FIRST BIG CROSSING: Day 1

DAY ONE
 
We're off!
We spent a bit of time becalmed before clearing the cape but it gave Jon time to splice our new spinnaker halyard onto the shackle.

A mother humpback and her baby came up behind us as and blew "goodbye to Mexico!" spouts. Their bodies in silhouette against the sunrise as it reflected off the water. SO BEAUTIFUL!

The wind came up to about 15 knots pretty close hauled, the seas were 8-10 on the beam. We wanted to try for some westing, so Pura Vida put a bone in her teeth and we pulled  up all the big sails and charged ahead.

Just as Jon went down for his off watch chill-out, we noticed the bilge starting to turn. I told him i would keep an eye on it but half an hour later, he was up poking around as it wouldn't quit. He turned it off and pumped it out by hand then waited to see what would happen. Ten minutes later the alarm went off. We were taking on a lot of water-and fast.

Of course, this was just about the time land disappeared from sight.

Of course, the wind and the seas had really cranked up just as the alarm started to screech.

We quickly reefed the sails and I fell off a bit so Jon could assess the situation.

He spent the next two hours searching the boat for the cause.
Taking on water sixty miles into your 2700 mile trip is a little unnerving... but he kept his cool. It meant digging out ALL my carefully stored goods, to check all the thru-hulls-which were fine (as we suspected) because we just inspected them in La Paz.

After much beard-pulling Jon found the cause-an ancient and long ago disconnected air conditioning hose-the hose loop is usually ABOVE the water line. Pura Vida is WELL below her water line at the moment-with all my AWESOME cans of goodies, i guess- so after some pulling and wrangling and yoga moves-Jon fixed the problem.

It's 5:15 PM. We've made about 50 miles since 7AM-the winds have been light for the past few hours. The seas are tame (6-8 feet on the beam), the kids are giggling about something in the cockpit, Jon is taking a little breather, I made beef and lentil stew and we still have some fresh bread from the bakery...
So far, so good!

Something to think about, while you're enjoying a nice, stable, reality wherever you are;

The oceans occupy nearly 71% of our planet's surface!