On the dock at KYC

Happy to be here.

Jimmy Buffet gets it

"I wrote a note said be back in a minute,
bought a boat and I sailed off in it, don't think anybody is going to miss me anyway.
Mind on a permanent vacation, the ocean is my only medication, wishing my condition wont ever go away."

Let me elaborate on my previous blog post where I described sailing as an addiction. My mother "carol" recently commented on how hard it seems out here at sea. And indeed, traveling in a small slow sailboat across the biggest ocean on the planet is not for everyone. BUT, for those of you out there reading this blog (ed lynt...) and others, can attest to the absolute thrill of it all. Why else would the sea call to so many generations of writers and poets and adventurers? I myself do find it taxing, both physically and emotionally, but the rewards far out weigh the hardships. At sea your world is shrunken into basic survival. The rigors of the deck watch routine keep a pace at sea that makes sense out of an otherwise chaotic situation. The constant sea state change and wind shifts make the "work" of sailing interesting and passes the hours. You literally sit for hours and hours and watch the sea birds and waves. Passing the time talking to your crew mates about philosophy, conspiracy theories and your favorite Seinfeld episode.. The clouds offer their own set of entertainment. And I cant go on enough about the night sky. If all of you who are suspect of this obsession, I can promise you, that one starry night sky as the boat rocks back and forth sailing into the darkness, with no sound except the wind and the wake of the boat would make you a convert.
And then there is the simple pact that sailors have between each other. We are a boat full of strangers who just met to make this trip, but lifelong friendships have been made. The comraderie that exists between sailors is a bond that can only be understood standing in a yacht club bar after a long passage has been made and the fleet all safely at port. Shadowside hopes to be at the bar soon enough. Our landfall is expected to be early tuesday morning.

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star light star bright

Sailing is an addiction and everyone on this boat is an addict. There is no other way to explain cramming yourself into close quarters with perfect strangers, subjecting your body to gashes and bruises and the occassional scaulding as you try to drink coffee in between wave sets (I dont think anyone has been able to successfly drink a cup yet. But for those of us who are weak to this vice, there is nothing better than the dreamy trade winds and a starry night sky. With all of this talk of a storm raging on the Islands, there is a small sailboat slowly drifting towards its destination, safely out of reach of Darby. We are calmly bobbing through the night. Captain just came on night watch, we let him sleep an hour extra. We are all tired and ready to see land, but in the meantime we are enjoying the less than dramatic weather. Alejndro just came down to tell me the moon is rising.

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Circling the runway

We are still in a holding pattern. Its not a bad place to be stuck, in the middle of the most beautiful blue sky and ocean. The trades winds are gently taking us toward Hawaii but our sails are reefed n and we are limping along at 5 knots. There will be a weather briefing tonight at 8:00 and we should know then if we are allowed to continue on. At our current rate, we wont be making landfall until Tuesday morning anyhow. So unless Darby decides to stick around longer than expected, we will be taking shower and drinking mai tais on Tuesday.
It has gotten hot here and we are going to try and rig some shade on deck for the watch crew. Its also hard to sleep below during the day, so by th time we get to land I suspect this crew will be all tuckered out and sun kissed.
In the meantime, its great sailing weather and life is good.

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Darby blarby

Welp, no evidence of any tropical storm that we can see out here 495 miles away from the Islands. Actually the closer we have gotten, the calmer the conditions. Currently we are cruising at a conservative 6 knots with a reefed main and jib. We could easily be carrying more canvas but we are not racing as fast as we can towards Hawaii and planning on letting the storm pass until we enter the 120 mile safety zone. The strong winds are not the only concern, its the sea state that can last a few days after the storm passes. And big swell in Hawaii means BIG SWELL. This place invented the big swell. So we are playing it by ear and getting all weather info we can. Fortunately we are a very slow boat, so there is no rush, even if we wanted.
In other news, the night sky tonight is marked as one of my all time favorites. Kathy and I dimmed the instrument lights and were speechless. It was so dark we couldnt see the front of the boat as we sailed into sheer blackness. There is nothing to hit out here in the middle of the ocean, so on night watches you basically just stare into the night and make sure the wind doesnt shift too rapidly. Is become warmer as we head south and we no longer need our foulies. Once this dumb storm gets out of our way, we will be able to see land again. Its going to be weird to stand on terra firma again. My body is so used to lurching and being thrown around.

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These cookies are making me thirsty

N25.36 W148.45 We've have been redirected by the race committee to a way point that is 100 miles away from the storm. All boats that are close enough to get to Hawaii by Saturday are safe to cross in front of Darby, all other boats still racing will proceed with caution and head toward Hawaii Sunday morning. This will make our eta into Hawaii Wednesday morning. The communication boat "Rapture" has been giving us regular weather updates.
The crew is a little tired after a rocky night SLOWLY bobbing around in the ocean. The moon was incredible and the stars were twinkling. We woke up this morning with a beautiful sunrise and very mild conditions. We are headed to the way point and will catch up on sleep and start counting down the days till mai tais. We are safe and in the cockpit making Seinfeld jokes per usual. All is well. Hawaii is far.

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Darnit Darby!!!

Ok friends and family. Thank you for your concern for us and looking out as tropical Storm Darby is messing up our Mai Tai plans. Rest assured that we are taking precautions. The Pacific Cup staff has been in great communication with all boats and we are receiving regular weather updates. Currently Shadowside is slowing down. We have put double reef in the mainsail and shortened the jib. This will make us slow down and also ready us for any nasty squalls during the night that Darby is spitting our way. There will be more info on the Pac Cup website, but know that all boats are taking precautions and we will resume the race as soon as it is safe to do so. Shadowside might be the ONLY full keeled battle ax of a bat in the entire fleet. All of the reasons we are the slowest boat in the race, also make us the safest in storm conditions. Everyone on board has sailed and trained for storms just like this. We are prepared and will stay safe. I will update the blog twice a day so you will know how we are doing. As of now, we just ate quesadillas and im going to take a nap...so everything is groovy out here in the deep blue.
In other news...Mom, why do you need an "alias" who is carol?

Ciao

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Lad's Birthday Shadowside Pac Cup Limerick

There was a young sailor named Lad
Who wanted the best to be had.
His crew must be limber--
So soon he found Kimber--
Which made all the other boats mad!

Alejandro was loyal and true,
Add to that he could cook and could crew.
He signed up on the ketch,
Found how quick she could fetch,
And away to the galley he flew.

Kathy preferred to just drive.
When asleep, was she dead or alive?
She woke up at the wheel
And steadied the heel
Through numerous Shadowside jibes.

This crew drove her fast through the ocean.
Not distressed, not at all, by her motion.
She rocked them to sleep
With the minimum creak
All happy that Lad had the notion.

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"No one will ever believe you"

Bill Murray walks into a diner, takes a fry off a guys plate and says "no one will ever believe you". That's the theme of tonight's blog. Shadowside is perfectly balance right now. We have her rigged with a reefed main and jib and the wind is directly aft of us propelling us down waves at great speed. Squalls have been blowing through and we even reached 9.5 over ground! We have a little more than 700 miles yet to go and a small storm to the south of us we are keeping our eyes on. Alejandro and I dragged our legs off the starboard side of the bow today and let our feet get hit by waves. We giggled every time they got us. The water was blue and perfect and I got hit by a flying fish. We are still currently last in our division, but we re hoping that because we are sailing one of the slowest heaviest boats in the fleet, that we will still rank on corrected tie. The faster boats are cruising ahead of us, but if we keep chugging along, we still have a shot to rank. Regardless, we are having fun and enjoying some great sailing. Jorge is doing 90% of the steering now, as he actually is more accurate than we are. The wind vane is a remarkable piece if technology. It uses the wind to transfer energy to direct and steer a rudder hung off the transom of the boat. t uses zero electricity and can steer 24/7 forever. We love Jogre. He allows us to eat lunch and attend to other things, like, well, sitting in the cockpit and talking about what other movies has Sally Field been in recently.

Ok folks, I hope everything is good out there in the real world. I know we are excited to be able to talk to our loved ones soon, but also reluctant to enter back into the real world. We have zero idea what is happening outside of this boat. Our lives revolve around wind, waves and gps coordinates. Oh, and Bill Murray came aboard and stole a fry.

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If this isn't nice I dont know what is

Today was great. The sun came out with blue sky, and the Big P was a deep crystal azure. The winds were favorable 20knts and we sailed the entire day wing n wing clogging along t 7-8 knot. Jorge did his job and kept us on course, while we talked about movies and conspiracy theories and traveling in Tokyo. Did you know we didn't actually ever land on the moon AND that octopus are smarter than a 5th grader?
Today was captain Lad's bday, which we somehow overlooked his wife's hints to alert us. We were able to gather some items together and have a nice time out in the cockpit just before sunset. The moon and stars also appeared. Kathy and I watched the full bright moon dip and dive behind clouds in a dramatic fashion. Mars is visible too. This is the Pacific Ocean night sky I've been waiting for! A squall blew through and knocked Kathy and I out of our moon daze, Winds picked up to 33 knots and we had full main and headsail flying. It was a hairy few minutes but the boat and crew are fine. The squalls will be occurring with regularity the closer we get to Hawaii. Did I mention Hawaii is far? Its is the most remote chain of islands ON EARTH I am told. Farther away from land than any other islands. We sre more than halfway, and can see the finish line approaching here in just a few days. Stay tuned in. And for those of you leaving comments, we love them but cannot respond back. But keep cheering us on and saying hi, we love it.
I'm going to go back on my 2am watch now and look at the night sky in the middle of the ocean. If this isn't nice....

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Best Day Ever

I think we are figuring out sail trim on a ketch; George, the windvane auto pilot is treating us really well (he even steer us through squalls); and we are still on course. The sun came out today, there may be stars tonight! So far we have had only one clear night, and a few nights where the moon peeks through dramatic clouds creating spots of light on the ocean.

Thanks again for all the encouragement, especially from you office bound ones. There's no place else any of us would rather be. All systems continue to be highly functional and if there is any "breakdown" the crew is so skilled we get the thing problem solved and fixed within about a half an hour. We hot wired the engine to get it started. We recarpentered a bunk shelf this afternoon.

We have cleaned everything on the boat but ourselves; it's been a bit cloudy until today, when we started sailing without our foulies, even when it's raining. And we love the rain! Shadowside handles high winds (25 to 30 knots is the most we encountered) like a champ, with a real easy, rolling motion.

Tonight or tommorow, sun showers!

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Favorite Bill Murray movie

7/19 Our halfway party was dinner with ribs, chips, and champagne. We toasted to a 1000 miles of sweet sailing and 1000 more to the finish. Hawaii is really far away. The weather continues to be overcast and a few squalls have blown through, but nothing too dramatic. We have all gotten into our watch routines and can shorten sails at a moments notice. Jorge, our Hydrovane self steering system is my favorite thing on the boat. Alejandro and Kathy like to hand steer on their watch. I prefer to snack. Living in a small sailboat with strangers you run the gamut of conversation topics. We have gone through all "best of" or "favorite fill in the blank" questions. I wouldn't want to be with a different bunch of rag tag crew. Kathy is hysterical with crazy travel and sailing stories and ALejandro continues to be the international man of mystery and is our go to guy when we need any help with anything. Captain is calm and good humored even when we accidentally gibe the main violently. We are looking out for j and having fun.
Shadowside is chugging along on a 255 COG at 7.0 knots over ground. She is a sturdy, heavy boat and I feel really safe when the wind picks up. The seas have been 10-12 rollers that toss the boat 30 degrees to port and then back to starboard, sometimes so steeply that my stomach drops. The rest of the fleet seems to be much farther North than us, but we are making good time and might even rank!

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Mind the nachos!

We re all wondering when the sun is going to come out. Its been cloudy and overcast for days and nights now. Every so often the sun or moon will show themselves and we are washed in a brilliant light across the sea. But, even in the absence of the sun and stars, The Big P (Pacific Ocean) is so beautiful. We are currently on a down wind slot running with the main alone until watch change and we will set the jib u for wing on wing which should give us an extra knot of speed. Even while typing this in the nav station, I am being flung side to side with the pitch of each wave. These last few days we have all gotten a fair amount of bruises. Alejandro made nachos for lunch yesterday and they we amazing. While we were chowing down, and probably because we were cowing down, we jibed. "Mind the nachos!" I yelled. Cause, when as sea, you need to watch out for precious resources.

We are halfway and are going to celebrate today! We are also working on posting some pictures, but its been low priority cause we are exhausted from this washing machine of a course we have been on for 24 hours. Ocean sailing is exhausting and at times down right hrd. BUT BUT BUT...then you go sit in the cockpit and watch the waves and move cross the sea with only the wind, literally in the middle of nowhere. Its serene, sublime and surreal, and worth every bruise and lost hour of sleep.

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Adventures at Sea

It's wonderful to be on a boat where everything works! And if it breaks, Kimber, Alejandro,or Lad can fix it. I'm halfway decent at downwind driving, so I can keep the boat steady while they do what they need to do to set up the spinnaker, wing out the jib, trouble shoot one of two auto steering machines, or write blog posts. Lad makes navigation look easy (since the system was set up by Bill Myers, it is easy!) and we are on course for the partys in Kaneohe. Lad is great at team building and making sure we all get plenty of rest, food, and hydration, and that Shadowside is organized and clean. We are all loving sailing on a ketch--it track so well down wind, the motion is really comfortable (Kimber just said she hates the galley. That may be for any galley under way, so she's strapping in right now to the West Marine kitchen strap.) Fortunately, Alejandro is a chef so we have had iron chef meals from the great provisions organized by Donna. I do want to note that we made such good time the first day because Kimber and Alejandro were all over making the appropriate sail adjustments as conditions changed--reefing, furling, raising and lowering sails as needed in bumpy conditions. Thanks so much for all your comments. We love our ground crew! This is a dream come true for all of us, and it's great to listen to each other's stories on night watch and get to know each other. Cheers, Kathy

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Day 6 and no flying fish

1:17am on 7/16. Our position is currently N 31.26 W 133.35. We are cruising along on a beam reach at 7.2 knots COG 251. Its been overcast and mild temperatures as we head toward the half way point. The moon tonight would occasionally make an appearance and shine a brilliant light on the otherwise black sea. Ill be excited when the clouds part and we have some sunshine and stars. We changed sail configuration a few times today to adapt to some shifty wind. We didn't fly the kite today and instead chose to continue with our downwind set of wing and wing. Shadowside is a heavy boat and takes the waves like a champ. She has a very sea kindly motion and all the crew are always excited for off watch hours to fall fast asleep, even in the middle of the day we sleep like babies. There is a radio hour everyday at 5:00 where all the boats in the fleet an check in and hear undated info and get the latest standings. Regrettably three boats have left our division which leaves only 4 boats to compete against. We are still listed at last place but not by a big margin AND these standings do not account for corrected time. So we have a chance of winning some accolades at the awards ceremony. The crew just keeps chugging along with our watch schedules and reminding each other to drink water and eat some snacks. I wouldn't want to be with a better group of people. Everyone is working together, and given that we are living in a space as big as most of your home kitchens, we are keeping our good humor and rallying together when we need to quickly respond to something happening on deck.
Kathy heard there was a revolution happening in Turkey, but other than that, we are oblivious to what is taking place on land. Our world revolves around the wind, waves and what to eat for dinner.

Until the next witching hour.
Kimber signing off

p.s. Respond to the blog. We really love hearing from you.

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Going where the wind takes us

Howdy land lubbers! Shadowside here with another report from day 4? of he race. Time tends to meld together out here in the open ocean. Between watch schedules, sail changes, and the incredibly hard task of making scrambled eggs in a rolling sea, one tends to forget the day. We are currently N32.09 W131.06 course over ground 225 drifting along at a measly 4.6 knots. The wind has shifted to the aft of and we are waiting for watch shift to set up a whisker pole so we can fly wing and wing. The weather and sea conditions have been favorable, although we are all still dawning our foulies. We can feel the warmer weather approaching, and Ill be able to put away all of my Patagucci technical warm clothing. The night sky is overcast so there are no stars or moon to speak of. Just the black black horizon. George, or "Jorge" as we also affectionately call him, because not only do sailors give their self steering gear names, we also give them nicknames. Jorge has been doing less steering downwind and the actual humans onboard have been hand steering. Its quite a strange feeling driving a sailboat through the dark black ocean.
The crew remain in good heath and spirits. We have been eating well and getting enough sleep with our 4 hours on/4 hours off watch schedule. We are currently last in our division BUT that has not dampened our fighting spirit! We are the bad news bears of the race, the mighty ducks of the Pac Cup!! The era of the ketch is not over.

Hope all is well and good out there on dry land. Until next time. Same bat channel time same bat channel.

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Spinnakers and meatballs

Hello friends and family from the middle of the Pacific Ocean. Shadowside's current position is N 33 44.880 by W 127 59.634 with a speed over ground of 8.1. We enjoyed much calmer seas today after having our feet put to the fire the first night with much gustier wind and a big sea state. Shadowside is taking good care of us and we are all enjoying sailing a ketch rigged boat with all of the sail configurations we can make. The crew is in good spirits and have settled into life on a 40' boat. With some of the crew having a hard time eating the first 24 hours, our first meal was a real blessing. Pasta and meatballs! For those of you that have never tried to cook at sea, just know that any meal preparation is a trial of defying gravity.
We have set up our 5th crew member, who we have named George. George is a Hydrovane self steering system that will steer the boat for us while we sit there and look at waves, make sail changes, or just try not to spill our morning cup of coffee all over the place. We love George and imagine he speaks in the third person like that Seinfeld episode. "George loves sailing!" We will try to update the blog daily, so stay tuned to more tales of adventure. Until then, know (mom) that we are safe and having a great time. Don't forget you can comment on the blog and we will receive your messages.

Adios and good night from the middle of the Pacific Ocean.
-kimber

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2016-07-12-1200 PDT

They are doing great.

On the Pacific Cup tracking page LINK it shows them with 1921 nm to go and moving at 7.3 knots.

That means, only 11 days to go. That would be Saturday the 23rd, a whole week ahead of the finish deadline. Not bad.

LINK to a fantastic starting line photo.

Day 1 - 22;45

78 miles down course - Sailing down our course line under reefed jib and mizzen wind 20-25 knts NW waves about 10 feet.

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2000 and ready to go

After a challenging day of preparation the Shadowside is ready to set sail. Special thanks to Bill and Donna for their efforts on our behalf.

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GG Bridge, calm and clear.

Less than 24 hours to go.

Shadowside Crew

Together for the first time at BYC.

Shadowside Crew

First time together BYC.

The Finish Line

We have planned our route as best we can ahead of time. We have a couple different kinds of weather information. We even know how to get detailed start line weather and Kathy tells me that she has tidal current charts to help us out under the Golden Gate.

What is there left to do? Well, the Finish Line would be one example.

Unlike the Transpac Race (That is held on odd numbered years.) our race does not finish at the Diamond Head Buoy off of Waikiki. Instead, our finish line is in the open ocean off of Kaneohe Bay on the east side of Oahu.

Kaneohe Bay

 The orange cross marks the approximate location of the Pacific Cup finish line. The picture below shows this part of the chart in more detail.

Detail of the Pacific Cup finish line.

The finish line consists of that part of a line through the aeronautical beacon on Puu Hawaiiloa (On the Marine Corps Base.) and Pyramid Rock that extends NNW from the yellow cross where the line crosses Latitude 21deg 29min.

This is a little different than previous years because there is a new rule that boats are not permitted to cross the part of Latitude 21deg 29min that is indicated by the horizontal red line on the chart. You can easily see why. All those little dots cluttering up that part of the ocean represent the locations of different kinds of experimental machines for producing electricity from wave motion.

So, when we are finishing we will pass just north of a temporary buoy located near the yellow cross on the chart. Our official finish time will be when we cross the line from Puu Hawaiiloa through Pyramid Rock. Then we will follow the green arrows to the "Sampan" channel and on into the bay. It will take us about a half hour to reach the Kaneohe Yacht Club where we are expecting a big reception.

Yet Another Kind of Weather Map

COAMPS shoreline detail

Our regular weather maps don't properly show the details of the wind as it meets the shoreline. For the first few hours of the race we need more details like the ones provided by this special chart. Here the blue crosses are roughly located at the Pt. Reyes Lighthouse, at the Farallon Islands and at the Golden Gate Bridge.