Answering your questions. Ocean, day six. News via satellite link.
At last! We’ve finally got the wind we’ve been waiting for. Admittedly, it’s coming straight at us. It’s blowing 15 knots for now, but so steadily it’s downright annoying. Because it’s blowing directly from where we need to go. And Lady Mary is tracing one beautiful zigzag after another, at least doubling the distance. Today’s flight speed is 5 miles per hour. But along a curved path. All morning the yacht bounded cheerfully back towards Tahiti, and now she’s threatening to bound off towards New Zealand. We don’t need to go either way just yet. Bali, incidentally, isn’t on our route yet either, but we may call there in a year or eighteen months. I find that island very intriguing.
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We’re taking stock of our food, realising that, with our plans having changed, we may be a little short of fresh fruit and vegetables. We have mountains of everything else. We stocked up back in Panama and bought a few more things on Pitcairn Island, where, surprisingly, the prices turned out to be the lowest in the Pacific—goods came straight from New Zealand, with no mark-ups. And we bought a few more things in Tahiti. In short, we loaded up on tinned food and noodles. We’ve also got about 10 litres of beans, so we won’t starve.
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People asked in the comments how we clean the boat. We dive in masks and fins and scrub her with brushes at anchor, or even at sea if the need arises. It’s a meditative process, and not a one-day job. Although in emergency mode, you can get it done in a day or two. We have a post on the subject on our website called Sharks!!! Search for it—everything about cleaning the boat and its side effects is explained there in detail.
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And here’s another question, about the hand sewing tool for sails that the captain used to repair the mainsail the other day. It looks exactly like an awl with a wooden handle, a sewing needle and a spool built into the handle. We’ll show how it works in a video sometime. In short, it’s a matter of painstakingly sewing every stitch by hand, after which the seam looks machine-sewn.
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Friends, thank you for your comments, support and involvement! With what lies ahead of us, your support is a real lifeline. And we’re very glad that you are reading, or have read, In Search of the Castaways. Anyone who hasn’t caught up yet, do it urgently! Or watch the film In Search of Captain Grant. In the next update, we’ll explain why this has suddenly become important. And we almost forgot: tomorrow, the second part of our video tour of the yacht will be released on our YouTube channel and here in the group—come and visit!
Hugs to you from 21 degrees south latitude!