We’ve been sailing more or less north over the last couple of days, with good wind and moderate seas. We should soon be hitting the light aiir surrounding the Pacific High, which is still looking very confused. Oh well, we will sail (or motor) with what we get.
Early Saturday A.M. we spotted what looked like a well-lit ship on the horizon. There were several decks, and it was definitely a big one. But, it wasn’t showing up on the AIS. After several minutes of puzzling over this, the ship vanished behind the low clouds, and eventually reappeared above the clouds as — the Moon. The broken clouds on the horizon had completely fooled us.
The rest of the evening was spent sailiing through light squalls. Come morning the skies were mostly clear, and the water was sparkling. A beautiful day. Around noon the fishing line went into the water and pretty soon we were hauling in a 36″ Mahi-mahi. Fish tacos for dinner! In the afternoon we spotted a ship on the AIS receiver, about 25 miles off but on a course to cross our bow at a range of four miles. At about ten miles we could see her on the horizon. As she crossed well in front of us we hailed her on the VHF, just to say hello. She was carrying a cargo of coal from Mobile, ALA to China. And she had definitely seen our AIS transponder.
Last night was more good sailing, moderate winds and seas, and light squalls. This morning we sailed under a rainstorm, which did a good job of washing the several days of salt deposits from the deck and rigging. After the storm we were treated to a brilliant rainbow.
And so we sail on.
Paul / VALIS