Day 6
00:00 Local, 06:00UTC
pos 14deg49.9S, 162deg03.1W
Distance to Totoya Isle, Fiji: 1050NM
We had a good sailing day yesterday, starting with the spinnaker in light NE, which strengthened to an eventual 25 knots plus. By mid day we were running a reefed main plus spinnaker, doing 9-10 knots with 13 knot surfs. Eventually it got too much for the spinnaker so we snuffed it and continued with the jib. By late sunset the wind was dropping rapidly, so we dropped the main, furled the jib and back out with the spinnaker, doing 5 knots in around 10 knots of tailwind. So we are being kept busy, with no sign of those so-called trade winds WHICH ARE SUPPOSED TO BLOW STEADILY FOR DAYS ON END. But by staying north we avoided that low. The sea was quite bumpy at times with a big SW groundswell and a small short period NE windswell moving over each other, with shimmi bobbing on top. We are now about 100 miles south of Suvarov. The next closest island group is Samoa (427 miles), then Tonga (721 miles), then Fiji (1050 miles).
Early on we caught two Mahi-Mahi (Dorado), Chantal baked a loaf for lunch with Mahi salad, Kahlil made Mahi curry and rice for dinner.
We only have about 3-4 days left of motoring in our fuel tanks, so we still need at least a week of good wind to make it to Fiji. Hopefully the SE trades will kick in soon. Thats all from us on shimmi, quite boring, I know.
Cheers
G
