02 52 S  98 04 W

All is well as we make approximately 200 nm per day averaging 8.3 kts under sunny skies since leaving Galapagos.

Best marine life performance to date goes to a giant pod of dolphins (probably 200 or more dolphins in the pod) in a feeding frenzy close to Sea Mist as we came along the first morning. They were hurtling into the air in all kinds of flips, jumps, somersaults as they charged to the surface and into the air as they came up from below to satisfy their hunger on a huge school of fish near the surface. Accompanying the dolphins were some Masked Boobies in their fishing routine of dive bombing in formation.

The next surprise was in the midst of the dark hours of the first night on passage. I had need of turning on some deck lights to trim sails a little and out of the darkness came these white seabirds keenly using my deck lights to dive into the water right beside Sea Mist and bag fish attracted by our lights. These Boobies look like extra large sea gulls in terms of body shape but are cleaner white with black trim for colour…..but the main feature is their ability to dive in formation when feeding on schools of fish. The Blue Footed Boobies are a bit smaller than their cousins the Masked Boobies; the Blue Footed ones fish close to shore and live out of the water on the shoreline rocks etc when not fishing. The Masked Boobies live and fish far from shore….nesting on remote small rocks/islands well offshore.

Nothing much else to report; S/V Kilkea and Sea Mist have remained close together on this passage and their masts are generally within eyesight of one another. Both crews like the proximity of another vessel as we are otherwise very much alone in the vastness of this Pacific Blue. We do connect daily by High Frequency Radio Nets with other boats also making their way to the Marquesas; the primary net has about 20-25 boats checking in with their position and reports of weather being experienced by them. The fleet checking in are strung out up to 2000 nm ahead of us and all the way back some 500 nm to the Galapagos behind us.

DTG to Nuka Hiva: 2535 nm