Inbetween it looked as if we could make it in 10 days but the wind still diminishes. We're down with our speed now to 2,5knots changing the ETA to 12.4.2013. 4 days ago we were supposed to travel only 6 ore days, now it's 7. Whatever. We cannot change it and wait waht is going to come. One day we'll arrive. In the meantime we talk a lot, have fun, laugh, sleep and eat very well. But yesterday I cooked the last fresh food. Except for 2 portions (feeeing all of us each) of fresh meat and potatoes and bread for today that we still have. Then we have to change to canned food with pasta and Pumpernickel (thank god we found Pumernickel in Vina del Mar. Besides that nothing is happening. Few birds and the first flying fish were seen yesterday, else nothing but blue water. No enemy (other ship) either.
Can someone pls pray for some wind for us so that we can move on?
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Marcus and Michaela sailing the world's oceans on their most beautiful boat Alita. Join the adventure!
05.04.2013
04.04.2013
Shit day
Sorry for the expression, but that's really what it was, or better, mostly what it dealt about. Did you ever think, s... could make a day more interesting? Well, only if you're out in the ocean, nothing to do or see...
Last night in my shift I was faced with the toilet pump not flushing anymore. When Marcus woke up I told him. Concentrated on the well-being of his boat and crew, Marcus could not continue to sleep (my solution was: tape the toilet so we can't use it, use the other one and repair it once we're not in the middle of the ocean in rocking waves) but started the repair marathon. As you can imagine it is not the most beautiful work. In the tiny bathroom, in the rocking boat, taking apart the pump, taking off hoses just to find out that one drain hose is completely stuck. He tried to install a short cut which did not work because the other hose was too short. we were both basically up the whole night and went to bed when we saw we have to wait til after dawn to see if we can unlock the drain hose. Thank do our two crew members took over Marcus' shift.
Well, to make a long story short, S... is like concrete once it gets stuck. 4 hrs of working on it Marcus with the help of Gyuri and Thomas finally got the breakthrough and water finally run freely again....But, we all laughed during this freeing operation. Ugly, but amusing.
After that we changed sails and Marcus then went back to assmebling the toilet installation again. Success!!! 12 hrs after starting the repair process with just a short sleeping break of 3 hrs.
Marcus is our heroe. Whatever challenge comes he does not complain and just gets it done with patience. Only after hours of trying to repair without success he said "could this not happen in a harbour, where it's quiet and you can get parts?". We all try to help as much as we can, but Marcus has the main load with his boat. He is just very brave and concernd about Alita and the crew's well-being. I am sure everybody who has been on board with us can sign this. Thanks Marcus!
Right now we're -or better the sails - are suffering from little wind in combination with stupid little waves. That slowed us down a lot. We'll probably loose 2 days and will arrive either on the 9th late at night or more probable on the 10th.
Current position: 27deg60'S and 096deg37'W
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Last night in my shift I was faced with the toilet pump not flushing anymore. When Marcus woke up I told him. Concentrated on the well-being of his boat and crew, Marcus could not continue to sleep (my solution was: tape the toilet so we can't use it, use the other one and repair it once we're not in the middle of the ocean in rocking waves) but started the repair marathon. As you can imagine it is not the most beautiful work. In the tiny bathroom, in the rocking boat, taking apart the pump, taking off hoses just to find out that one drain hose is completely stuck. He tried to install a short cut which did not work because the other hose was too short. we were both basically up the whole night and went to bed when we saw we have to wait til after dawn to see if we can unlock the drain hose. Thank do our two crew members took over Marcus' shift.
Well, to make a long story short, S... is like concrete once it gets stuck. 4 hrs of working on it Marcus with the help of Gyuri and Thomas finally got the breakthrough and water finally run freely again....But, we all laughed during this freeing operation. Ugly, but amusing.
After that we changed sails and Marcus then went back to assmebling the toilet installation again. Success!!! 12 hrs after starting the repair process with just a short sleeping break of 3 hrs.
Marcus is our heroe. Whatever challenge comes he does not complain and just gets it done with patience. Only after hours of trying to repair without success he said "could this not happen in a harbour, where it's quiet and you can get parts?". We all try to help as much as we can, but Marcus has the main load with his boat. He is just very brave and concernd about Alita and the crew's well-being. I am sure everybody who has been on board with us can sign this. Thanks Marcus!
Right now we're -or better the sails - are suffering from little wind in combination with stupid little waves. That slowed us down a lot. We'll probably loose 2 days and will arrive either on the 9th late at night or more probable on the 10th.
Current position: 27deg60'S and 096deg37'W
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01.04.2013
T-Shirt sailing, dead fish and bird on a wire
Every day the water around us is getting warmer. That means, that the wind is getting warmer. Now I can be outside looking for ships in T-Shirt even at night with a water temperature of 27degC. Besides that not much to report. Some dark clouds teasing us with chaning winds; blue skies and cloudy skies, clear star nights and dark cloudy nights. The fluoreszing algea are back letting us sail through a sea of stars at night. And during the day a deep blue ocean invites to go swimming...
My easter surprise yesterday was a small flying fish tired of living whom I found dead on deck - or maybe a wave had decided to end his life by washing it on deck. Yesterday we had lots of waves washing water over the deck. Thank god it's more quiet today. Oh- yesterday means easter sunday, for us. Yeterday morning we put up the twistle sail which is as big as two foresails, about 120m2 (Passatsegel, wie zwei Vorsegel) to sail faster with less wind. In comparison: the main sail has probably around 50m2, the genua 75m2 and the parasailor about 140m2. It works quite well. With true winds between 12 and 16 knots, sometimes up to 20 knots, from behind we sail at an average of 7 knots. At the moment our estimated arrival date is in 6,5 days. It may vary 1 day or so. We all guess we're gonna arrive at night, as always. And I bet that we will see 1 ship, and this will come in a direction that we have to move out of the way. This has always happened once. Just to give sense to our shifts...We'll see.
Marcus started fishing again, well, he tries to. The only thing that has bitten our fake blue octopus so far is a seagull (Seemöve) today. Poor thing. Twice it tried already, should have noticed it is not a fish. The third time it bit and got stuck. Marcus had no choice other than pulling the bird in while it tried to fly away, lifting it on board with the hook through the mouth looking out of its head. With gloves on this hands Marcus held the big bird and pulled the hook and octopus out, then put the bird back to water. Thank god it did not bleed too much. At first it looked a bit puzzled, tried its wings and then flew off. Not long later we saw the next seagull wanting to catch our octopus. Quickly we pulled it in, need to change the fake thing to attract fish instead of birds, since we're not hungry enough yet to eat birds...
Our current position: 28deg42'S and 091deg01'W
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My easter surprise yesterday was a small flying fish tired of living whom I found dead on deck - or maybe a wave had decided to end his life by washing it on deck. Yesterday we had lots of waves washing water over the deck. Thank god it's more quiet today. Oh- yesterday means easter sunday, for us. Yeterday morning we put up the twistle sail which is as big as two foresails, about 120m2 (Passatsegel, wie zwei Vorsegel) to sail faster with less wind. In comparison: the main sail has probably around 50m2, the genua 75m2 and the parasailor about 140m2. It works quite well. With true winds between 12 and 16 knots, sometimes up to 20 knots, from behind we sail at an average of 7 knots. At the moment our estimated arrival date is in 6,5 days. It may vary 1 day or so. We all guess we're gonna arrive at night, as always. And I bet that we will see 1 ship, and this will come in a direction that we have to move out of the way. This has always happened once. Just to give sense to our shifts...We'll see.
Marcus started fishing again, well, he tries to. The only thing that has bitten our fake blue octopus so far is a seagull (Seemöve) today. Poor thing. Twice it tried already, should have noticed it is not a fish. The third time it bit and got stuck. Marcus had no choice other than pulling the bird in while it tried to fly away, lifting it on board with the hook through the mouth looking out of its head. With gloves on this hands Marcus held the big bird and pulled the hook and octopus out, then put the bird back to water. Thank god it did not bleed too much. At first it looked a bit puzzled, tried its wings and then flew off. Not long later we saw the next seagull wanting to catch our octopus. Quickly we pulled it in, need to change the fake thing to attract fish instead of birds, since we're not hungry enough yet to eat birds...
Our current position: 28deg42'S and 091deg01'W
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