The One That Got Away
Well, imagine our surprise yesterday afternoon when, after nearly two days with the line in the water, the fishing reel starts squealing. We rushed into the cockpit and about 200 meters behind the boat, I see this lovely fish jumping, trying to throw off the hooks. I ran up on deck, dumped the main sail and we quickly furled in the genoa. (Exciting so far isn't it). After about 5 minutes I managed to get the fish along side and I had hooked, what looked like, a 15 pound sailfish. I tried to net it and missed and just when I went to go a second time, the line broke! Oh well, Cathy did see it, and can, and will corroborate the story under oath if need be. It was hard to see the broken line and realize just how close we were to having fresh fish for dinner, lunch, breakfast, dinner, lunch, etc. We would have been eating the fish for 4 days. Unfortunately that was my last hoochie (plastic squid) and I don't have anything else to drag behind (except maybe Cathy). Perhaps I will find something in Niue.
We started to loose the wind late yesterday and by evening we were down to 4 knots or so. As we weren't going to make it to Niue Thursday anyways, we decided to just keep going at that pace. Again, unfortunately, the wind went lighter still and by 04:00 we were down to about 2 knots. The weather was not encouraging to stick it out as the forecast is for light variable winds for the next 5 days. We are basically in the middle of a high pressure system that is almost centered over Niue. We are running at low revs to try and conserve diesel as much as possible as it is around NZD 2.50 a litre to replace it. The motor was a bit difficult to start but has been running fine. I'm hoping that a good long run under load will clean it out. I just ran it up to full RPM and it didn't miss a bit so maybe the airlock is gone and we are back to normal. The problem is likely dirty fuel and getting air in the lines when changing filters, I hope!
We started to loose the wind late yesterday and by evening we were down to 4 knots or so. As we weren't going to make it to Niue Thursday anyways, we decided to just keep going at that pace. Again, unfortunately, the wind went lighter still and by 04:00 we were down to about 2 knots. The weather was not encouraging to stick it out as the forecast is for light variable winds for the next 5 days. We are basically in the middle of a high pressure system that is almost centered over Niue. We are running at low revs to try and conserve diesel as much as possible as it is around NZD 2.50 a litre to replace it. The motor was a bit difficult to start but has been running fine. I'm hoping that a good long run under load will clean it out. I just ran it up to full RPM and it didn't miss a bit so maybe the airlock is gone and we are back to normal. The problem is likely dirty fuel and getting air in the lines when changing filters, I hope!
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posted by Brian Ackles - S/V Cygnet at
11:41
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