Blue Skies At Sea

The weather finally opened up for us and we are once again back at sea, southbound under clear and sunny skies, a light 10 knot breeze, a long low swell from the west, and a good forecast for the next couple days, anyway. Like Neah Bay, Gray's Harbour was a wonderful place to visit with a friendly population and lots of its own character that none of us will ever forget. We had a surprise visit from Dr. Deanna (Tim's sister) and Laeeque (who were in the neighborhood for a medical conference). They brought medical supplies (freebies from the conference), took us to dinner, drove us to the store for provisions, and helped with the installation of the autopilot. (These are the kind of visitors we really like!)

Our departure had been mostly delayed by the weather, and we considered taking on additional crew for this leg of the voyage, as we all dreaded the thought of hand steering through potentially foul weather and high seas. But as the days rolled by, Tim kept busy installing the autopilot and enlisted the help of Geoff Wilson, an engineer who flew up from California to assist with the final and most complicated part of the project. Geoff was a great help, and in just two days, had the system up and running. We have named this new crew-member "Loretta", and she is steering the boat right now, tirelessly and more accurately then any of us ever could. Because she is a fully redundant system, with two of everything, she is actually two autopilots, and so her other name is "Jojo". Despite her identity crisis, she (or he?) doesn't get sick no matter how rough it gets, never complains about the food, and doesn't care what CD is playing (though we think the Beatles are his (or her?) favorite).

Watch the position reporter on the Winlink website to follow our progress down the coast. We have not been on the internet for a couple weeks and have not had much (any) email forwarded to us lately, so if you sent a message and were awaiting a reply, well, keep waiting. We will try to catch up over the next few days while at sea, but we probably won't get much out until we reach California. It is nice to be underway again, and even nicer to see the mighty Pacific earning her name (for now).