Here’s a quick update on our journey this past week. We saw only light wind as forecast on the lee side of the island last Thursday. There was just enough time for a quick snorkel in Kealakekua Bay before dark. The quiet continued until we rounded the southern tip of the island and met with the strong trade winds and rolly seas. The rough conditions continued through that Friday and Saturday. Paul was never seasick but the rest of us had varying levels of illness and recovery time. For one of the crew it was too much, despite any treatments we tried. We hove to on Sunday evening for a rest but on the next afternoon she still wanted to go back to land. We turned around and sailed back to Hilo. The other crew member decided that the delay would leave her with too little time in the Marquesas and also chose to disembark. After a quick touch-and-go drop off on Wednesday we headed straight out again.
We are now making good progress in pretty favorable winds. Weather reports show that we might even stay on this tack the whole way there, or at least until we turn south to cross the equator. In the meanwhile, we are eating lots of fish thanks to the large skipjack tuna we caught on Tuesday. There were also three flying fish on deck yesterday morning, but they were too small to eat. Watch for more posts on the SV Serenity Facebook page as we make our way across the 2000 mile expanse of ocean.