For fun, I thought I’d let you take a glimpse at our Ship’s Log. Following are some excerpts from some of our passages. (single letters are abbreviations of our names; numbers with n and w are latitude and longitude; times are given in military format; additional info given in italics)
Patronus Ship’s Log
(excerpt from our 1441 mile passage: North Carolina, USA to St. Thomas, USVI)
11/4/12: 0728 Threw off the docklines. Sailed away from the safe harbor. Catching the trade winds in our sails. We’re actually doing it!!!! (this is from a favorite Mark Twain quote of ours)
1100 nav station hatch open. Wave crashes in and soaks everything. Gulf Stream: ugh.
1900 fishing rod holder breaks
11/5/12: 1858 Dark squalls left and right of us. Cruise ship aft starboard side going to Grand Turk. I Love AIS (note to readers: AIS is an electronic tool that gives us info about all boats, that have AIS installed, within a 48 mile range. It tells us their heading, speed, and the approximate time of impact, if we are on a crash course. We see the name of the boat so we can call them on the radio and politely ask them to not smack into us. Big commercial boats are required to have AIS and it has helped us many times this year.)
Wind 16-20, Going 7 knots.
Cloud shape of man with open arms
Making mac and cheese a la Mema
Lightning at sea
11/6/12: 1200 Mutiny on Patronus. Dad and kids do a pirate skit. Perfect timing. So much fun and cheered us all up.
- clipping onto the boat in case we fall overboard at night
11/7/12: 0300 squall.
0530 jib halyard breaks at top of mast. Chris and I have to take down the sail in the dark. Still shaking from adrenaline. So glad we have jack lines to snap onto.
0858: flying fish lands in cockpit. Hammer bar and race caps: Breakfast of champions.
1915: 655 miles traveled. 655 to waypoint. Yet not half way:(
1927: wind 15-20, gusts to 23, Wind 235, heading 122 some seas knocking us around, going 7 kts, 658 log, Latitude/Longitude: N 28 33 W 69 09
Looking for more squalls. Sky looks ok though for now
Have not fixed storm jib halyard
Dad and B snoozing on deck, CRP asleep down below
Had Kathy’s chicken and rice for dinner. Great
Did Reese’s hair in bucket. Took long time to get knots out.
Still no shower for me:(
11/8/12: 0320 shooting star, hot cocoa, two twizzlers
Playlist Cheek to Cheek, Via Con Mi, My Funny Valentine (Chet Baker version), She, Biggest Part of Me by Ambrosia (she’s the light that breathes in me)
Did Message in a bottle!!!!
1630 on watch after shower and lots of rest today. Cranky. Feels like too much longer to go. Got to talk to friends on satellite phone nice. Reading history of Caribbean. Kids on deck playing. Dad and Chris asleep. Lasagna in oven. 808 miles down. 540 to go. 27 06 n 67 07 w
TTG (Time To Go) finally not maxed out at 99 hours 99 min:)
1815: waiting for squall
1900: 26 48 n 66 58 w
Lasagna a hit. Squall never came. Dad smoking. RP asleep
828 miles traveled
No stars or moon
- Throwing out a message in a bottle at the 1000 mile mark.
11/9/12: 0335 On watch. “Moonlight and love songs, never out of date.” As time goes by. Longer, Dan Fogelberg moonlight quiet overwhelmingly beautiful “longer than there have been fishes in the ocean”
1100 tried spinnaker. Worked well to 18 kts. Rounded up hard at 18kts. Caught small fish, threw back
E cleaned forward head and tidied up. Trying to dry wet towels and clothes so I can put in laundry bag
Kids working on another message in bottle.
Food free-for-all. Eat it if you can go down below long enough to get it!
1637 Bryson using math to calculate the percentage of fuel we used and have left.
11/10/12: 0130 on watch. So tired. Couldn’t sleep in our cabin. Too rough. Gusting to 30 kts. Main and jib reefed. Chris says EPIRB deployed from holder overnight but did not go off. Put in ditch bag. Scary! It fell behind fuel cans. He heard it and grabbed it before it fell in water. Thinking about how close we just got to having the Coast Guard fly over us! Just had an apple and a few potato chips and one twizzler. Traveled 1045.1 miles. 368 to go but not yet rhumb-lined. More 30’s. Gotta go.
0530 still up. Needed C to help reef so he hasn’t slept.
346 to go. Waiting for wind to go to 60 so we can head right at St Thomas. It got light out quickly but overcast no sunrise
Had to tie up fuel can that was coming loose.
0600 finally down to rest. Crashed in boys room with Porter and Bryson. Sun up so P got up shortly. Rough trying to sleep but did and it was restful.
11/10/12: 1000 got up, ate breakfast, cleaned up things that flew around over night. Washed face. Brushed teeth
Back on watch. C and dad down below sleeping. Kids playing.
312.9 to go. 1111.71 traveled so far. Wind 20-28 kts NE
Just had a spirited and lengthy conversation with the wind instrument. Wind direction hit 150 and I may have asked it to marry me.
Heading : 190
Very rolly. Shooting starts: Most I’ve ever seen in life I think.
1140: Spotted bird. Land must be getting close…
11/11/12: 0200 Happy First Birthday to Patronus! On watch. Trade winds set in with rollers from behind. Heading right at St Thomas. 200 miles to go. Going 7-8 knots. Hard work steering. Constant attention so we don’t jibe. TTG says 28 hours which would be perfect timing-won’t arrive in the dark.
Listening to iPod songs haven’t heard in months.
0324 crescent moonrise smile amazing
11/12/12: 1000 caught mahi mahi
Had dinner somehow in rolling seas. Porter chicken with lemon, cous cous, corn.
1940 Dad sees red light off starboard side around two miles away. Hail on VHF. s/v Liberty from Rhode Island on way to Red Hook in St Thomas as well. He left 11/1. Fun talking to someone from the rest of the world. Can’t stop looking at his red light.
11/14/12: 1236 last night watch! Got some rest in cabin but it is really hot and sticky. Had an apple, water, 4 twizzlers, 5 Swedish fish. Should be good to go for four hours:) Want to put up sail by myself but not confident enough. Will wait for Chris to wake up. Longest engine has been on in 8 days so I’m not complaining. Reading book on history of Caribbean. Dry. Squalls.
0200 Land. Ho. 43 miles to go. Found ice cream at the bottom of the freezer. Happy:)
0247 last water tank almost empty.
Going off watch. So tired. 30 miles to go. When I come back up we will almost be there. Yay.
Somewhere over the past few months, the Caribbean has melted away my sharper edges, allowing me to float along with the love/sand/heart/ocean of this lower latitude paradise. My ship log entries have changed as well. The facts, figures, and numbers that used to be important to me have been replaced by thoughts, feelings, and impressions, both deep and irreverent. These are what I now deem to be important.
Well, that and our boat speed, of course!
Patronus Ship’s Log
(excerpt from 261 mile passage: Dominica to Grenada)
1/28/13, 0824 Depart Portsmouth after saying goodbye to Titus, Anything Goes, and Virginia Dare. Kids doing school. Fishing lines out. Sad to be leaving.
0950 cleaned floors and cockpit
1147 winds light. Titus texts us to tell us he can see Patronus and Anything Goes sailing from Roseau. It feels a little better to know that someone is standing on our perfect island, watching us leave. Noticing.
1513 10.1 knots baby! Caught two bonita.
194: Not everyone gets to watch the gold moon rise giant in the black sky from the cozy cockpit of a sailboat blasting along at 10 knots in a beam reach. Feeling grateful.
2049: What the &%@# do any Stevie Nicks songs mean?
2100: Trying to like Radiohead because Craig says they’re good. But it keeps reminding me of Pearl Jam. Or is it Nirvana?
2239: extendo-blinking to Heart and Soul by T’pau. Hit 11.4 knots several times.
Patronus Ship’s Log
(excerpt from passage: St. Maarten to Tortola)
- we pass the largest sailboat in the world
4/19/13: 0147 En route to Tortola from St. Maarten.
Racing Enchantment of the Seas to Tortola:) ten miles to beam of us. Not for long! Big Dipper gigantic above my head. Soft breeze. Downwind
at 8 kts. Twizzlers. water. Book. Headlamp. Clipped in. Under blanket on lazarette. Had to leave Anything Goes again. Had to leave Kelli. Off to read.
0316 wondering about the difference between those who study the stars
and those who look to the sea. One looks outward from the planet. One inward. But
perhaps the important distinction isn’t about trying to find the
merits and results of each of these pursuits but in celebrating the
looking.
And our most recent passage:
Patronus Ship’s Log
(excerpt from 552 mile passage: British Virgin Islands to the Bahamas)
4/21/13: Virgin passage. Quit soda, again, for 12 hours. On watch for 12 minutes.
Already about to cave in. Chilly. Sturgeron (seasickness medicine) working. Took at 1517. Had pizza for dinner. Cloudy. Wind 80. Sog 6.5. Heading 300 for Great
Inagua.
2130 huge warm (ugh) water and three twizzlers. Trying to stave off the
soda. Pudding queued up and ready for my 2200 treat.
Reading Jimmy Buffett’s A Pirate Looks at Fifty. Had my water and pudding. Closest we’ve been to a cruiseship at night. 4.4 miles away. Looks so big. Trying not to look sideways to the sea where giant rolling waves blot out the horizon and seem out to get us.
0200 all done. Completely spent.
- night watch. checking the instruments.
4/22/13 1917 sunset clear. kids playing so great. Felt headachy then better after Motrin and taco dinner. Correcting schoolwork. Kids ready for bed
1951 kids asleep. Checked instruments. Turned on tri color. Got flashlight ready. Gemini first stars I see. Moon almost full. Bright out. No targets on AIS for 24 miles. All alone out here. We are just north of Dominican Republic. Wish we were stopping there. Wind 97 at
17 kts. 6.3 sog. Heading 305. Nice to have compass lights working.
Listening to fave songs: Emmanuel. Over the rainbow. Bubbly. From my
Heart to Yours.
2130 ate an orange so I don’t get scurvy. LOL.
2315 wrap jib around head stay trying to go wing on wing. C hurts toe
going on foredeck.
Playlist for Sunrise, by DJ Jazzy Erica:
Predawn song: These Arms of Mine, Otis Redding. Groovin, The Rascals
First light: Happy Together, Turtles
A Taste of Honey. Herb Alpert and the Tijuana brass. (Decided that is
the first song I will learn on the trumpet. Just need a trombone player
to play with me.)
Baby I’m Yours, Barbara Lewis “till the stars fall from the sky”
Miracles, Jefferson Starship “if only you’d believe in miracles so would I.”
Whenever I Call You Friend, Kenny Loggins. “I see myself within your eyes.
Sweet love showin’ us some heavenly light. I never seen such a beautiful sight.”
Sunrise: Aquarious. “Let the sun shine. Let the sun shine in. The sunshine in.”
Venus, Frankie Valli
True Fine Love, Steve Miller Band
These are Days. Natalie Merchant
Beautiful Day. U2 “The heart is a-bloom. On the road. But you’ve got no
destination. You’ve been all over. And it’s been all over you.”
0655 Porter pops up on deck. Life jacket on. Crawls onto stbd lazarette and
stares at the sails. He is so cute.
0722 called dad. Anything Goes about 70 mi behind us.
0945 made blueberry muffins and thought about the song Funky Cold Medina. I should download that.
1630 Playing memory with kids
1838 leftovers for dinner. Spaghetti w meat sauce. Fresh guacamole and
pineapple. Dolphins jumping high. Sailing right into Awesome sunset
2045 instruments turn off and on. E noticed AIS turn off. Went to autopilot
and tried to steer back but main jibes and breaks block on boom.
Bends preventer. Another nighttime journey to the bow for Chris. So scary.
2344 can’t read anymore. Finished a big part of my iTunes clean up
job. Not in the mood to correct kids’ math workbooks. Air very humid. Trying not to
freak out that we might jibe any second. 15 minutes till I am off watch. No boat targets.
4/24/13 1621 running along south shore of Great Inagua. Not in Kansas
anymore. Looks like Anegada. Flat and white beaches far as you can
see. Cleanup on boat. Showers. Working on iTunes. Have all blogs written
through Dominica. Super. Now I’m only 14 ports of call behind…..
Bryson is just as enthusiastic about music these days as his little brother. When Bryson discovers a new song he loves, he puts it on his playlist, hits the “repeat” button, and listens to it for hours until he knows the lyrics and rhythm by heart. I remember doing that with “Escape (the Pina Colada Song)” as an 11-year-old myself. Oh. Except it was on a 45 record, so I had to keep getting up to move the needle back to the beginning!
Only The Lonely, Roy Orbison
