Day 5: Waterworld

Only Day 5, but already land seems like a dim and distant memory, and
I'm starting to get into the rhythm of life back on board my boat. As I
said to Leo Laporte in our podcast this morning, switching between my
land-based life and my ocean life is maybe a bit like switching between
driving on the right and driving on the left - the more times I make the
switch, the easier it gets.

There were a few times in the weeks immediately before my departure when
I wondered just how I would cope with the transition. Life on dry land
was eventful, hectic, social, and stimulating. Life on the ocean is,
well, none of those things.

But it's ok. And today there were three signs that I'm settling in.

1. When this beautiful bird (see photo) landed on my boat, I quite
happily spend half an hour just watching him. The pink and blue of his
beak are spookily reminiscent of the color scheme of my website, so I
hope his photo blends in in an aesthetically pleasing manner (!). He was
busy cleaning his feathers while balancing on the cleat on the bow of my
boat (and his sense of balance was much better than mine). I can't
imagine taking half an hour to do nothing but watch a bird when on dry
land - but here it was the highlight of my day. He hitchhiked for about
45 minutes before spreading his wings and flapping languidly away.

2. I saw a boat not far away - some kind of fishing boat maybe, with a
haze of black diesel smoke belching from its engine. It briefly flitted
across my mind that they might have some cold drinks - as in
refridgerated cold, maybe even a beer! - on board, so maybe I should
hail them. But then I decided, on balance, I was in ocean mode, so I
wouldn't. So I just carried on rowing, and they carried on belching
diesel fumes, and we went our separate ways.

3. I'm getting into my Zen Dog mode. I've got a drinks mat on the wall
of my cabin, courtesy of my friend Romy, and it has a picture of a dog
chilling out in a little boat. The words say:

Zen Dog

He knows not where he's going
For the ocean will decide
It's not the destination
It's the glory of the ride

And that's how I'm feeling at the moment. I have no idea what the coming
weeks and months will bring in the way of excitement, danger, challenges
and learning experiences. But whatever happens, it's the glory of the
ride. Feel free to remind me I said that if/when I start whingeing about
how long I've been out here!

Other stuff:

I recorded my first podcast of Stage 2 with Leo Laporte this morning.
Nice to talk with him, as always. Find the podcast on iTunes, called Roz
Rows The Pacific (or we might be linking to it from this site too - I
will check with Nicole tomorrow).

I'm also uploading my first videocast from the ocean. Trying to coax it
up over the painfully slow Iridium connection at the moment. It goes
first of all to my wonderful video editor Dawn Pasinski in Lafayette,
CA, who will pop it into a video shell that we created while I was still
on dry land, to make it into a 2-minute piece. It's a right royal pain
uploading these video clips, so I hope you find them worthwhile! Once
she's edited it together, it will appear on YouTube, with a geotag on
the RozTracker. And we'll probably embed it into a blog as well.

Enjoy!

Thanks to Lorrin Lee for all the lovely food you got for me just before
I set out. The sweet potato chips went down very well today! And the
apple bananas were yummy, but now, alas, finished.

Crave of the day: anything cold

And finally, a big HAPPY BIRTHDAY to Evan, genius creator of the
RozTracker. Thanks, Evan, for all your hard work - it's been a pleasure
working with you, and I'm only sorry I can't be there to a) have a
birthday drink with you and Alannah, and b) actually see the RozTracker
in action!

General report:

Time: 2145 HST
Position: 20 29.387N 158 24.538W
Wind speed: a blissful 2 hours this afternoon of N wind, 5-8kts,
otherwise almost dead calm
Weather: overcast, hot
Sea: varied between choppy and dead calm

Weather forecast, courtesy of weatherguy.com

NE to Eerly trade winds should begin to fill in later today. May see
some
ESE direction for brief periods. A low pressure system north of Hawaii
disrupts the high pressure ridge once again so the winds won't be high
as usual. When the wind speeds gets to be less than about 5kts,
direction is very uncertain. Towards the end of the forecast period
winds become more trade like with wind speeds around the 15kt range.

Forecast below is for a SSWerly route at 1.25kts (30nm/day):
Date/Time HST Wind kts Seas (ft)
28/1200-28/2100 E-NE 3-10 2-4
28/2100-29/1200 NE-ENE 10-17 3-5
29/1200-30/0000 NE-ESE 7-13 3-4
30/0000-30/1800 ENE-ESE 5-12 3-4
30/1800-31/1800 ENE 4-15 3-4
31/1800-01/1200 ENE-E 10-17 4-6

Sky conditions are mostly cloudy with mid to low level clouds. Isolated
to scattered rainshowers.