Coyote's Log

Let me introduce Coyote’s Pacific Cup return crew; #1 Steve Hill, owner of Coyote #2 Rick Elkins, owner of LightSpeed a Wylie 39, a SSS Member(Single Handed Sailing Society)who #1 frequently races against in single handed races. #3 John Dukat, owner of Critical Mass an IOR Mini Tonner, and a Richmond YC member. #4 Jacob Wenegrat and #5 Julia Wenegrat, owners of Pisces a Jason 35. They just returned from cruising in Mexico for the past several years, and now live aboard in the Seattle area. This has been an amazing trip with this great crew. Everyone has ideas on how to make the trip more comfortable, and everyone wants speed to get home faster with!!! Everyone is trying to trim differently, and playing with the sail plan to maximize the speed with in the wind and wave conditions. If necessary they start the engine, roll up the jib and power for wind. We now have a solid breeze, and have flown along after noon and evening. The conditions are challenging at times, for example we just reefed the main sail because we are in 22 knot winds with the 135% jib up - it is midnight and pitch black out, and we are again crashing thru the seas at ~8 knots. It is amazing how much chafe the boat takes when running 24 hours a day for 11 days. We nearly chafed thru our jib sheet, only found it because #2 found a Japanese fishing ball. So now we carry a jib sheet PLUS a secondary jib sheet sheeted in tight just to reduce the risk of having a jib sheet blow, especially during the long nights. Have we talked about ear plugs? Trying to sleep without them is nearly impossible, with all the water running past the boat, crashing into waves, people talking, sails shaking„„Ear plugs stop not only the noise but the motion too, and that is the amazing part. Once ear plugs are in, it feels like the boat has become becalmed, no wind or waves. A few times I have pulled out one plug, only to discover we were still fling along, so back in it went, and to sleep I went. #4 has been working with the Grib files, and has been downloading scheduled weather faxes (something #1 could not figure out how to do, but Jacob did in 3 minutes) and our Routing Software Expedition and has determined that on our present course and speed we will have wind the rest of the way!!! We are now cracked off a bit, and speeding home at a SOG of 7.5 knots and VMG of the same! Only 742 miles to go. Food continues to be fantastic with #5 leading the charge. Ever diligent, cooking prep begins at 2100 (9pm) for the following day, and #5 tells us what is on the menu, um um good. I(I just found out that we are having Egg Muffin Sandwiches for breakfast!) Tonight #5 made Spaghetti and Meatballs, with fresh baked cup cakes by Each morning #2 and #1 wake at 1030 to fresh coffee and notes and directions for finding our breakfast in the oven ready to go! We have never had it so good. The entire crew is looking to have Buffalo Burger’s one of these days, hoping to real in Green Buffalo….. Lunch today consisted of leftovers and hand made Pot Stickers. Wow, these were the real thing! With a bit of Soy Sauce and Mae Ploy Sauce they were not only terrific but beautiful. #2 has done a fantastic job of taking on the KP duty and washing from each meal. This has been terrific as we always have a clean kitchen. Yesterday I caught #2 sawing my dishwashing brush in half! Then he drilled a hole in the stub, and hung it on the faucet. My poor brush, but #2 likes it better with the “sawed off look”, “I can get into the cracks better!”. #5 has been doing trash watch, looking for plastic, and other sea trash. Amazing thing, we have seen very little of trash in the middle of the High, we thought we would see tons. Turns out, the vast majority of trash we have seen during the return trip, seems to be coming from fishing boats. Buckets, line, nets, etc. #1 has (as I understand) joined the snoring group with #2 and Not sure if we are all sleeping better, or if the trip is just wearing on us all. Probably the latter. #1 needs to find out who’s mystery sock landed on his pillow, could be the beginnings of a mutiny? In the past 24 hours we have used the engine just 5 hours, so it looks like we will be bringing extra fuel home with us, now that the winds have filled in. No ships sighted in the past 24 hours, nothing on AIS, nothing on Radar, just Coyote and her crew. At our half way mark we were further from land you can possibly be anywhere else in the world, we are truly on our own out here. A crew dependent on each other, the crew dependent on Coyote, and Coyote dependent upon the crew. 712 miles to go now„„ Coyote