Live updates of our pacific crossing

We have begun our Pacific Ocean Crossing to French Polynesia.

This page will be used to show our progress and update anyone caring to be updated. I hope to provide quick daily (or every few days) updates in this post.

In the map to the right; The black line is our general path, broken into 1 week – or 700 mile – sections (estimated). The green line is the equator, where the winds for hundreds of miles tend to be very, very light. Total distance will be 2800-3000 nautical miles.

In the map below you can track where we actually are in real time, including the weather forecasts

(full screen map)

Updates:

April 17 – We are officially checked out of Mexico and have left the safety of our final port. It took us 6+ hours of sailing over 26+ miles to get to our anchorage, just 13 miles from our starting point. Now we just wait for the proper winds to push us West-southwest. Hopefully the wind will fill in by the weekend

April 20 (Day 1) – We left the safety of our anchorage and started our crossing of the Pacific Ocean. We expect very light winds until the 24th, as we chose to leave with the better sea conditions before the upcoming wind will make it very, very ugly closer to land.

April 21 (Day 2) – Only made 78 miles in our first 24 hours. Slow going, but it has been comfortable. Kerri not feeling 100% for the past few days so getting a lot of sleep. Light winds from behind in the morning, switched to moderate winds closer to our nose by late afternoon. Sunset visit by a pod of spinner dolphins. Water color has gone full ocean-blue on us.

April 22 (Day 3) – 105 miles sailed in the past 24 hours. Uneventful day. We are now >200 miles offshore and have entered a highway of sorts. An ocean current is giving us a boost of nearly 1 knot now, and will for a couple more days.

April 23 (Day 4) – We managed 109 miles in the last 24 hours. A Boobie (the bird type) stayed on our bow overnight. Cute, but shat all over. Today was a day of chores: made water, got our whisker pole setup, tidied up on deck for heavier weather that will come eventually, and so on. Had one thing on the boat break today, which we bandaged up over a couple hours and got back to the sail.

April 24 (Day 5) – 111 miles in the past 24 hours. We passed 400 miles offshore and are now in the steady winds promised after we got ourselves west of the 110 longitude. From here we will make more miles each day, but sacrifice some comfort as we start heading down wind towards the equator.

April 25 (Day 6) – The Starlink dish tried to abandon ship in the very early morning hours. It was noticed with just a single thread holding on the last of two bolts. Kerri had to be woken to assist, as hanging half my body over the railing to manipulate small tools and bolts was simply not safe. Her awake and watching would be the difference between life and death if I fell over. The problem was sorted, and the day mostly uneventful. Stronger winds are now at our rear as we continue to sail south and west allowing us to progress another 118 miles in the 24 previous hours… past the 500 mile checkpoint. Minutes before sunset Kerri had to wake me. The brand new furler line had just broken, meaning we could not retract our headsail. I spent the next hour reinstalling the same line after it was quickly repaired with a knot. Nothing we can’t handle, although I did almost lose my glasses overboard after I punched myself in the face as is customary when working with any tool.

April 26 & 27 (Days 7 & 8) – We continue to sail, making good time know in the more stable winds. 125 and 134 miles in each 24 hours period, respectively. 800 miles in to the passage as of this evening. We made our first serious heading change since we started, from SSW to South. 1000 miles to the equator. VHF radio on the fritz. We have our handhelds as well as our old one (recently replaced new one dead within a year, go figure) which I will install after the sea state calms down a bit. All else going well.

April 30 –

We haven’t turned on StarLink in a couple days, as we aren’t getting sufficient solar in this cloudy region, and our alternator has started to not give our full charge — just one of the many things that have broken, all or in part, since this journey began — so no updates on our regular platforms, but all’s well overall. I’ll try to update more frequently here (which I can do via the little Iridium Satellite), so those folks following along know were still alive!

Today we made it to 1,000 miles! That’s a little over a third of the way. All but the first couple of days, however, have been fully uncomfortable, in big confused seas. Hard on us and the boat, but everyone’s surviving so far. Each day’s forecast seemed to indicate that it’d just be one more day in these winds, then we’d move out of them, but as each day progresses, they fill in and reposition again just so that we’re right in the middle of the strongest of them. It’s getting us there faster, but it’s completely against our plan of comfort before speed. ~ Kerri

May 1 (Day 11) – no internet the past few days. Having to conserve power with cloud cover. Not much to report other than the sloppy seas and high night time winds taking a serious till on us both. A week straight if this has beaten me down. Still progressing towards equator where winds might calm a bit as we near….

We made it far enough South to encounter our first series of squalls. Feels like progress! It was a good intro to squall country — in the middle of the day, so we could see what was coming. We’ll, not the first one, but luckily we just caught the corner of it. The others, we were able to navigate behind once we spotted them, so only caught their tail ends.

We are, unfortunately, having to motor for a couple hours each day since we entered this deeply cloudy region. Our solar can’t keep up with our battery consumption, even after moving our chest freezer food to the fridge and shutting it down, and not turning on Starlink. To make matters worse, we’re having an issue with our alternator only charging at about half output, so we have to motor twice as long to top off the batteries. ~ Kerri

… (Later in the day) – just as we were set to exit this windy, rolly, area of the Pacific we got hit hard by an ocean storm. Rain in sheets. Wind in gale force. Waves of an intimidating height. It hit us dead in. No where to run, but run we did anyway, for an hour, hoping the storm would pass us over in time. Eventually the winds had picked up to a point the keeping control was requiring a lot of physical force on the wheel. It is at these times that things break, so before that happened we made the call to heave-to (sailing equivalent to pulling to the shoulder). Another hour before the storm passed by enough for us to get going again… tired and a bit shaken, but Meriwether took care of us in the end.

Tim focused on hand-steering the boat, and I stayed in the cabin, applying rags to all the new deck leaks that materialized undiscovered over the past year-and-a-half in arid Baja. I opened the companionway hatch just long enough to snap a shot of Tim in the dramatic wind and rain, both of us smiling and completely at home in this mini-storm blowing 20-25 knots. But, the thing with squalls is, they pass right by. In 10-20 minutes, it’s over. An hour later, the winds had only built, two hours later, we clocked 40 true on the wind gauge. We finally made the decision to heave-to, but even that was quite nerve-wracking, as we were still dramatically healed over, port-side deck buried in water. No photos of this — I was a bit occupied — but the seas around us did look exactly like every dramatic sailboat-in-a-storm scene you’ve seen in the movies. Except for that darn cheerful bird, happily riding the breeze right there next to us — what is he doing way out here anyway? We waited it out (some of us more calmly than others), and the gale finally passed. Now, as we near the doldrums, we’ve decided to go ahead and just start motoring, to get us past this band of weather. ~ Kerri

May 2 (Day 12) – Just under half way to French Polynesia, 1400 miles traveled, and we made our first radio contact with another sailboat about 20 miles ahead of us. It was an immediate moral boost to hear another voice. We are not completely alone out here. In fact, we currently have eyes on a fishing vessel just 4 miles away, our first visual indication of other human life in 12 days. Wind, sea, and clouds played nice enough today for us to get a few fixes done as well as two very-very much needed cockpit showers (our first showers of the trip). We should be south of the band of stormy ocean by tomorrow, which will reduce the stress level a lot.

PS, it is hot enough to wear only shorts, 24 hours a day. Anything more is just too hot, even at 4am.

May 3 (day 13) – Last night was spent sailing in heavy rain through the pitch black night. On alert enough to don our foulies and stay up in the cockpit. Unwarranted in the end, but little sleep accomplished by us both.

Today has gone smoothly since sunrise. We seem to have passed the area of weather and saw our first blue skies in well over a week. Just a few more days at this heading will get us to the equator.

Post-gale, the winds died, but our priority was to make a couple latitude lines south as quickly s as possible to get out of that band of weather that shook us up. We motored a bit over 12 hours due south(ish), dodging squalls, which we’re a bit more gunshy of than before.

We hit The Dolrums — that stretch of ocean notorious for its lack of wind, and were actually looking forward to a break from moving, rolling, swaying nonstop for 12 days. Others we’ve seen swim in the perfectly still waters. But as “luck” would have it, a wind bridge is forecast, so likely no still waters for us. Certainly none so far. It also means we’ll get to sail through rather easily, so we’ll count our blessings.

Overall, though, it’s the calmest day we e had since the first or second. We got some much-needed chores done and overall feel well rested. We take our watch shifts by how we’re feeling — not a schedule — and neither of us took a down shift at all during the day.

An easy night so far. The big band of squally clouds covered half the horizon behind us, and the sunset, as we waved then goodbye for more settled weather for a day, at least. It’s the sun set, we saw a light in the horizon. There’s a boat out there within visible distance! It’s not on AIS, but radar shows it about four miles from us. A fishing boat, I assume. The first sign of human life we’ve seen for a while. ~ Kerri

May 4 (day 14) – 1600 miles down. 1300ish to go, 10-11 more days. Just a few more days and we arrive to the equator, which we plan to heave-to and have a small party before continuing on.

We’d been close-hauled to close-reached last night and into the afternoon. The seas built and were confused and we spent most of the day bucking and sipping the bow. In the late afternoon, the wind and seas finally settled, and this evening we’re ghosting along, still heavily reefed, in light winds and comfortable seas. The stars are out again. ~ Kerri

May 6 (day 16) – 1800 miles completed. The past couple days have been smooth sailing, finally. The waters have calmed down making for much more pleasant days. Not a lot of wind, but combined with a nice ocean current we are still making more than 100 miles per day. We continue to get a couple things repaired each day after the ocean’s attempts to slowly dismantle Meriwether out from under us. The forecast says, though can never be trusted, that we will have fair winds the rest of our sail. 1100 miles to go.

At last, for the first time since the first couple of days of this journey (fifteen to sixteen days ago), we have been sailing for two days straight now in comfortable seas, a good current carrying us efficiently our destination. We’ve been anywhere from a close reach to beam, in 9-15 knots, cutting through the water like butter. This has been a long time coming.

Today we were visited by a large pod of large dolphins of some sort that, as best as we can, we identified as possibly pigmy killer whales.

We should have a couple more days of this before the wind and the current have it out with each other and stir up the seas again, so we’ll enjoy it while we can.

We glided along at a relatively good clip (considering the low wind in combination with still having not shaken out our first reef on the mains’l. We’re lazy like that). Smooth seas and good sun gave us conditions make some more potable water and for me to turn on the StarLink and get a bit of work done. As the sun sets now, the only concern is if the winds will get lower. Though it would make sense to get the whisker pole out before dark, Tim’s taking his first sleep since the wee hours of the morning, so I’ not waking him up for that two-person job. We’ll just have to rush a sloppy Genoa for the night. ~ Kerri

May 8 (day 18) – 1950 miles into the voyage, and just few moments before sunrise on our 18th day, we crossed from the northern hemisphere to the southern. From pollywogs to shellbacks in naval terminology. It is all downhill from here, literally.

We have just crossed the equator, and have now officially graduated from being “pollywogs” to “shellbacks”. Neptune has been bribed with booze, as is tradition/superstition, to keep us in his good favors. Now I’m going back to bed. ~Kerri

May 9 (day 19) –

Before and after the equator crossing, the winds were as light as could be. Early today, we entered a new hood where more squalls reside, so we made up some miles, sometimes a bit faster than comfortable (fat ol’ Meriwither was rolling with the homies at 7+ knots at times). As the sun sets tonight, we’re just hoping it stays mellower than that for the dark hours. Soon, we’ll be making our way to a current that align with the wind, as both push us straight toward our destination. We’re over 2,000 miles into this journey now, with only 800 miles and about a week left to go. The end is not so much “in sight”, but fathomable! ~ Kerri

May 10 (day 20) – The past few days has been all about making some miles. After the calm of our equator crossing, the wind has filled in nicely. Add to it the ocean current now in our favor, and we are scooting right along. Thursday night and Friday were the last real hurdles to overcome. Stronger winds would make for an uncomfortable period, but we had been through worse already. Six days away from landfall now. The count down has begun

May 12 (day 22) – On our final leg. Under 500 miles to go and hauling ass in the trades. Lots of nothing to do the past few days and in our future. Just riding it out to French Polynesia now. If all goes well we can be there late Wednesday or early Thursday. Fingers crossed

A buddy boat who left around the same time that we did, but being a catamaran, quickly overtook us and made it to Hiva Oa several days ago, affirmed with us that the current forecast was right, and that once we got to 3S, we’d pick up what they called the “Pacific Express”. That’s exactly what happened. For the past couple of days, and hopefully for the next several, we’re riding favorable winds, current, and sea state straight toward our destination. At a comfortable 10-15 knots of breeze, we’re making way at 5-7 knots. After 21 days at sea, we only have somewhere between 3-5 days to go at this pace. ~ Kerri

May 14 (day 24) – About 230 miles to go at mid day. That works out to two more nights, to avoid arriving at night. The forecast is very mild, with barely double digits in the wind models. It is good for comfort, but bad for speed. So, we have hauled out the big colorful Spinnaker sail to over-speed during the daylight hours. We won’t leave it up overnight, so slower speeds in the dark half of the day, hopefully averaging out to the 4.5 knots we need to ensure a third night at sea is not necessary. So close now. Arriving and dropping anchor is all we can think about.

We are projected to make landfall Thursday sometime after sunrise. The seas are as calm as we’ve experienced them this entire passage, and tonight for the first time in weeks, where we saw a handful of lights from fishing boats near the ITCZ, we see the light of another vessel out to our port. It’s SV Outrun, who we’ve been keeping in contact with as they make the same journey south. Suddenly there are so many other boats appearing on our tracker, as we converge with a new group of boats who began their passage from Panama. Good night for shooting stars. ~ Kerri

May 15 (day 25)

The downside of the smoothest seas we’ve had this whole trip is that it’s the lack of wind that makes them so calm. We had a couple of days of smooth sailing on the main and polled-out Genoa, and when the winds lightened even more this morning, moved in to our asymmetrical spinnaker (the first time this whole trip that we’ve flown it). By sunset, the winds had died even more, and the swell increased, making it impossible to keep the spinnaker full, so down can the sail, and we’ve been motoring overnight. Since we never got the full doldrums experience, we still have plenty of fuel left, so could motor the whole way to Hiva Oa if need be. We REALLY want to get there before last light on Thursday. Just a smidge over 150 miles to go! ~ Kerri

May 16 (day 26) – Land ho!!! Still five hours from being able to drop anchor and begin the process of making Meriwether liveable again, but the end is literally in sight

After 26 days and one hour of sailing (2908 nautical miles) we have arrived in French Polynesia and set our anchor. All we want to do at this point is go to bed – together – for a full 24 hours. Then we can start on the repairs and shove off to nearby anchorages