Passage from Las Perlas to the Galapagos

My original post about this passage that I wrote during the passage was erased when I tried to upload it, so I am sitting on the bow of Zoe, enjoying a sunset in the Galapagos and will try and recap and hope that I do the passage justice here.

Not going to lie that I was a bit nervous about this passage. Seeing how the last passage I was on Zoe went, I think there is some validation to this. Although the boat has been completely fixed and she (Zoe) is sailing better than ever now, sailing is still so new to me that these passages still seem a bit daunting. Not to mention that I am responsible to cook our crew dinners which in itself has involved a huge learning curve in figuring out how to make a delicious meal in a kitchen that is rocking and shaking and rolling and trying to throw you out of the kitchen. Needless to say, I was nervous for this first long passage since our shake down.

We set off from Las Perlas at 12noon. Since this is technically a race, we had a very official start. I am completely unfamiliar with the world of sailing, let alone racing, so it was really interesting to me. We started having countdowns over the radio from Rally Control hours before the official start time. About 30 minutes before we were officially to set sail across the start line, the fleet started gathering outside of our anchorage at Las Perlas, each boat trying to advantageously position themselves closest to the startling. It is kind of a funny phenomena to be a part of. Then, over the radio, the countdown begins, we raise our spinnaker and take off. There was a lot of excitement, raising sails, tightening them, pulling the winch, all trying to keep our speed! And our speed we kept . . . for that first day.

Into the first night at sea, we could see at least 5 - 7 boats on the horizon. It was so beautiful, out under the stars of the open ocean with these shimmering lights on the horizon of friends you knew were enjoying their first nights of the passage as well. From that night on it was an incredibly "easy" passage. Possibly too easy. We timed the wind wrong, along with many other boats, and hit the doldrums with zero to light breezes for almost 5 days. Some boats timed it right and went south first and then hit the rhum line . . . they were far out of our sight after the first few hours. We went a couple days without having a fleet boat within vision, but most days and nights we could see a bright spinnaker flying in the distance or a sparkling mast light lighting up a spot on our horizon. At one point, another one of the fleets boats, Pete Smoke, was so close to us that we radioed over and invited them over for a glass of wine. They tacked over to our boat and we actually tried to pass them a bottle of wine . . . but that didn't work out so well. ha. Although we finished the passage running on diesel fumes and just trying to not be the last boat to cross the finish line into the Galapagos, we had an overall very enjoyable passage!

I am still very much getting used to being at sea. Haven't quite found my routine yet, but am definitely working on it ;) Our watch schedules were decided for this passage that Kelsey and I would share a watch schedule and the guys were really easy on us! We had from 9pm - 12midnight and then from 7am - 12noon that we (mostly Kelsey, ha) were responsible for sailing Zoe. "Sailing" is a loose term since we ended up having to motor a lot or ride the current with a slight breeze, but who's counting.

My days were filled lounging in our boat hammock, baking bread, swimming, having time to read as many pages as I wanted in my book, learning to tie knots, cooking dinners, keeping my eye out for sea life. Kelsey and I tried to do yoga one morning on the passage, as we were approaching the equator and it didn't quite work out so well. It's is tough keeping your balance physically and mentally on a rocking boat, ha!

Crossing the equator is a post within itself. I never realized what a big deal it is for mariners to sail across the equator. I will write a post about the ceremony we had at the equator but I can say for now it was pretty special to sail across the equator, definitely something I will never forget as long as I am a turtleback ;)

The sea life is really interesting to me in these passages. It is pretty amazing the vast difference of sea life from coastal to life in the wide open ocean. As we left the coast we had dolphins swimming with us, birds fluttering above Zoe and antagonizing her to go faster, manta rays flapping their wings up at us to wish us well on the way. You definitely feel the vibrance of sea life near land. I would say that you feel the vibrance of life far out to sea as well, but it is just so different. When we got into the open ocean, it was magical to see a bird and we would encourage them as much as we could to stay with us for a bit. Most of them took us up on the offer. We had a yellow footed boobie with us for an entire day and night of this last passage. It was so fun to wake up in the morning and see him still riding our bull pit ever so proudly. Out at sea we also started to see tons of flying fish! I have only ever seen these out on a passage and they are amazing! These little guys get about 6 inches to 1 foot off the water and just zip zoom around and then dive back into the water. It is hilarious. They are total tweekers. Ha! Kelsey and I also discovered flosvorescent jumping fish one night on watch. We were skimming the flashlight over the water trying to light up the flosforescents in the waves, and all of a sudden this little light beams were jumping all over the place, almost like glowing rocks skipping across the water. After a serious investigation, we realized that they were flosforescent fish that were annoyed by the flashlight and jumping around in their anger for us disturbing them. It was really entertaining. When Captain Ed came on watch after us, we were so excited to share our discovery with him, but his tired, blurry eyes didn't seem nearly as excited about these glowing hyperactive fish. ha.

Our crew has also deemed me as the radio personnel for SV Zoe, meaning that I have to do the radio check-in once a day. George is responsible for the boring morning check-in where we give them all of our technical data (Longitude, latitude, wind speed and engine hours) and then I get the fun check-in at 6pm to chat about how our day was. Mind you this is a "radio conference" of sorts with all 30 boats listening in. I guarantee that some of the snooty yachters don't like my antics, but most people have enjoyed my lightening up of the radio waves.

All in all this passage was about 6 days (about 850 miles) from the starting line in Las Perlas to the finish line in the Galapagos (Captain has our actual time). It was smooth and slow sailing/motoring and a good gear up for our next passage, the longest of the entire circumnavigation, from the Galapagos Islands to the Marquesas , 2,980 miles and roughly estimating almost 4 weeks at sea. Yowza! Not sure my sea legs are ready for this.