A night under the stars!!
Sowell Family's Travels on Gijima
Skipper: Tim Sowell Admiral Tracy Crew Sean & Alex
Tue 16 Feb 2010 10:33
miles to go (23:24.045N 107:01.862W), the glow of Mazatlan's lights reflect
off the clouds, providing direction and a focus, in a night with clear
skies. Tonight there is no moon, so the dark night and the peaceful sound of
Gijima cutting through the water, the wind has dropped to 5 knots 30 degrees
off the bow, we are making all the rest of the wind with the motor, the
sails have been brought in, so we only now have the main up. The seas have
also smoothed out, and the ride is going well, Tracy did the early watch.
She saw what we think was the La Paz ferry which passed within 2 miles of
us, it was nice to see Tracy wake me to check action, and that the AIS and
radar combination gave us all the information needed to make corrective
actions. It was a good education exercise for Tracy on some of the new
navigation aids. The time before I went off watch as the sun was setting the
boys who had woken from the afternoon sleep started craft session, Tracy has
cupboards of crafts on board and we set about doing a number of activities.
Sean and I were provided the challenge of building a model Leaning Tower of
Pisa (which we made good progress and will finish tomorrow), while Alex did
some cards and shape modeling, the cockpit is ideal for this as it is big
enough for them to do this on the floor and we can still move around.
Again it is nice to be out on the sea at night, I am able to withdraw the
hatch in the cockpit this opens up the cockpit to the stars above. In the
warmer air you can keep this open while in the safety of the cockpit, I am
trying to understand and identify these stars. The stars actually shimmer
white over water showing how calm it was out there, no other lights exist
out there, the white wave off our bow fluoresces against the green starboard
navigation light as it peals off into the darkness. This calm setting is
soothing and continues to relax me, and allows good reflection on what we
are doing, and also ideas for the future. As Tracy commented yesterday our
extended stay at Los Muetros was a turning point in my approach as I seemed
to reflex even more, I suspect that idea of schedule started to disappear,
while I had done this in mind, but not in reality, but by delaying the
sailing was a change for me, and a good one, while the initial 30 to 40
miles where uncomfortable they were better than 2 days earlier which would
have been un sailable, so the call and patience was good call, showing my
evolution. Maybe our cruise started earlier, but only now I have shifted
into the attitude of this new life style, this is good, as it shows a drop
in tension, and increase in safety as we do not need to rush things. With
this passage also a good test for the family on a 30 hour passage it
provides another opportunity as we move down the coast.
We are about 3 to 4 hours out, the coast has just come onto the radar
indicating that it is 24 miles, we will running down the coast a little to
the port, hoping to arrive on the slack full tide as this port can be
shallow from reports.
Stay tuned next report from harbor.