ALICE MARTIN

Tuesday July 11, 2006 @ 01:50 AM GMT-08:00

Day 8 - half way there - FINALLY

Lat:27.8920° Lon:-140.7222°  Wind: NE 8.5 kt | Temp:71° |

We just can't seem to shake the high! Last night we started off going at 8-9.5 knots. When I came up to start my shift at 6am - it was down to 5-6.5 knots.

But sea is beautiful. It's a deep clear blue - witha few puffy clouds. Every now and then a flying fish skims across the waves. Boy they can fly!! I thought they gave themselves a big run-up under the water and then leap out and skim the waves - but no - they turn in the air - like a glider - fascinating. We haven't caught any more fish, nor been visited by more dolphins - that would be a real treat.

2 big things happened today - 1 we passed the half way mark - and 2 - we fixed a problem which could have been very serious.

First - half way - Stan was at the helm at 6:57am when we crossed the half way point. I think we doing all of 5 knots at the time. We celebrated with sparkling cider for breakfast. We also awarded the fastest driver prize - went to Bert for getting up to 14 knots - witnessed! I would love to see that number again - SOON. We continue to be troubled by this big HIGH - just can't seem to escape it - fortunately for us - it appears that no-one else can either.

Second - the more serious. Yesterday, when we did our daily inspection - we decided we needed to track down a water leak problem. Alice's shoes were getting wet but why? A look in the engine compartment yielded the clue. There was LOTS of water in there. ALmost 20 gallons after we had bailed it dry - and it was salty - so where did that come from? We checked all the through hulls and the hoses attached - but no leak. This morning it was still dry - so where had the water come from. Bert decided to test a theory - we had been turning off the water pressure pumpos because they were running too long - but we had not found any problem - we should have checked under the engine! It appears that the hot water hose passes close to the flywheel and it must have moved enough to make contact during our battery charging engine runs. The good news is that the problem is now fixed - Bert gets a gold star - and we are not losing any more water. The other good news is that we had been switching the pump off except foir when we needed water - and the other good news is that we left with over 60 gallons of fresh water in 1 gallon jugs. We are consuming about 5 gallons per day - so we still have plenty of water for 12 days and we should arrive in Hawaii in 6

So we continue to press on - Cali Girl is going gangbusters - we are holding onto 2nd, but our friend Jim Quanci in Green Buffalo is on a charge. He made a left turn 2 days ago to head south - we tacked off of our South tack yesterday - probably too soon - so we'll see how the 2nd half of the race goes.

At 11:15am today we were at N27 59' 25.8" W139 15' 38.2" - covering only 143 in the last 24 hours. We are 1072 miles from SF with only 1031 to go! By my projection we will get there on Sunday morning - lets see how that pan's out.

Best wishes to all our fans and loved ones on dry land from Alice, Stan, Bert, Irwin, Rudy and me (Ian)

Posted by alicelouise | Permalink | Comments [4]