The Rain Blog

Position as of 16:00 UTC 04°52'N, 124°39'W
Rain, rain, rain. We saw our share of rain yesterday evening. Around 19:00 local time, the squalls started marching across form east to west. There was not a lot of wind with them but the wind was clocking all around the compass. We spent a busy hour and half tacking and gybbing trying to stay on a southerly course. We even hove-to for a while to wait for one of the big cells to pass. The rain was coming so hard you could barely see the bow of the boat. One advantage of the rain like that though is that it hammers the seas flat. We finally gave up around 200:30 and started the engine, pulled in the headsail and motored straight south. At that particular time the wind had backed to the south so we weren't making great time but we also were not heading north as we had a few times the previous hour. By 02:00 local time this morning, the wind had come back to the NE and we were able to turn the engine of and sail between 3-4 knots straight south.
On the radio front, we have been able to use the radio more in the past 18 hours than we had for the past week. I fuddled around with the connection between the tuner and the backstay yesterday and hopefully it will last until I can get the unit serviced or replaced. In the meantime, we will stay sailing with Toketie and are in contact regularly during the day.
I have been thinking about a few comparisons that may make understanding what life on the ocean is like for us on a small ship.

6 Reasons Why sailing is like Being 1 Year Old
1) You can walk but you really have to hang on to something or you fall down
2) You get to eat all your food out of a bowl, usually with a spoon
3) Going to the toilet is a major accomplishment, usually followed by a feeling of satisfaction that you didn't knock yourself out
4) You get to sleep every 3 hours or so, nap time is VERY important or we get all cranky
5) When you are one year old, you drink out of a spill proof "sippy cup". When the boat is pitching and heaving around the ocean, you drink everything out of spill proof "sippy cups"
6) You get to speak in a language that no-one else understands (talking about the ITCZ with HAM operators on your 802 with the AT140 while dealing with lots of QRM) If you can decipher that sentence congrats, you too can cross the ocean!

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