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American Spirit II - Day 60; In a Tropical Trough; Still Looking for the Trade Winds; How Galapagos Got It's Name; Tuesday, March 4, 2014



Got hit by a mild rain squall 20 minutes into my watch at 12:20 AM. Rolled jib and center window of dodger up; and put up piece of canvas between the dodger and bimini again. Wind 4 knots. Still motor sailing 4.8 knots, with 1 knot current against us. Only 2 other sailboats near us now. I believe most went south earlier in the day.

We're in a Tropical Trough now. Low Pressure systems form out of such trough's. Not good. However, in looking at our weather GRIB files downloaded over our SSB Radio, it looks like we'll be moving out of this trough by tomorrow; and the weather forecast doesn't predict any serious winds from it.

Off watch at 1:00 AM. Supposed to go off watch at 12 midnight. However, when we do watches, if you feel awake enough to give the person following you an extra hour of sleep, we all try to do that. Joel looked especially tired when he went to bed earlier, so I gave him an extra hour. Slept like a baby from 1:00 AM to 7:00 AM. Mike gave me an extra hour of sleep, because my watch started at 6:00 AM. What goes around comes around. Or something like that. Speed 6.0 knots thru the water, but only 5.0 over the ground due to a 1 knot current against us again. Rolled jib out and speed increased to 6.0 knots over the ground. Wind 7 knots from SSE. Need 10 - 15 knots from SE (trade winds). Still not enough wind to sail without motor. Hope to find trade winds at 5 degrees south (300 miles south of the equator). Three boats near us now.

At 11:00 AM we had our daily net. Most boats checked in and gave their positions. Some boats did not due to radio malfunction or being too far away.

At noon our position was 3 degrees South; 93 degrees 5 minutes West.

Rain showers on and off all day. Yuk! Two to three foot waves on port bow. A little uncomfortable due to light wind (4 knots) and chop.

Joel and Mike worked on water maker for 1 1/2 hours, trying to stop air leak. Changed out 5 and 20 micron filters that had got clogged with algae while in the Galapagos. Talking about the Galapagos, I read a book today about how the islands got their name. Ready? The Franciscan priest who discovered the islands in 1535 saw a large land tortoise, and its shell resembled a Spanish horse saddle, which is called a, you guessed it, 'galapagos.' I'm not making this up. And I can attest that the shell does look like a saddle.

Four boats within 8 miles of us. Amazing.

At 4:30 PM one of the boats in front of us, II Audeacious, called on the radio and said that they just hit a squall with 26 knots of wind. We rolled up our jib, put one reef in our main, and zippered up the center dodger window. We didn't have long to wait. Five minutes later we hit it, though the wind maximum we saw was only 17 knots. Lot of rain.

10:45 PM. Two knots of wind. Still motor sailing.

Looking at wake behind boat, besides the 40 foot trail of sparkling phosphorescence were small balls of phosphorescence shooting down the wake line every minute or so. Six to twelve inches in diameter. The wake along the side of the boat was also lit up by phosphorescence. You never get tired of seeing sights like this. Never.

On a final note, Monday's log was sent to a SSB receiving station in Watsonville, CA. 2,840 miles away. It's amazing how far our radio signals go and can receive messages (emails). I think this station is the headquarters of our email carrier, Sail Mail. For the first time I thought we were sending and receiving messages at the same time. I'll check that again tonight. Maybe I was hallucinating.

Brian Fox

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