Monday, February 29, 2016

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GPS fix

Lat: S 4 47' 25''
Long: W 96 33' 41''
Time: 07:42:35 UTC
Date: 29-02-2016
Altitude: 8 m
Velocity: 0 km/h

Accuracy
Horiz: +/- 16 m
Vert: +/- 32 m


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I am standing mid-watch. Although overcast the moon is shining through and
we can see occasional stars. Reboot is making 6 knots and rocking gently in
3 foot seas.

We are under the influnce of the south equatorial current. Last night when
we were drifting the bow was pointed east (toward the current) while we
drifted with the current (west). Wild. Today I realized that the weather is
similar to the Gulf Stream. Perhaps that is because the conditions are
similar - a flow of warm water with cooler water on both sides. It only
took a week to figure it out. I am so quick!

The Boobies continue to ride along. Rookie has wacked them when they land
on the solar panel. They have moved to the bow. B. F. Skinner would be
proud of them. I can hear their calls as they search for dinner.

My watch is over but I am wide awake so I am standing Davyd's watch. The
two principal states on a long passage are boredom and exhaustion. Davyd
had an exhausting watch early this morning. This is my way of glving back.

Fair winds and following seas :)

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Sunday, February 28, 2016

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A very long night Becalmed. Rain. 6 foot seas. A very uncomfortable
situation. At sunrise got some wind. Moving again. Everything and everone
is wet.

Fair winds and following seas :)

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Another day of skuding witk occaslonai rain. The up side is we are making
decent time. The water temperature is 81 f and the air temperature is 79 f.
It makes it warm inside Reboot.

Today's entertainment was two birds. We think they were boobies. One took
up residence on the solar paneis. The second arrived about 1/2 hour later
and was rebuffed. He took up residence on the bow.

It was fun watching them land. They would "shoot the break," line up for a
down wind final, drop the gear and land

To the music of "danger zone".

"Wheels down, flaps down, hook down, all down."

"Call the ball."

"Roger ball."

"Ball ~ ramp - deck."

Unfortunately the approach camera was inoperative. Next time.

After some time we chased the bird off the solar panel. We then had to wash
the panei. When the bird returnd we tried to chase it off. I don't know who
was more surprised when Rookie poked him with the boat hook! he got the
message and left for good.

Fair winds and following seas :)

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Saturday, February 27, 2016

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Another day of skuding witk occaslonai rain. The up side is we are making
decent time. The water temperature is 81 f and the air temperature is 79 f.
It makes it warm inside Reboot.

Today's entertainment was two birds. We think they were boobies. One took
up residence on the solar paneis. The second arrived about 1/2

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A long rainy day. Mostly a continous heavy mirt with periods of actual
rain. We are in battery conservation mode as the solar panels are not doing
much charging. We could run the engine but that uses fuel. My preference is
to arrive at our destination with full fuel tanks. That way they are
available in an emergency.

We are at S 03* 50' W 92* 59' doing about 5 knots under overcast skys. It
is 3 am local and I, Captain Roger, am standing watch. XO has just arrived
in the cockpit for head butts and has now curled up next to me. Rookie came
off watch an hour ago and is sleeping in the cockpit. Davyd is asleep
below.

The watches on Reboot are of variable length. From 10 pm to 4 am they are 2
hours long with 3 hour "shoulder" watches and 4 hour watches during the
day. We find the short night watches easier to stand.

Fair winds and following seas :)


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Friday, February 26, 2016

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It has been over a week since we have seen or heard another vessel. It is a
big ocean!.

We have also been disappointed with our fishing. Despite 24/7 trolling we
have not had a bite in over a week. Rookie (aka Mike) thinks it might be
the el nino effect. The birds have been following us. We thought that
meant fish but instead they have been spotting our lure.

Another overcast and squally morning. 2888 nm to go.

Fair winds and following seas :)

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Thursday, February 25, 2016

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Into every life sone rain must fall. Today it was the front head
overflowing. Enough said.

The wind moderated at dawn. We put up the full main and jib. We rocked at 7
knots most of the day.

Davyd spotted a sea turtle. He was about 100 yards from Reboot and then was
gone.

Fair winds and following seas :)

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With current wind can not get south without back tracking. Need shift to
east. We are slogging along in skud and occasional rain. Not much fun.
Losing average speed but still above 100 nm per day. Waves on beam and
light wind means lots of rocking.

On a positive note 3004 nm to go.

Fair winds and following seas :)

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Wednesday, February 24, 2016

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Skud running all day. Dawn wind 6 knots. We got up to 4 knots with apparent
wind shifted all the way to thebow. Could not turn south west for more
consistent trades without going into irons.

We sighted a whale and a pod of juvenile dolphins.

We took advantage of the light air and flat seas to do a load of laundry.

High temps spawned squals with winds to 20 knots and rain. Waves kicked up
to 5 feet. Was able to head west but course SW was very rough.

Tonigit beautiful sky with some residual squalls around Reboot. We go into
the night with 50% jib and no main at 5.5 knots.

Fair winds and following seas :)

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Whale HO!

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Tuesday, February 23, 2016

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We have been making about 1.5 knots for the last 6 hours. The sails are
banging, the waves are a foot or less, we have a full moon and the rest of
the sky is fiiied with stars.what are the three old salts doing? Listening
to Maria Callas singing arias. Priceless. Fair winds and following seas :)

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We have been traveling down the South American coast both to minimize our
time in the ITCZ (doldrums) and to avoid the Galapagos. We have now turned.
We are now heading west (forever or 3170 nm) to the Marquesas. We are still
420 nm north of our goal. We will work our way south as we sail west. Fair
winds and following seas :)

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Monday, February 22, 2016

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We have crossed the equator and are in the general area of the ITCZ. Winds
have been very light - less than 10 knots true. We are flying our asym and
have managed to maintain 4 knots most of the time. After almost a month
(since we left St. Thomas) of north winds they are now shifting to the
east. We head south west to avoid the Galapagos while continuing south to
get into the eastern trades. we have neither seen nor heard another boat in
4 days. Fair winds and following seas.

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Sunday, February 21, 2016

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No more pollywogs! Reboot crossed the line. Shellbacks all! 21 feb 2016 @
0609 utc.

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Friday, February 19, 2016

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It is nearing sundown. So far it has been a pretty normal day. The wind has
been about 15 knots so far. We have been tacking down wind. Little wind
shifts all day have required minor course changes. At North 2 11 we are
stil in the ITCZ. At West 082 10 we are near the border between the Eastern
and Central time zones. Fair winds and following seas.

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Thursday, February 18, 2016

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Crazy day. Becalmed for 3 hours. Put up asym was able to make way in very
light air. At sunset wind increased to 30 knots and stayed that way until
dawn. It finally moderated to 15. We are entering the area of the
intertropical convergance zone. Fair winds and following seas.

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Wednesday, February 17, 2016

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Join us as virtual crew! Are you following our journey? Text your name and
email to 00 870 776 411 146. After we arrive and have internet we will send
you a virtual crew certificate for your wall. Do it before we "cross the
line" and we will include a virtual "shellback" certificate too. But wait,
there is more! Just kidding. You can follow our track at
www.sailboatreboot.com. Fair winds and following seas :)

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@ N 06 32. W 080 46. Interesting night. Max wind 25 knots. Min wind 5
knots. Pretty moonlite night. Passed through shipping lanes. Saw 10 ships.
Wind shift from N to E. Now on beam reach. Fair winds and following seas :)

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Tuesday, February 16, 2016

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A sunrise, sunset, the end of day 1. 113 nm made good. 3949 nm to go. Fair
winds and following seas :)

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Monday, February 15, 2016

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in the Pacific Ocean after transiting the Panama Canal. Pictures and
passage notes to follow. Fair winds and following seas!

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Sunday, February 14, 2016

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Cleared Gatun Lock in the Panama Canal. Overnight in Gatun Lake. Finish the
Canal tomorrow.

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Davyd to the top

Davyd at the top
The time had come. After a short trip up part of the mast it was necessary to do work at the top (about 60 feet above the deck.) The electronic wind vane needed to be re-attached after repair.

Davyd wanted to climb and since he is the lightest of us both Mike and I agreed. (It is much easier to tend the safety lines of someone lighter.)

Davyd wanted me to share how cool he is. Here is the picture!

Fair winds and following seas :)

GatĂșn Lock transit

Reboot is scheduled to transit the locks at 6 pm tonight!

Watch live! http://www.pancanal.com/eng/photo/camera-java.html

Fair winds and following seas :)

Saturday, February 13, 2016

Hanging

As we finalize Reboot for our Canal transit tomorrow we decided we needed a down day. The fact that the entire marina is under assault from flies was a not inconsequential reason to stay off Reboot. We hung by the pool. This took me back to my high school years. We lived 1 1/2 mile from the beach. All summer our parents would drop us and our Sunfish at the beach in the morning. Each day we would swim, sail, and hang out. Good times.
Fair winds and following seas

Thursday, February 11, 2016

Cleared for Panama Canal transit.

Current schedule is Sunday afternoon Atlantic locks, overnight in the lake. Monday morning Pacific locks. Google Panama Canal web cams for live Reboot action! A screen grab of us in the Canal would be great.

Climbing the mast

Davyd
Climbing the mast seems to be a rite of passage on Reboot,

Fair winds and following seas :)

Oops

We wondered about that large radar return as we tried to find Shelter Bay Marina at night!

Fair winds and following seas :)

Wednesday, February 10, 2016

Downloading Garmin Charts

Allow me to save you a lot of time. As we are about to pass thru the Panama Canal I wanted to purchase and download new charts for our 52x2 chart plotters. They download to SD cards. After 5 1/2 hours of frustration let me offer the following:


  1. You can not use the Chrome browser to find and download charts
  2. You can not use the Microsoft Edge browser to find and download charts
  3. You must use Internet Explorer (available in Windows 10 if you use the search function and search for Internet Explorer)
  4. You must have a Garmin account
  5. You must have registered your chart plotter in your Garmin account
At this point you will actually be able to discover what charts you need, pay for them, and download them to a SD card on your computer.

Fair winds and following seas :)

Monday, February 8, 2016

Transit - St. Thomas to the Panama Canal

We departed Charlotte Amalie in St. Thomas with more than a little bit of trepidation. Jimmy Cornell of "World Cruising Routes" strongly advises against making this passage in January or early February due to strong easterly trade wings and high seas. We did experience 25 knot winds and 10 to 12 foot seas but Reboot handled them without a care. Reboot tends to "pick up her skirts" in a following sea. The seas roll under her giving a pleasant hobby horse motion. A heavier boat might have been pooped.

We ran the 9 day 6 hour transit with only the jib. Average boat speed was 5.4 knots. Surfing the waves the SOG would vary between 3 and 9 knots every 10 seconds or so. The most the jib was ever unfurled was about 50%. We ran a good portion of the time at 35%. Once we left Charlotte Amalie and turned southwest we only gybed 4 times! That includes lining up for the harbor entrance. We did run a little North of the Columbia coast as the weather is usually stronger within 100 miles of the coast.

We arrived in Colon at 10 pm est. After sailing! through the harbor entrance we attempted to find the marina. We turned back when we discovered a sunken wreck. We motored to the small boat anchorage and spent the night on the hook. In the morning we motored to Shelter Bay.

Fair winds and following seas :)

Saturday, February 6, 2016

Shelter Bay Yacht Club

We at arrived at Christobol at about 10 PM last night. After sailing through the harbor entrance (awesome) we tried to find Shelter Bay Marina. After almost hitting a sunken wreck we decided to go to the small boat anchorage. It was in fact small but we were able to find a spot and drop in 26 feet. Morning and on to Shelter Bay. A very narrow entrance channel into a nice marina with boats from around the world. Today we rest,tomorrow we get organized for our canal transit.

Fair winds and following seas :)

Friday, February 5, 2016

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Land ho. 6 hours to landfall in Panama!

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Wednesday, February 3, 2016

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Last night we had a spot of trouble. As the wind picked up we started to
further furl the jib when the sheet jammed fron an override on the drum. We
rigged a backup sheet. We were able to clear the drum and restore normal
operation.

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Tuesday, February 2, 2016

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Settling in. Reboot has passed the halfway mark 595 nm with 441 to go. We
are about 140 nn of Barranquilla, Columbia. We expect the highest winds and
waves near the Columbian coast That is why we are further North. We are
curently at about 13 38 N 073 46 W. C 236. S 6.6 Wind 20 knots. Waves 10
feet.

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Monday, February 1, 2016

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The conditions have freshened.Wlnd ne 20 g 25. Wave ne 7 to 10. C 227t. S
6.1 1016 mbar steady. Sky 50% cum. 2pob. 1 mew. 453 made good. 582 to go to
panama.

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