On day 19 of the passage Lady Mary entered the Eastern Hemisphere.
And we jumped straight from Thursday to Saturday.
When we sailed from the very south of Australia to Tahiti five months ago, there were two Thursdays in a row aboard. It is like Jules Verne's *Around the World in Eighty Days*: during a west-to-east circumnavigation one day is added to the ship's calendar.
Now, travelling west, one day is removed when you cross the 180th meridian.
So our date is finally the same as it is for most of you: the 19th. Actually it is already the 20th, because yesterday's post failed to send.
We have already moved the clocks twice, and Vladivostok is only two hours different from us now.
Home territory is close.
We could not completely ignore the missing day, 18 March, because exactly two years ago on that date we stepped ashore on the final continent: Australia.
We then got stuck in one place for an entire year and remained in Australia for a year and a half in total.
How do you make a day in the ocean unique?
Spend it differently from the usual routine.
That is apparently why we charged the most economical laptop we have — Nastya's. Mine died on 1 January, while Lada's and Andrey's consume far too much electricity.
In celebration we spent half the day watching the series *Shifr*, drinking tea with mango jam and finishing the fried tuna.
No, of course we do not spend all our time eating in front of a screen.
We also read, do lessons, replaced the chafed line on the windvane steering gear, and changed the equally worn furling line for the genoa, our largest headsail.
Still to come are evening exercises — historically our exercise sessions on passages happen in the evening — a shower on deck from a plastic bottle, and sending and writing letters. Sorry, friends, for many different reasons we answer very slowly.
For several days we have been sailing through a belt of rain and squalls.
Thin strips of tuna hung on strings to dry now threaten to rot before they dry.
Mould is beginning to take over the walls.
The hatches are closed. In squalls the yacht rounds up into the wind and accelerates to nine knots.
The wind ranges from twelve to forty knots, constantly surging up and down, so we hand-steer almost around the clock.
The deckhand and the wind
Ladunya found vocal exercises and songs on her phone that she had learned during singing lessons in Australia, and spent two days singing them on deck.
Apparently that is why so many flying fish gathered around the boat.
They glide above the water looking more like little birds. I imagine people seeing the open ocean for the first time must stare in amazement at this miracle: is it a bird or a fish?
Yesterday frigatebirds circled overhead, probably arriving from the American islands we passed without seeing.
Every day a booby had been circling the yacht too. Yesterday it disappeared somewhere — perhaps it got tired of resting on the water and returned to land.
Today there are no birds at all. Everyone is staying home in weather this wet and stormy.
Rain pours as if from a bucket and the wind whistles like a highwayman at up to twenty-two metres per second.
We are waiting for the weather to change, having somehow decided that by around 10° north the rainy belt will end.
Five days from now, then…
For the moment, to produce electricity, we have started the engine.
Thank you to Viktor E., Kali Mara and everyone who supports the expedition budget through YooMoney.
Thank you for the comments and messages on the website, friends. We read everything.
Hugs.
You can find our real-time position under the Route tab. It shows the track from the Rockstar Iridium 360 tracker provided by MVS Telecom.
Sent by satellite on day 20 at sea.
Coordinates: 6°25′ N, 176°55′ E.