It’s Tuesday afternoon and we are moving along well, motorsailing on a close reach at a bit over 8kts. We could probably sail but the seas are very lumpy with true wind of only about 13kts and I want to keep moving.<\/p>\n
The waves have been larger than the wind would suggest as a strong squall came through mid-morning, bringing with it a 90 degree wind shift and winds peaking in the mid 30s.\u00a0 It was very large cell and took hours to pass so the waves built up to quite impressively, and quickly.\u00a0 \u00a0The sky was incredibly dark and ominous looking so we had a reasonable amount of warning.\u00a0 \u00a0Oddly, we didn’t get any rain, just a LOT of wind.<\/p>\n
The winds were from the northeast and in order to try to minimize our deviation from our intended track and to not overwhelm the boat, we stayed in the Gulf Stream longer than we probably should have.\u00a0 Generally, we would leave the Stream shortly after Hatteras and head toward the tip of Long Island, about a 10 degree course change to the west.\u00a0 However, when the squall hit, we opted to turn east to stay in the Stream.\u00a0 That turned out not to be a particularly good idea as with a better than two knot current opposing the wind, the waves built quickly and were alarmingly large and breaking.<\/p>\n
At the peak of the wind, a wave hit the side of the boat, cascaded across the deck and quite a bit of water ended up washing into the back of the cockpit.\u00a0 The water washed across the deck with the force of a fire hose.\u00a0 Some water was forced under the seals in the deck hatches.\u00a0 It was the first time that has happened.\u00a0 However, there was just so much water that I suppose it shouldn’t be a surprise that some found its way down below.\u00a0 I made a note to replace the gaskets.\u00a0 The “to do” list gets longer.<\/p>\n
However, the biggest mess was caused by water that leaked through the zipper in the opening at the front of the dodger, where quite a bit of water came through and ended up splashing down the companionway.\u00a0 Actually, there wasn’t all that much water but what ended up on the cabin sole will certainly leave a good amount of salt in its wake.\u00a0 \u00a0I think that I’ll design a plexiglass “storm window” that can be affixed to the front of the dodger to eliminate that problem in the future.<\/p>\n
I don’t want to think about what would happen if the zipper window in the front of the dodger were to fail as the amount of water that hit it today was pretty amazing.\u00a0 \u00a0With a plumb bow and the boat moving along fairly fast, a lot of water finds its way on deck so it’s only a matter of time until we really get hit by a big wave that will overwhelm the vinyl window.\u00a0 What a mess that would be.\u00a0 \u00a0For an “anal” guy like me, that much salt down below would be quite distressing.<\/p>\n
While Pandora is in quite good shape, the number of “to do’s” that are piling up is a bit overwhelming.\u00a0 And don’t forget that I have to find time to remodel two bathrooms this summer.\u00a0 Yes, Brenda, I remember.\u00a0 And yes, I want the new baths too.<\/p>\n
As I write this we are about 300 miles from home and I expect to round Montauk sometime on Thursday<\/span><\/span> afternoon.\u00a0 I really don’t know what sort of winds we will have or if we will be able to sail but if the wind we have today is any indication, we should be there sooner, perhaps as early as Thursday<\/span><\/span> morning.\u00a0 \u00a0That would be great as I’d much prefer to arrive at the Club in Essex during daylight. I guess we will see.<\/p>\n The tide in eastern LI Sound is flooding (coming in) until early evening on Thursday<\/span><\/span> so if we are able to carry the tide up the CT River, that would save us a lot of time.\u00a0 It’s too early to say as the difference in our arrival time, with even a single knot difference in speed, can be many hours after such a long run.<\/p>\n Just a moment ago, actually within about a quarter of a mile of distance, we left the Gulf Stream with the water temperature going up about 15 degrees.\u00a0 \u00a0It’s remarkable to see just how quickly that happened.\u00a0 \u00a0The water color went from a deep blue to grey and the seas flattened out.\u00a0 It’s amzaging that after a thousand miles the “wall” of the Stream is still so well defined.<\/p>\n It’s quite amazing how quickly things deteriorated earlier today when the wind picked up opposing the current in the Gulf Stream.\u00a0 It went from an easy motor sail to really nasty in short order with water flying all over the place.\u00a0 \u00a0The good news is that things settled down in just a few hours once the wind dropped back to the mid-teens and we left the unsettled conditions of the Gulf Stream.\u00a0 As we have been within the Stream since shortly after leaving Ft Pierce on Saturday<\/span><\/span>, it feels nice to have more settled conditions.<\/p>\n We were visited last evening by a pod of pilot whales that came right up to the boat, not ten feet away.\u00a0 \u00a0I only got a glimpse of them but they were quite large, perhaps 15-20′ long.\u00a0 They look like really big black dolphins.\u00a0 What a sight.\u00a0 Sorry, no pictures.\u00a0 We have also seen quite a few dolphins, not many very close to the boat however.<\/p>\n Well, I am pleased that things have settled down now and hope that we won’t be hit by any more squalls but it’s nice to know that we can handle them, even when things get really “sporty”.<\/p>\n Happily, it seems that the crew has gotten their “sea legs” so no sickness in spite of the bumpy conditions, especially earlier today.\u00a0 Well, not sporty for the moment anyway.<\/p>\n I guess that’s about it for now.\u00a0 I am sure looking forward to being home.\u00a0 1,000 miles of ocean sailing is a lot and I am ready for dry land.\u00a0 \u00a0For sure, it’s going to be a bit of a job to get Pandora cleaned up after a long ocean passage.<\/p>\n Well, we will be home soon and, with a bit of luck, that will be sometime Thursday<\/span><\/span>, perhaps early Thursday<\/span><\/span>.<\/p>\n Yes, I am ready, really ready, to be home with Brenda.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" It’s Tuesday afternoon and we are moving along well, motorsailing on a close reach at a bit over 8kts. We could probably sail but the seas are very lumpy with true wind of only about 13kts and I want to keep moving. The waves have been larger than the wind would suggest as a strong […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_mo_disable_npp":"","_s2mail":"","site-sidebar-layout":"default","site-content-layout":"","ast-site-content-layout":"default","site-content-style":"default","site-sidebar-style":"default","ast-global-header-display":"","ast-banner-title-visibility":"","ast-main-header-display":"","ast-hfb-above-header-display":"","ast-hfb-below-header-display":"","ast-hfb-mobile-header-display":"","site-post-title":"","ast-breadcrumbs-content":"","ast-featured-img":"","footer-sml-layout":"","ast-disable-related-posts":"","theme-transparent-header-meta":"","adv-header-id-meta":"","stick-header-meta":"","header-above-stick-meta":"","header-main-stick-meta":"","header-below-stick-meta":"","astra-migrate-meta-layouts":"default","ast-page-background-enabled":"default","ast-page-background-meta":{"desktop":{"background-color":"var(--ast-global-color-5)","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""},"tablet":{"background-color":"","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""},"mobile":{"background-color":"","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""}},"ast-content-background-meta":{"desktop":{"background-color":"var(--ast-global-color-4)","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""},"tablet":{"background-color":"var(--ast-global-color-4)","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""},"mobile":{"background-color":"var(--ast-global-color-4)","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""}},"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-5765","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.sailpandora.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5765","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.sailpandora.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.sailpandora.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.sailpandora.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.sailpandora.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=5765"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/www.sailpandora.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5765\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":5766,"href":"https:\/\/www.sailpandora.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5765\/revisions\/5766"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.sailpandora.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=5765"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.sailpandora.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=5765"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.sailpandora.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=5765"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}