Pacific NW

Expeditions

Early this morning we reached our southern waypoint, on latitude with Cocos Keeling. The strategy is that this will allow us a better wind angle when the winds shift more southerly in the afternoon. We ran down the latitude wing-on-wing throughout the morning and into the afternoon. I was a bit disappointed with our speed–still in the high 5s but we need to average 6.2 knots to make the entrance to Cocos in daylight. It was a major concern, and I spent the morning fiddling with the calculator and fretting about our speed. We normally heave-to and wait offshore if approaching land at night, however the winds and seas are forecast to continue building up to 30 knots during that night. We’d rather be sitting in the duck-pond lagoon at Direction Island and recounting our passage, rather than remaining offshore in building seas.

In the afternoon we saw the classic high mare’s tails clouds and a giant halo around the sun–a sure indication that a warm front is approaching. I pulled out my weather books and read up on what to expect. Luckily, the associated low is to the north of us, and in the Southern Hemisphere this means that we are on the side that should experience little rain and not much temperature difference. Despite the lighter winds this afternoon, we kept a double-reef in the main. Kelsey made an excellent Falafel for lunch, our “last supper” at sea she called it, as it will likely be too rough to cook tomorrow.

Sure enough, in the late afternoon the winds shifted 90 degrees to the south and freshened to 18-20 knots. Our routing strategy has paid off, and we are able to hold a beam reach. As the front drags through the winds will build more, but should back more to the SE again, and we can have the winds abaft the beam (more comfortable sailing). The Monitor vane bracket seems to be holding fine for the moment, but there is still movement at the bracket. I’m going to try and stabilize the brackets with hose clamps and bolts when we get to Cocos Keeling. Just keeping my fingers crossed that I don’t have to do hand steering if we have another bracket failure. These brackets are a major weak point on an otherwise robust design.

We’re into the 8s now on boat speed, making “piles of miles” as I’m calling it. With the improved speed, we are targeted to arrive around 1500 hrs tomorrow afternoon, which should give us a good daylight entrance. Fingers crossed!

We spent the whole day and night beam reaching in 15-18 knots of wind. It was perfect sailing, other than the fact that we had to keep all the hatches and portholes battened down as the spray shot over the rails. Any time the wind is on the beam or forward of the beam, it can get stifling hot down below in the cabin in the middle of the day. Today was no exception, as we are still only 11 degrees away from the Equator. We clocked out a whopping 165 miles since yesterday’s noon, and I feel a bit better about our approach to Cocos Keeling now.

I can’t believe the amount of plastic we are seeing in the Indian Ocean. At any one point, within one boat-length of us, a flipflop or oil can or plastic bag will drift by the hull. We passed through a few garbage gyres where I could see about 500 separate chunks of plastic floating within view on the horizon. Truly, the ocean has become completely saturated with plastic–it is a witness-less tragedy. I suspect it has something to do with the fact that we’re still relatively close to Indonesia. It’s a strange feeling, being this far out here, and seeing manmade objects everywhere you look. Akin to skiing to the South Pole and finding a field of Snicker’s bar wrappers and bottle-caps there, I suppose.

We’ve been using the electric tiller-pilot in lieu of the Monitor these past two days, in order to save wear and tear on our jury-rigged repair of the broken Monitor bracket. The tiller pilot complained a but today, however, and decided to unscrew itself both at the end-cap tiller attachment point and also inside the unit at the recirculating ball-screw drive. Both detachments required a quick “all hands on deck” moment. Kelsey quickly plopped Taz into his high-chair with a jar of applesauce, and took the helm while I set up the Monitor vane and fixed the electric tiller pilot. We’re back to using the Monitor now, but I am unhappy with the bracket still–there’s a bit of deflection that will eventually lead to another failure in the future. Our friends on the “Beguine” are sailing two spare brackets to us in Cocos Keeling, but in the meantime I may try to rig up a more solid turning block attachment by bolting the blocks directly to the caprail. Ahh, the joys of circumnavigating…

We’re really looking forward to Cocos Keeling! It’s one of those places we dreamed about as we planned our voyage route. We’ll use our time there to rest up and put Privateer in top shape for the big sail across the Indian Ocean to Rodrigues.

It was hard to leave Christmas Island, after spending two weeks among the trillions of crabs that swarm the island and meeting some of the friendliest island folks we’ve encountered on the whole voyage! We’ll post journals soon of our exceptional adventures there.

We slipped the mooring lines before first light and sailed out into the Java Trench. Within several hundred feet from the anchorage, the depths plunged off into 1000 feet, and then to 15,000 feet just a few miles from the island. For the 530 NM passage to Cocos Keeling, we are sailing over a massive chain of extinct underwater volcanoes. Christmas Island is the only summit in the chain that breaks the surface, and it is said that it is taller than the mass of Mt. Everest, when measured up from the sea floor. From underwater, Christmas Island would look something like the scale of Mt Rainier, “Privateer” anchoring on the rim of the summit.

As we left the lee of Christmas island we picked up the swells and got battered by a few gentle squalls and heavy rainfall. It actually worked out pretty well, as the hard rain washed the yellow phosphate dust off the boat, which we had a heavy dusting of after anchoring downwind from the mine loading operation in Flying Fish Cove. The winds went light in the wake of the squalls so we did an hour or two of motor-sailing, topping up our battery banks and making more water with the water-maker. The gloomy morning finally gave way to a sunny afternoon and the trade winds have filled in nicely now. We’ve been making 7-8 knots with 15 knots of wind on the beam all day and into the night.

We’re angling down to the south right now as the trades are predicted to intensify and veer more S-SE on Tuesday evening. We’re hoping to keep the wind aft of the beam on our final approach to Cocos Keeling by using this tactic. Hopefully, we will keep up the good speeds through the passage in order to arrive at Cocos in daylight. I had originally wanted to leave Christmas Island at sunset for better timing of a morning Cocos arrival, however the winds at sunset yesterday were strong with a ferocious sea tearing past the island. Presently, we are looking at an evening Cocos arrival, which is less than ideal. We may have to heave-to and spend another night at sea if we cannot make the entrance in daylight. Time will tell–we’re still 400 NM away. Such are the thoughts and worries that a ship’s captain bears…

I’ve been growing out my beard again, as this gives me friendly reception with the Muslim populations on the islands. Today Kelsey looked up at me from the companionway and noted many grey hairs on my chin! I suppose it’s from looking out at all the swells and “greybeard” seas in my sailing career. I’m glad to be growing older out here at sea, with my family, bounding over the waves.

(Kelsey)
Christmas Island unquestionably belongs to the crabs. They occupy nearly every nook and cranny across the island, tucking themselves into the naturally occurring holes of pockmarked volcanic rock, clawing over the curved roots of the Tahitian chestnut tree, ducking into hollow, decaying tree trunks, and generally scurrying about the musty rainforest across a carpet of moss, fungi, a mess of leaves and a landscape of well fertilized dirt. The forest understory is scant as the land has little defense against these creatures. They’ve tilled and softened the earth with trillions of holes so that each step is an uncertain one.

The vibrantly colored reddish-orange crabs, of cross-island mass migration fame, are conspicuous against the forest floor while other crabs in shades of brown, blue and gray are often somewhat camouflaged. There are some 20 crab species on the island, including robber crabs (known previously to us as coconut crabs), nearly as big as basketballs and dwarfing the ones we’d seen in Fiji. Here they grow larger than anywhere else of earth. Immense, a bit intimidating, and apparently opportunistic, they live up to their name if personal effects are left unattended. Around these parts, you wouldn’t dare sleep out under the stars for a night.

Days of sporadic downpours brought the crabs out in hordes, to our delight. We’d been under the impression that we had to seek them out but, as it turns out, the crabs were simply everywhere and unavoidable. A few months shy of the November red crab migration, we got a sense of what a spectacular phenomenon it must be, undoubtedly one of the great wonders of the natural world. Looking ahead on the trail with a panoramic sweep revealed the forest floor alive with minute movements. Hiking about required a constant eye to the ground as we gingerly zig-zagged our way through the staggered line of crabs. Similarly, out on the roads we found ourselves cautiously swerving around them despite the foot-high metal barrier in place to keep the crabs out of harm’s way. Shame falls upon anyone who accidentally hits an enormous robber crab while driving. The fatality is added to the month’s total and broadcast on the community chalkboard, stationed prominently in the main roundabout for all to see as they drive into town. Crabs clearly rule here.

Outside of the town area, the island is nearly all national park, a rugged landscape of steep, jagged cliffs, remote beaches and interior rainforest home to many endemic plant and animal species. Without a 4WD little of the island’s thick jungle can be accessed, so we were lucky that some generous locals loaned us their Land Cruiser (even outfitted with a car seat), fit to navigate steep roads of loose gravel, skirt potholes, and straddle washouts. Initially we traveled along extra wide, flat gravel roads laid for the “land trains,” the multi-bed semi-trucks that transport the island’s phosphate reserves to the loading dock. Drooping vines gently swept across our windshield even along these more manicured roads. Pockets of trees rising tall and as wild looking as Dr. Seuss’ Lorax trees forced our view upwards along their spindly trunks. Spurs off of the main roads led to the island’s natural attractions and some of the most rugged driving we’ve ever done, with signs everywhere clearly indicating 4WD ONLY. Fortunately, our vehicle performed like a monster truck, tackling any potential obstacle with appropriate vigor.

Taz was a happy camper riding around in a car for a change, with a front seat (and very illegal) view. During our island tour he splashed around in the shallow waters at the base of a moss-laden waterfall, got misted by salt spray at the lively local blowholes, and poked into countless crab holes with his stick. Although he’s terrified of his wind-up crab on the boat, he showed no fear in approaching the real thing. Under the canopy of Arenga palms, and from the vantage point of his hiking backpack, Taz enjoyed spotting the obvious red crabs and counting them, “One, two!” or “Many!” We mistakenly left our mosquito repellant behind and he looked a bit worse for the wear at the day’s end, like the survivor of some backwoods boot camp. Fortunately we were more bothered by our negligence than he by the bites!

Along the roadsides, a strange sight caught our eyes–stakes with dangling sausages. From our conversations with park employees, we knew that these sausages were injected with a poison known as 1080, with the purpose of killing off the feral cats that are a threat to the endemic bird population. This long-term eradication program involves many employed in the day-to-day work of “cat baiting.” In a strange and disconcerting twist, we saw a coconut crab at one of the bait stations, aggressively swatting at the sausages. With its apparent determination and physical prowess, the crab likely made quick work of the poisoned meat.

Long live the crabs!

We hare safely anchored down at Christmas Island! Our 1,025 NM passage from Ashmore Reef took us almost 7 days, with our 12-hour heave-to stop included. Not bad! All under sail with no motoring. Heaving-to in the gale was also good for our battery bank, as the wind generator pumped out the amps once we stopped running downwind.

Daybreak revealed 25 knot winds and squalls–the first solid squalls on this passage. We knew our weather luck would run out at some point on this ideal passage… Taz was still sleeping soundly at 6 AM when we let the staysail sheets fly, jibed the boat around, and got under way again. We quickly accelerated and set up our downwind sail configuration again. The seas were big, but the electric pilot gave them everything she had, and thankfully spared me from 6 hours of what would have been tiring hand-steering. Geez I’m such a wimp on the hand-steering now! But really, I’ve had my hand chained to a tiller for years, and I’m happy to give the autopilot some practice now 🙂

As we approached Christmas Island the seas built to sharp peaks and the swells sort of “zippered” together from 2 different directions. The color of the sea and the leaping foam at the wave-tops looked exactly like that famous Japanese painting of the wave. About 15 miles away, a bright-green Christmas Island emerged from the waves, and as we sailed toward her coast we watched massive plumes of spray as the swells pounded into the cliffs. Blow-holes shot plumes of vapor hundreds of feet into the air, like dragons breath.

The ever-present Australian Border Force aircraft swept in from out of nowhere as we neared the island, buzzing overhead and asking for our details yet again. This is now the 4th time we’ve been buzzed.

We quickly rounded the lee of the island and struck sails as we glided into Flying Fish cove, aptly named as we’ve had more flying fish on this passage than any other that I can recount. Remarkably, the anchorage is the one calm pocket amid the boisterous trade winds. The Island looks completely fascinating and we can’t wait to explore. We are definitely in a foreign land now. It feels like the Marquesas almost, with the vertical volcanic cliffs. The waters are crystal-clear and we can see at least 150 feet down to the bottom. There’s a mosque nearby with a loudspeaker broadcasting ghostly prayers every few hours throughout the day and night. More to come soon… For now, sailor’s rest. Another passage successfully complete!

Good thing we reefed early! The winds built to 25 knots and the seas are starting to stack up. The electric pilot is holding our course well and not too overworked yet, because our sails are well balanced. The boat is rolling again like a metronome, and we feel like we’re back on the Coral Sea passage. We could only fill Taz’s bathtub about 1/4 full as the water sloshed from side-to-side. He loves his sea baths and relaxed in the tub for hours and hours, becoming increasingly fascinated with his now-shriveled toes and fingers.

At sunset it was decision time. Even with our slower speeds with reefed sails, we still made 150 miles today, and our ETA at Chistmas Island is during the middle of the night. When you are passage-making and sailing to new lands, it is never a good idea to arrive somewhere new after dark. Even more so because our electronic charts on the GPS do not give any detail for Christmas Island (we’ve literally sailed off our charts). The winds were a comfortable 17 knots at the moment, but forecast to build to 25 knots after midnight with increasing seas from a system to our south. We had 2 choices: 1. Sail into the lee behind Christmas Island and heave-to around 2 AM and reach the anchorage at first light, or, 2. Heave-to after sunset and start sailing again at 2 AM, so that we could see the Island as we approached, but in higher winds.

We opted for the prudent approach, and hove-to shortly after sunset. The winds filled in and built right up to 30 knots with heavy squalls, but we were “parked” safely and relaxing as the squalls blew past. I can’t imagine the nightmare we would have faced if we had tried to fumble around with a radar approach to Christmas Island on this black night. We were so comfortable, in fact, that we stayed hove-to for the entire night, until after daybreak the next day. And so we spent our last night at sea, 30 NM from Christmas Island, with plenty of sea room to drift, and got a good rest before our final approach. It’s a wonderful feeling to know that Privateer heaves-to so nicely. When the weather goes sour we can just park the boat on the ocean and get a good sleep!

We had yet another big mileage day–165 miles in the last 24 hours. For the past three days we’ve had 169, 168, and 165 NM. We are now fully 1 day ahead of “schedule” and may have to heave-to so as not to arrive at Christmas Island in the night.

We had another scare with a fishing boat today, when suddenly straight ahead it looked like we were on collision course with a dead whale! I quickly grabbed the Monitor vane line and altered course at the last minute. The whale turned out to be a massive styrofoam float with a rotten palm frond sticking out the top, with a smaller buoy attached. It wasn’t until after we passed that I looked back and saw another one of those pesky open boats attached to the buoy, several hundred yards away. We had sailed right in between the boat and the buoy, and presumably right over their net! The swells were large and the light blue boat camouflaged well in the waves. At this point, Kelsey and I are quite rattled by all the small boats out here, and almost expect to see one every time we scan the horizon. We’re on constant 24-hr watch.

It was shaping up to be another fantastic sunset and I was feeling very relaxed and good about the passage, when our good angels left and a little demon hopped aboard for the night. First, I re-broke my toe while climbing into the cockpit and lurching into a wave. Not sure if I wrote about it earlier, but on passage in the Coral Sea I slipped and cracked my “pointer” toe. It’s been catching on things because it hangs down slightly lower than the rest of them now. Re-breaking it was more painful than the initial injury! Let’s just say that Taz unfortunately learned a few new words from the experience, and at random intervals repeats the “F” word to me. We’ll try to ignore that one… “Yes Taz, we’re having FUN! FFFUN!”

Next, our propane ran out right at sunset, in the middle of dinner prep. Not a disaster, but the prospect of changing out the propane tank on the bow while at sea in big swell is a wet one at best. And my mind was a bit foggy from the pain-killers I had just taken. I opted to pop on one of our spare Coleman cylinders which will give us 2 days of usage, rather than wrestle with lashing the larger spare tank. As I was doing all that up on the bow, we heard a strange bang, and the boat started veering off course. I rushed back to the stern and saw that out Monitor line–the one we had just re-set–had parted again. Strange. And then I discovered a problem: one of the turning block brackets had bent and sheared off at the base. This was definitely a problem that couldn’t be solved at sunset, and a fix that will require some SS metal work. Our beloved Monitor, steering us faithfully for tens of thousands of miles, has suffered her first (minor) breakage. Fortunately, we are only 200 NM from Christamas Island, but we now must rely on our small electric tiller pilot.

Kelsey and I had a meeting at the beginning of the night watch: The reality is that if the winds build (which they are forecast to do) the inferior electric autopilot will become overwhelmed, and we will need to hand-steer for 2 days. We were not happy about that prospect after our Nelson to Opua experience in NZ… We decided to double-reef the main and reef the Yankee, to make a nice small sail plan that the electric pilot could handle easier. The biggest drawback to electric autopilots is that they steer a perfect course, but do not allow for changes in wind direction. This means that if the winds shift and get behind the mainsail, the boom could unexpectedly jibe over. The Monitor vane automatically keeps us on the course our sails are trimmed for, whereas the electric pilot will require constant attention to wind angle and a new course will have to be punched in manually every time the wind shifts. Since we are wing-on-wing the main is already sheeted out, so very little adjustment can be made to sail trim. We just have to maintain the tricky line to avoid a jibe. We cracked off a bit to the south, so that the winds favored the downwind pole side of the boat, rather than the boom side.

The bad luck happened in a quick set of three, so hopefully things will return to normal. We never did see that sunset…too busy adjusting to our new set of passage rules. Kelsey woke me up at 2330 hrs to tell me she’d seen a light. Somewhere up ahead of us, I saw it too. A flashing red and white light of some sort. I guessed it was a fishing buoy but I’ll have to look it up. We saw it flash a few more times up ahead, and then nothing. Needless to say, it had us very worried. It was almost as if the lights were there just to scare and annoy us! After all these fishing boats and clutter in the water, we’re feeling pretty rattled about collision at sea.

We smashed out another 168 NM since yesterday. The decks are completely plastered with flying fish scales. Each night a dozen or so flying fish make their last leap onto Privateer and end up stunned in the scuppers. By early afternoon their bodies have hardened into little cooked sausages, seared by the tropical sun. I make the rounds on deck each day to un-glue the unfortunate creatures from the deck and toss them back into the sea. I suppose it’s the same concept as driving and collecting many bugs on the windshield and radiator screen. No bugs out here–just millions upon millions of flying fish. Vast swarms of them leap from the waves all day long, bouncing over the swells like skipping stones.

The motion of the sea changed in the afternoon, when we sailed over and between the summits of two 11,000 foot underwater peaks. Suddenly the seas got choppy and confused, and we rolled from side-to-side very annoyingly all afternoon. It turned into one of those days where you just get comfortable and do as little as possible.

Suddenly Kelsey shouted down below to me “Pete, oh my god there’s a boat right next to us!” I shot above decks in a quarter-second and instantly saw an open boat not more than 15 feet off the side of our boat, and a man on the bow with a long line coiled in his hand! The bastard had snuck right up on us in the 3-meter swells and had approached us. In the second instant I saw two more boats, surrounding Privateer. “Get below and stay down–HIDE!” I urgently hissed to Kelsey. In that moment, we both assumed that we were under pirate attack. It was a terrible shock. I frantically tore open the sat phone case and emerged into the cockpit with phone on and radio in hand, to let them know I was talking with the outside world. The boat alongside caught a glimpse of me and fell away. The three boats gathered at our stern while the men shouted to each other, and circled their bows back toward Privateer. It was a very tense moment. We continued sailing along at 7 knots, wing-on-wing. And… we slowly sailed away. The boats did not come back toward us.

There are numerous reports of small fishing boats approaching sailboats and asking for booze, cigarettes, or medicine. But we were 200 NM off the coast of Java. These guys were way offshore for the tiny boats they were in. Also, 1/2 mile is considered a very close distance for vessels to pass at sea. These guys were looking into our portholes! There is no way a boat could safely come alongside in 3-meter seas. Their boats were low and small and impossible to see even from a few swells away–they simply vanished behind the walls of water. I’ll give them the benefit of the doubt and assume they were just overly-curious. But there’s no way around having suspicion–we are sailing astride some of the most notoriously pirated waters in the world, where even Indonesian Customs officers have been known to turn rogue.

We’re all settled down now, but have blacked out our lights tonight and are running dark, to avoid revealing our position. I can’t even imagine what a hard life it must be for those fishermen way out here in those tiny, crude boats. I don’t even know how they can carry enough fuel to make it out here, fish, and back! Thank god they didn’t try to board us. What a shock, to feel like you’re the only people on earth while sailing at sea, to be suddenly face-to-face with an unknown entity.

Another day smashing out the miles in ideal conditions. At the moment we’ve got 15 knots just aft of the beam and Privateer is cranking along at 8 knots, smooth as a train riding on the rails. We had a bit of wobbly wing-on-wing in lighter breezes today but the trades are filling in nicely now, and (knock on wood) it looks as if they’re here to stay, based on the latest GRIB reports. It’s almost as if the instruments are lying–just glanced at the GPS showing 9.2 knots…

Around mid-day a pod of very large brown dolphins visited us. We’re out over the deepest parts of the Java Trench now, with 22,000 feet of water under the keel.

The excitement of the night watch came at around 2 AM when we crossed the shipping lanes from Perth to Singapore. Suddenly a few ships popped up on our AIS (Ship Identification System) as we sailed wing-on-wing across the freighter highway. The first two freighters were no problem–we passed astern of the first one and well of the bow of the second. But then the Helga Oldendorff popped into the corner of the screen, coming from the opposite direction and on a converging collision course. Our sail configuration didn’t allow us any course change, and our speed was dependent entirely on the wind. Privateer and Helga’s speeds were almost matched at 8.5 knots, and we were 12 NM away from each other. It’s times like these that AIS is an invaluable tool on board. We radioed the ship, reported our position to the bridge, and worked out a plan with the captain to safely pass each other. The Helga swung to port and did a huge “s” curve in order to pass behind our stern. At the closest point we were 3 NM from each other. It’s great that a 1,000 foot ship will alter course by a few miles to give our little ship some sea room!

Using the AIS is exactly like playing the old computer game “Frogger”. We have to cross multiple “lanes” and decide whether to pass in front or behind the ships, judging speeds of each and taking into account wind direction, currents, etc for us. I can see that just now four new ships have popped up ahead of us, so our game of Frogger continues on into the morning hours… Good grief another 3 just appeared ahead too. The one of most concern is literally called the “Dong-a-Leto”. Time for a cup of coffee…

We smashed out 169 NM on our noon-to-noon distance since yesterday. It’s as if Privateer is on an invisible conveyor belt. And in the 12 hours preceding the noon position, we covered a whopping 92 NM. If we could keep this speed up, we’d have a 184 NM day… Alas, we’ve slowed down a bit because we reefed the main at sunset. Safety and comfort come before any kind of record-breaking attempts. It looks like the winds will build a bit all the way through until we near Christmas Island.

Last night and all the way into this afternoon we continued to cross paths with the north and southbound freighters. At one point, Privateer was surrounded by a circle of 7 freighters! We’d read that Australia has the highest per capita level of consumerism in the world (even more than the USA), and here was the visual proof. We could smell the bunker fuel on the sea air. “Frontier Explorer”, “Dong-a Leto”, “Ocean Garlic”, and “Shin Heir” were just a handful of the eclectic freighter names that crossed our bow.

We’re back in quieter waters now and dealing with just a few odd fishing vessels. Around noon one of our Monitor control lines parted, frayed apart by continual use. Kelsey grabbed the helm while I quickly trimmed off the frayed end and re-set the gear, and we were back on our way again. We continue the wing-and-wing sail plan, occasionally tacking the Yankee over when the winds go more southerly.

Kelsey had a bit of a rough day with Taz. He was all ramped up and trying to run around the cabin, but she had to restrict his movements in the seaway, and he wouldn’t take his nap. He’s cutting his 11th tooth now, with 4 breaking the surface at once, and his face is a continuous slather of drool.

Every day we pull the sun over our stern and she sets just off the starboard bow. Every day we pull the moon over our stern and she sets off the port bow. Like a giant celestial backstroke, the heavenly bodies are our arms dipping into the seas and guiding us across the Indian Ocean. One glance is all it takes to know what time it is and what direction we are heading. We briefly got blown off course today and I immediately recognized that the sun was shining on a different part of the bulkhead down below, as I was napping. Such is the way your senses become attuned at sea. There’s almost no need for a compass.