As recorded by her gallant Captain and crew.
Up the minute news and information on the Racing Yacht Coyote and her continuing journeys!
Groundhog Day As day comes to a close, we find ourselves clawing our way - away from the expanding high. Problem is, the high is expanding directly over us, and beating us to SF! This keeps the winds velocity down (bad for sailing), and a poor wind angle (bad for heading to SF). However, we are making the most of it. During the past 48 hours, we have used the engine just 12 hours. We sail along, the wind gets light, so we roll up the jib and poser for 5-10 minutes and pick up the next breeze. We have powered a few times for 2 hours, but we do eventually pick up the wind. Good time to open the hatches and air out the boat, before the next blow and wind waves/spray come. It looks like we may be burning less than 1/2 gallon an hour at the mid RPM’s, so we are really stretching out the fuel, just in case we end up with no wind and need to power for 48 hours…. Then, while heading into ever changing wind direction and velocity we generally let Auto Raymarine Autohelm) drive, because she pays attention, does not take breaks, and does not need to look at a compass or shoreline to get her bearings. This is a very fast and accurate way to move as quickly as possible out of the high. For the past 5 hours we have had a terrific wind (14-20 knots apparent) and we are powering away from the high as fast as possible. The barometer is dropping - which is more good news indicating we are escaping the high. We are still trying to move north, as is the rest of the 18 boat return fleet, so if there are gale conditions on the CA coast, we can broad reach home, rather than try to beat into “Gale Alley”. 840 miles to go now„„ Coyote
