks, we realize that you probably have no background on our thought process, so I'll try to give you the extremely brief synopsis of many a long evening spent walking around the marina and town trying to reason out what we should do. Essentially our options fell into two main camps: 1) Offshore to Hawaii and back or 2) Ship/Truck. The offshore route had several big things going for it, including (apparent lack of) cost, the opportunity to gain experience at offshore cruising, and the general bad-ass factor of pulling into the Puget Sound after 6000 something offshore miles. The shipping method had its own advantages, including the fact that it maximizes the fun value for our last several months, allowing us time to go back into the Sea of Cortez and then spend some additional time exploring the NW before starting 'real life.' There were many nuances to the arguments but essentially that is how it broke down, do we do the thing that is way out of our comfort zone but a major achievement, or do the thing that we know we enjoy?

Looking back at it, I think we both wanted to do the shipping option, but felt we ought to do the offshore option. The boat is ready, we have the time, and it's the right time of year to do it...sounds like the perfect combination right? Actually wrong. One of the lessons we've learned is that its not enough for the external factors alone to be in line, all the internal factors have to be there too. Are you excited about your destination? Do you feel 100% committed to the passage? Questions like that need to be discussed in a completely honest manner, because they are critical to the success of your passage.

As the first several days of our passage progressed, we both indepently and then jointly came to the conclusion that our own answers to the internal questions were frequently 'no.' What we really wanted was to get a bit of offshore time (say 10-14 days ideally) so that we'd have a sense of whether it was something we would want to do more of later down the line, and then to spend the rest of our summer exploring, hiking, snorkeling, etc.

Another important turning point for us was a day or two in when we realized that there was no way in hell...and I repeat, no way in hell, we were going to sail to Hawaii and then turn around in one months time and sail back to Seattle. We know people who have done this passage, and another of our friends perfectly sums them up as being 'total Vikings.' Since we were sure we would not be doing the return trip the financial picture of the different options changed, with Hawaii becoming the most expensive of all the options (due to the need to hire a delivery skipper or ship from Hawaii to Seattle). Not to mention how strange it would feel to hand over the keys to your home, vehicle, family member, etc to three random people to go bash through the North Pacific for a month...

As we closed with the Socorros Islands we knew it was really decision time, given the way the winds shift, and the distances involved, we would soon be passing a point of no return, where it just would not be that feasible to get back to Mexico without battling contrary winds the whole way. Together we came to the conclusion that we could be totally happy with the 5 days to a week that this shakedown sail will give us, combined with the shipping option. We've had the opportunity to get back out into bluewater with Pisces, shake her and us down again, and yet we still get to do the Sea of Cortez and the Pacific Northwest, it feels ideal.

So, in a nutshell that's the story of how we find ourselves doing either the world's shortest passage to Hawaii or the world's longest passage between La Cruz and Punta de Mita (depends on your perspective):) Currently we are aiming as far North as the winds will allow, which at times is Mazatlan, and at times Banderas Bay. No matter where we make landfall we will most likely try to make it over to Baja relatively quickly, as we want to revisit some of our favorite anchorages before our time in Mexico is up.

Lat 19 46' N, Long 108 11' W

24-hr Distance: 73 NM
Wind: 15-25 NW
Seas: 6-10 NW
Sky: Partially cloudy
Distance To Go: 2654 NM
Position: Lat 19 27' N, Long 108 03' W

Well, we didn't have the best 24-hr run yesterday, primarily because we ended up heaving to (stopping the boat) for most of the night. We've been beating in to a pretty fresh breeze, and seas that are being churned up by weather systems to the North of us. Morale is a bit low on board today. It's not easy going.

We ended up hove to last night because we were both having a bit of a re-evaluation as in 'why are we out here doing this?' We did decide to no matter what try and give it the full 4 days that people say it takes to fully adjust. Heaving to made it much easier for us both to recover some sleep with a highly improved motion. We are reserving the right to make this trip into a circumnavigation of the Socorros, followed by turning tail and running back to good old Mexico!

Really at this point I think our mood's are highly weather dependent. If the sailing gets easier, we'll undoubtedly become more cheery. As it is right now that, it's all we can do to keep down some water and a minimum of food. Currently we spend a good bit of time lying horizontal staring at the ceiling or trying to sleep. The most valuable things aboard (aside from sailing gear) are our earplugs and sleeping eye mask to block out light.

In good news however we are more or less headed due West now under jib alone, and we are hoping that the wind continues to clock so we can start easing the sheets a bit to ease our motion and the nerves.

Tons of dead flying fish on deck today. However too windy/rolly to attempt a clean up, so we continue on like some sort of fish funeral barge.

You may have noticed that our blog has been a bit neglected over the past month or so. It's not that things haven't been happening, it's that we have been deep in the throes of trying to decide how to get Pisces from La Cruz Mexico to Seattle USA. The primary options we were considering were shipping (expensive but easy and fast), bashing up the coast (cheap but hard), and sailing out to Hawaii first (cheap but scary).

It was an extremely hard decision, and we're still trying to take deep breaths and convince ourselves that this was the best choice, but we decided to give the offshore route a try. Primary considerations for us are that Pisces is totally ready for it, and when else will we have the boat, the time, and the desire to do something like this?

So here we are, sailing to Hawaii!! Last night we saw what is likely to be our last sight of land until we have reached Hawaii, a trip of about 2800 nautical miles!

So here it is: Day 1!

24-hr Distance: 104 NM
Wind: 10-20 W
Seas: 3-8 WNW
Sky: Overcast
Distance To Go: 2717 NM

We have been close hauled since leaving Banderas Bay, sailing at a decent clip with the Jib, Staysail, and one reef in the main. Our course has been towards the SW, and we are hoping that in the next day or so the wind will start to clock around, lifting us towards the direct route, and then allowing us to actually start the fabled downwind sailing! In the meantime things are good aboard, we are trying hard to just live in this moment, and certainly not think about how early in this long trip we are! Stomachs are also a bit on edge, so we'll keep this blog and computer time short.

We've got some dead squid and flying fish on deck, but we can't be bothered to clean them up in the current conditions. Pisces though is doing great, sailing along in the groove with Brutus (the Monitor windvane) firmly in control of the helm.

Drop us an email, we've got some..ahem...time on our hands and would love to hear from you.

As we were sitting on the plane at SFO yesterday waiting to take off for PV Jacob looked out the window at the bags being loaded onto the plane and pointed out one of our duffel bags going into the plane, ripped open with our stuff exploding out of it.

Luckily all of our bags and all of our stuff made it back to PV just fine, but every bag had been opened and inspected. We were carrying a large selection of boat parts and supplies and I'm sure that the dense metal parts set off all sorts of alarms.

Here's a partial list of what we brought back:

welding rod
galley water pumps
engine fresh water pump
gas canisters for PDFs
whisker pole end fittings
o-rings/clevis pins/bolts/nuts
2 stainless metal lengths
lanocote (lambs grease)
spray on water repellent
about 100 books


No wonder customs inspected our bags!



We are very happy to be back on Pisces in La Cruz, she's looking great, and we're keen to start getting ready for the next leg!

I thought I'd post a quick blog update on a couple of geeky boat things that I'm into right now.

1) Oceanography & Seamanship
Want to know exactly how many lbs of force it'll take to straighten your anchor rode? The optimal lookout configuration when searching for a MOB? How about the influence of vessel loading on stability? This book is great as it combines all the standard 'how to sail around the world' topics with the underlying science.



2) Antal Low Friction Rings
I spend a lot of time in chandleries staring at the blocks. Unfortunately, the prices are so high, I almost never get to actually purchase one (let alone a set!). So, I think you'll understand my excitement when I found these ring-leads. The idea (becoming increasingly common on the larger offshore racers) is that for many applications you don't actually need a block, a simple ring fairlead is fine. The advantages are huge: you save weight (not that Pisces really cares about this one), you get massive strength, there's nothing to break, and you save cost. We've ordered a few of these to play around with in a variety of different applications, and we'll keep you posted. But really, you can get a 'block' with a safe working load well over 5000lbs for under $20, how can that not be useful?!

We've spent the last few weeks on the "2010 Extravaganza Tour of US Cities," seeing friends and family and going to campus visits at potential graduate schools. Yes, this fall we will both be returning to school, Jacob for a PhD in Physical Oceanography and me for a Masters in Marriage and Family Therapy.

In the course of our '10 Extravaganza Tour we've been on 7 flights (to date) and visited San Francisco, Seattle, Los Angeles, Oxnard, Santa Barbara and San Diego. We are now professionals at navigating the early morning rental car scene at the airport, and explaining our cruising experience to professors in one peppy sentence.



After all this travel, we're happy to announce our new destination for the foreseeable future.....

SEATTLE, WASHINGTON

We hope you all come visit us!

We'll be back in La Cruz on Pisces in a week, and will return to more regular boat and cruising blogs soon.