Thanksgiving 2008

Sunset in Pismo Beach

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Cal vs. USC

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Ventura Kite surfing

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A Quick Sail Before College....

Pacific Cup '08 - Coverage of Morpheus Delivery from Hawaii

As most of you know, while onboard Morpheus I can only send text based updates to the blog. Normally, I'd get home after a trip and update most of the blog postings from that trip with photo's, video, etc.

Well, this time I managed to convince Mike Wallach that we should compete to see who can update his blog with the most interesting "multi media" content. This was sort of a head fake that Mike played right into.

You see, I knew Mike would do a fantastic job on his blog.

So, now all I need to do is give you the link to his entries and I've saved myself all kinds of work!!

For details on our trip home go to ....http://eatarf242.blogspot.com/search/label/Morpheus

Enjoy!!

Pacific Cup '08 - Video Summary

Pacific Cup '08 - We made it!

Pacific Cup '08 - Cocktail Hour as we pass the Farallon's

06:30pm
Still a bit foggy, but a nice view of the Farallons. Always interesting, especially for those that have not been here before.
25 miles to go.
- JDG
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Pacific Cup '08 - 4pm Update

45 Miles to go
Boatspeed = 8 knots
You do the math....
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Pacific Cup '08 - A Bridge too Far???

1100
80 miles from GGB
Deja Vu. I think I may have used that title before???
Anyway...good morning from Morpheus. Hopefully, the last good morning of this trip.
Over the past three days, I have held out hope of a mid afternoon arrival under the Golden Gate. That would be followed by a quick right hand turn into the StFYC where we could adjourn to the Grill Room for many arrival cocktails with friends and family and perhaps a short trip into the Marina District for dinner at one of my favorite local Italian restaurants.
Nice plan.
The only problem is that last night the wind shut off. Not like in the high where it shut off and left us with 5-6 knots. No this time we are talking less than 2.5 knots of wind. Plenty of hazy fog, and water like a mirror. The engine has been on, but our speed is not what we'd hoped for and now unfortunately we are looking at (what is becoming typical) an arrival time close to 11pm or more likely midnight.
So, have a drink for us this afternoon, and we'll see how things develop. Forecasts do not include any winds that will change things for us.
Patrick - You may need to find some pizza and beer for us. I'm sure you can figure out how....
- JDG

PS. Mike says he spotted a 2ft long shark a while ago, and we just saw an otter more than 80 miles from shore?
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Pacific Cup '08 - Cocktail Hour...

On a delivery, you always need something each day to look forward to. Each day, the good crew of Morpheus has had that thing that holds us through the day, that inspires us to continue to slog through the ocean, to keep our eyes open for ships, nets in the water, and floating glass balls. That thing is... COCKTAIL HOUR!!!!!!!

Each day about 5:00, Deb starts her chant, "Jim, is it cocktail Hour? Jim is it cocktail hour? Jim, is it cocktail hour?" We wake Scott up, purely for the social aspect of cocktail hour since he doesn't drink, and we retire to various locations (How many locations are there on a 50 foot boat?) on the deck for an hour of totally random and spontaneous conversation... Today, it was mostly Star Trek and spin offs, specifically about the various female characters on the shows, and their (lack of) costumes. Oh, and of course, fish. We always talk about fish, fishing, lures, lack of heavy fishing line, hooking vrs catching, how close to the boat you need to get a fish before it constitutes a catch... OMG! In the high's where we are motoring and no bow waves, we usually have cocktail hour on the foredeck, so we can watch for nets and garbage that we need to avoid. When the weather is worse, we all crowd under the dodger. Not that it offers any protection, since Scott got a wave right down the neck, and Deb got a lap full of a really cold wave, right after taking a shower and getting into her last pair of clean, really nice warm fuzzy sweats. *&YUYH&* But I digress...
Since Morpheus has historically been a dry boat on passages, cocktail hour caught the provisioning officer off guard. But, we did scrounge enough beer so that we could each have one Coors Light each day for most of the passage. Mike and Deb relished these beers, savoring the delicious "hiss" upon opening their daily beer. But the beer ran out. Horror. But, the provisioning officer came up with the goods and broke out the left over hard stuff from Hawaii. Since mixers were scarce, we had to improvise and come up with our own boat drinks. Jim's clever way of making ice in a zip lock was critical to the success of the boat drink experiment. Mike's "Morpheus Martini" of gin and Ginger Root was pretty much a flop, especially compared to the Rum and Pepsi Jim and Deb were enjoying. Rum, Pepsi and all sodas being gone today, Deb came up with "Pink Vodkas"! Vodka, ice and pink lemonade! Actually, very good. Since we are now out of Vodka, tomorrow we will try "Pink Gins"
Spirits are good upon the good ship Morpheus. See you all late Sunday!
Deb
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Pacific Cup '08 - How to cross an ocean on Morpheus

As this trip winds down, I will try to provide a summary of what the standard daily routine looks like onboard.
This may seem overly simplistic, however, please understand that we have spent considerable time discussing this and we believe it to be an accurate representation.
Here we go....
1) Standard Routine
- Sleep
- Stand your watch
- Eat
- Read
2) Repeat step 1 three times
3) Throw a fishing lure overboard with a disgusted look
4) Cocktail Hour - discuss some random topic in excruciating detail
5) Repeat all above until you arrive at your destination
- JG
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Pacific Cup '08 - Happy Birthday Christopher!!

8/16/08
Sunrise
Winds dropping, seas becoming more normal, still plenty of "mini-squalls" crossing our path. Interesting.

Happy Birthday Chris! 20 years old, wow!! Your Mother and I are sorry that we didn't make it home in time to celebrate with you. More than that, we are sorry that you couldn't join us for this trip. Hopefully, things will all work out better the next time around??
Hope you have a great day. We are pretty sure you'll manage just fine!!
See you tomorrow??
- Mom & Dad
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Pacific Cup '08 - - Miscellany

MW - Fishing and Gaming Correspondent - Morpheus Bureau - About 380 miles west of San Francisco


As pointed out in prior post,s there has been little happening on board Morpheus the last few days. Consequently we have had no time to blog about what we have not been doing. I will attempt to remedy that oversight with this post.



FISHING

No fish. Hooked something big and heavy at dusk a couple days ago on the light line. Never saw it. It went deep. After playing it about 15 minutes we got it close to the surface, it swam under Morpheus dragged the line across the rudder and broke it. Another lost lure.

We had three lines in the water yesterday, one today. Nada. Nada. But on a positive note, we have lost no additional lures.



GAMING

Thursday I won the Morpheus Liars Dice Tournament. It was not close. I never lose at that game.

Wednesday we established a pool for arrival under the gate. Entries:

Scott 1:00 PM Sunday
Jim 3:00 PM Sunday
Deb 5:00 PM Sunday
Mike 7:00 PM Sunday

Closest time wins. Loser buys the first round on land. Winner picks the drink. All four passengers must still be on board as we cross under the gate for results to be certified official.


OTHER
As cocktail hour convened today, Debby - fresh from the shower - claimed the only guaranteed dry spot directly under the dodger - She explained she was wearing her last clean dry clothes. Being gentlemen, the rest of the Morpheus crew, of course, acquiesced.

Do I even have to say what happened? Freak wave smacked the dodger at an odd angle, sending a river of water surging under the dodger and along the sliding door guide, pouring a bucket of water directly into Debby's lap.

The Morpheus is not a happy boat right now.

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Pacific Cup '08 - Not such a great day

Grey Sky
Windy aprox 20 knots
Confused Seas, swells from a variety of directions
Some onboard not feeling so good
Rain
Squalls
Uncomfortable, but safe and sound!!
Tomorrow better.
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Pacific Cup '08 - Reporting from Morpheus 081308

Just wanted to report nothing happened today. A B S O L U T E L Y nothing.
Scott
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Pacific Cup '08 - Drug Transfer at Sea - A done deal

Like clockwork (an hour later than predicted) Morpheus and Recidivist sighted each other traveling in opposite directions 972 miles from San Francisco.

Recidivist tacked and took up a course towards San Francisco. Morpheus fell in behind and slightly to leeward. Seas were moderate and the wind was blowing 15 knots. Pretty perfect conditions for getting the required med's transferred between boats.
It was easy. As we pulled along side the tossed over a throw rope (those things really work!). At the end of the rope was a dry bag attached to a second rope that Recidivist controlled. Scott and Mike stuffed the drugs in the bag (well Scott did, Mike was busy taking pictures), and once closed the bag was pulled back across to Recidivist. That's it. Easy as could be and we were off again!!


Hope they work!

Nice day out here. Another one. Easy downwind VMG sailing under main and jib. Home sometime late next weekend.
-Jim
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Pacific Cup '08 - Fish Story - Lessons #9 and #10

MW - Fishing Correspondent - Morpheus Bureau - Somewhere in the Pacific High
During the 2003 Tahiti to Hawaii crossing, Christopher, Patrick and I spent many hours in the cockpit under the stars discussing modern physics, particularly relativity, quantum mechanics, and the theory of parallel universes. No - really - we actually did. Sitting in a small boat between the deep blue sea below and the limitless stars above, it just seemed like the thing to do at the time. In particular I am reflecting on the discussions we had about the theories positing the existence of infinite parallel universes - many only slightly different from each other - existing only a short dimensional shift from each other. For example, in one universe you catch a fish, in the universe next door you don't - otherwise they are the same.
Somewhere in a nearby universe, there is a photograph taken on Sunday afternoon, with Jim and I standing on the stern of the Morpheus, each holding a four foot dorado/mahi-mahi that we just landed within 20 minutes of each other, one on the hand line, one on the reel. I believe that some terrible mistake has been made, and I am supposed to be living in that universe. But I don't live there, instead I am here in this universe with you, where that photo does not exist. This is what happened in this universe:
Jim called out "Look at that fish jump!" I looked in the direction of his outstretched hand and saw a big dorado crash back to the surface. Then behind it - another - and another - and another. "It's a school!" I said. The dorado/mahi-mahi is a beautiful fish. long. lean, metallic gold green, almost like the paint job on a two tone California hot rod. It was a spectacular sight as they leapt through the calm water, sparkling in the intense mid-day sun.
"I think they are heading for our lures." Jim said. They were. We were motoring through the Pacific high. As usual we had two lines in the water, a hand line with the cedar plug, and the reel with the underweight replacement line trailing a ridiculous rube-goldberg abomination I had fashioned out of pieces from the tackle box that morning. The school was moving in the opposite direction as Morpheus, quartering in toward our wake.
"Look." I said "That one is heading for your lure." Snap. He was on the hand line. I grabbed the line while Jim slowed the engine and put on gloves. I handed the line to Jim. The call of "Fish on!" brought Scott from below and Deb with my camera. It was a big fish. Four feet long. Well, to be precise, I'd put it closer to 3 ft. 11 inches.
Jim slowly and methodically brought the fish closer to the boat. I stationed my self on the swimmers platform in the stern of the boat to gaff or net the fish. Unfortunately, there is neither gaff nor net on board Morpheus. I was not sure exactly what I was going to do. I know what I should do - grab the fish under the gills. But Jim had the gloves and there were flashing teeth and a big hook, and I was not sure what I was going to do.
It is important to note at this point an obvious fact - the fisherman handling the line loses control of the fish once someone else nets or gaffs or grabs the fish or the line. Back to our story in progress.
The fish was at the boat. I grabbed a stanchion with my left hand to anchor myself to the boat, reached down with my right hand, grabbed the leader in front of the fish and heaved the gold green brute out of the water. Every bit of 3 feet 11 inches. He was over the transom now, but still flopping on the hook under my straining arm. I could not grab him with my other had without releasing my hold on the boat. What to do? I tried to lift him higher and throw him over the lifeline onto the Morpheus deck. He flopped, lost the hook, bounced off the transom, and was gone.
There was a long uncomfortable silence while we all looked at each other. I'd rather not describe the look that Jim was giving me. But before anything could be said, the drag on the reel started screaming. We had another fish on the line. I could not get out from under that gaze fast enough and scrambled behind the brass reel in the holder on the port side. Conscious of the light test line spooling out of the reel, I babied the drag, tightening ever so slowly - the fish jumped. Another dorado. Another four footer. Well, to be precise, I'd put it closer to 4 ft. 1 inch.
Long story short...er.. Long story not so long... I fought the fish for about 20 minutes, treating the line like a thread. The fish jumped at least six times bringing it in. Finally it rolled on its side and I could draw it slowly up on the stern. It was every bit of 4 ft. 1 in. Jim was already on the step in the transom wearing the gloves. Somewhere behind me I vaguely heard a small voice saying "Hey guys - I know how to do this. I snag fish in the delta all the time." I think it was Scott. Must have been. But I was focused on Jim. "Jim, the only way to bring it on board is grab it under the gills."
Jim said "I can get the wire leader."
I said "Jim, the only way to bring it on board is grab it under the gills."
Jim grabbed the leader and pulled the head of the fish over the transom. Then his hand slipped up the leader to the line. The fish flopped. The line broke. The fish was gone.
I dunno.
Both fish were caught. Both fish were brought on the boat. Both fish were "released" depending on how one interprets the "state of mind" of the fishermen and gaffers. Regardless of psychological interpretation, it was one of the most extraordinary fishing experience of my life.
Deb made a very nice Hamburger Helper plate for dinner.
RULE # 9
If your name is Jim and you have a fish on the line, have Scott and not Mike bring it on board.
RULE #10
If your name is Mike and you have a fish on the line, have Scott and not Jim bring it on board.
This is still not a bad universe to be in, but they were eating better on the Morpheus in that neighboring universe.
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Pacific Cup '08 - Happy Birthday Mom!!

Have a great day! Sorry to be away...
-Jim
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Pacific Cup '08 - Rendezvous at Sea

8/12
7am PDT
Good Morning. Celebrated passing the half way point yesterday with a few afternoon Morpheus Mai Tai's. 5:30pm cocktail hour has become a standard daily event. I think it's a nice addition to our passage routine.
During last nights roll call, Recidivist announced that it had a crew onboard with Cellulitous (spelling?). I guess this is something that has been developing over several days and has become a big issue. Normally this is treated with Penicillin, but the crew member is allergic to that. So...an alternative drug is needed. Lucky for everyone, we have the drug they need and we were the second closest boat to them.
At 1AM this morning we agreed to a rendezvous point aprox. half way between us, and should be meeting each other at about noon today. Lucky for us, they are right on the way home. Unlucky for them, they had to turn and motor upwind in 15+ knots of wind directly away from home.
Details of the exchange to follow. Who has ideas regarding the best way to pass drugs between two boats offshore in waves and 15+ knots of wind?? Send your suggestions by 11am!!
thanks,
-Jim
PS. Amazing to hear Steve Chamberlain of Surprise on the SSB last night during our Pacific Cup Roll Call. Steve is anchored in Tonga!!!
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Pacific Cup '08 - We catch a fish

MW post.
Catching the fish is a bit of old news, as Debby and Jim have already related the news in prior posts, but I thought our one and only fish catch was worthy of a bit more color before we move on to even more lessons on how to not catch fish from the Morpheus. Yes, we have two more lessons to divulge, but I just cannot talk about that right now.
I am admittedly a bit slow in adding details of that single catch because I was, quite frankly, intimidated by another bit of news. Via private correspondence on the boat we learned that some of these posts are being used in Mrs. Humphrey's 5th grade class as illustrations of creative writing. This certainly gives one pause. I mean, rambling on a blog about fishing, and sailing, and demon birds from hell is one thing. But helping shape the malleable young minds of the next generation is another thing all together. Shouldn't I be doing more? Shouldn't I be trying to pass along the collected wisdom of my 55 years? Or something?
Whatever.
When we last left off, Rule #3 of "How to not catch fish" documented a jumping Dorado/Mahi-Mahi behind the boat just after the line was reeled in. Rule *8 documented Jim actually hooking a dorado with the hand line a few minutes later, but losing it with a very sportsmanlike long distance catch and release. By the way - for the benefit of Mrs. Humphrey's 5th Grade class - I did not actually write Rule #8. It was appended by Jim while I was on watch and shortly before he posted it to the blog. Hence, I am not responsible for the double negative of starting a rule supposedly about NOT catching fish with another negation - "Don't hook a fish right at sunset". Yes, the whole thing confused me too.
Whatever.
The important thing, is the next morning after Deb relieved me from the sunrise watch, I put the cedar plug on the now seriously downgraded line of Chris' reel, and within 5 minutes had a two foot Dorado on the line. The call of "Fish on!" roused Jim from a sound sleep and he dragged himself up the companionway saying "This better not be a joke." With Jim and Deb's help we landed the fish. Finally. Then we sent Jim back below decks so he could preserve his illusion that filleting a fish on the transom can be accomplished without spilling a drop of blood, guts, or slime on the Morpheus. Within two hours the Morpheus delivery crew was enjoying a small appetizer plate of mahi-mahi sashimi. Within four hours we had mahi-mahi sautéed in olive oil with onion and garlic, served on a bed of rice, and drizzled with the garlic infused olive oil. There is not a lot of meat on a two foot dorado. but we were able to stretch what we had, and were left looking forward to the next fresh caught fish meal.
Alas this brings us to the unfortunate events of Sunday afternoon. But that will have to wait for a future post.
It is still too close.
It is still too painful.
Instead, we conclude with a new series - Life Lessons for Mrs. Humphrey's 5th grade class from the crew of the Morpheus:
Remember kids - Starving writers really starve, whereas starving software salesmen eat pretty darn good.

x-posted to Morpheus Sailing Blog and MW Mobile blog.
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Pacific Cup '08 - Dear Pat

We've picked up two glass fishing balls this trip!!
- Dad
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Pacific Cup '08 - Another Day in the Pacific High

Day #6 of our journey finds us 963 miles from Hawaii, and 1266 miles from San Francisco.
As usual we spend most of our day learning new ways NOT to catch a fish. I will let Mike describe the events of the day, but should mention to Chris that we've already lost 600+ feet of his high test line, and his lure collection will need some "enhancement" upon our return. Fear not, his birthday is 8/16!!
We've also become very good at clearing sections of net from our propeller. Nice that Mike feels so comfortable swimming around taking pictures of the boat and birds in the area. I do not really have any desire to add myself to the oceans food chain.
Still dealing with very light winds. Had hoped to catch the tail of a low sliding over the top of us today. Perhaps we will miss it?? Rage was reporting 35 knots only 100 miles to our North last night. Where is our wind?? Initial 160 gallons of fuel now down to about 120....
-Jim
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Pacific Cup '08 - Hi from the High

Hi you guys!
Well, we are in the high and motoring straight to SF. We should be motoring for another day, then the wind should pick up.
Yesterday was an adventure! I was on watch at dawn. Beautiful sunrise. Then Mike caught a Dorado/Mahi Mahi! Catching, cleaning, and deciding how to prepare it took a good chunk of time. O, then we had to retrieve the bucket that fell into the H2O while Mike was cleaning the fish. Then we found and retrieved a glass fishing ball. I made the ultimate catch using my straw hat! At this point, a HUGE brown albatross type bird joined us, trying to figure out what we were doing. (Wing span about 7 feet. Looked like a big goose size.) The bird obviously thought we might be a source of food. Off we go, closely monitored by the big brown bird,(BBB) and then his BBB buddy.
Then we ran over a piece of fish net that fouled the propeller. You have never seen Jim levitate so fast from down below to the back of the boat to kill the engine. We start floating around again, so we are joined by BBB # 3. BBB 1 decides to swim into our fishing line, so we have to cut the line and let it slip backwards through it's feathers, or he would have impaled himself with the hook! Mike was not pleased to lose his lure. We attached an under H2O camera to the boat hook, and took a video of the propeller. Yep...propeller fouled with net.
Jim briefly puts boat in reverse and a 2 x 2 piece of net floats to the surface. Just to make sure, Mike jumps into the H2O with mask and snorkel to make sure the propeller is clear. Did I mention we are in the MIDDLE of the Pacific Ocean, a thousand miles from land, and the water is 3 miles deep. You can easily see down 100 feet.
BBB # 4 comes to investigate. Mike start splashing birds to keep them at least a foot away... Um.. Mike? These are sea birds. They don't care if they get wet.... BBB 1 - 4 decide to give Mike 2 feet of space. Mike checks propeller. All is clear. Mike gets classic self portrait shot of himself, bird, Morpheus, Jim and me from the middle of the Pacific High. Mike climbs back in the boat, and we are off again.
Rest of the night went well.
Trying to get home by Chris' Bday, but we may miss by a day or 2. Will have a big party when we get home. OK?
Love to all. Keep me posted on the Olympics! Denise, say hello!
Deb
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Pacific Cup '08 - United States more to the right

Checked Morpheus progress at FIS Tracking. Please note that the US
is more to the right. -Bob
***
Bob,
Thanks for that helpful hint!! As Mike suggested in his response to you, I WAS holding my charts sideways. Have worked that issue out now, and I think you'll see some improvement the next time you check the tracking info.
Thanks again,
-Jim
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Pacific Cup '08 - MIke caught a fish!!

A small Dorado, but still a fish!
It was about 18 inches long.
He is happy.
My boat is covered in fish guts...
-Jim
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Pacific Cup '08 - Things we have learned about how to not catch fish from Morpheus

MW Post from Morpheus - Somewhere in the Pacific Ocean - Apparently heading for the Bering Sea
As noted in prior posts, we have had two lines in the water almost continuously since leaving Hawaii. Over the course of journey so far, we have gleaned some valuable lessons on how to not catch fish from the Morpheus. For the benefit of future sailors on the Morpheus who intend to invest time, money and effort fishing from the Morpheus in an ocean that is filled with fish, but would like to avoid the messy business of actually catching anything, we offer these helpful tips.
1) USE LURES WITH CORRODED OLD HOOKS.
On day two Jim decided to put a Rapala lure on the hand line. It looked like a brand new lure, but has spent some time in the tackle box as the hooks were a bit rusty and corroded. After a day in the water, the Rapalla emerged with bite marks all over the body of the lure, and points broken off the corroded treble hook.
2) BUY EXPENSIVE LURES PAINTED LIKE A FISH THAT DOES NOT ACTUALLY LIVE IN THE PACIFIC OCEAN.
On day one I fished with a lure I purchased at Hi's Tackle Box in San Francisco. It is a cedar plug painted like a Rainbow Trout. The local aquatic denizens were greatly amused.
3) AT THE END OF THE DAY, REMOVE YOUR LINE FROM THE WATER IMMEDIATELY BEFORE FISH START JUMPING BEHIND THE BOAT.
This just happened. I interrupted writing this post to go on deck and reel in the rig we have had in the water all day. As I was unhooking the retrieved squid lure to put back in the box, I looked up to see a three foot dorado jump right behind the boat where the lure was moments ago.
4) USE THE SQUID LURE.
It is friggin' useless.
5) HOOK A FISH THAT IS BIGGER THAN MORPHEUS.
Well we don't actually know big the fish was, as we did not get a good look at it. It may only have been as big as Morpheus is wide. We only saw a hint of the fish and the tsunami it triggered when crashing back into the water about 100 yards behind the boat. It may have been more than 100 yards back even at the time of the jump. If Chris is reading this blog, I would be curious to know the test strength and length of line he had on the big brass reel. I am guessing it had several hundred yards of 75 lb test. Note the use of past tense. But I am getting ahead of myself.
This happened yesterday. I used an overpriced big black brute of lure that I also purchased at Hi's Tackle Box. You can see a picture of it if you look back on my blog to the posts shortly before leaving for Hawaii. The staff at Hi's told me it was a Wahoo lure. It was affixed to Chris' rig by a fifteen foot titanium leader, also purchased at Hi's, which they assured me I needed if I intended to catch a fish with teeth. It is shocking what has happened to the price of commodities like titanium during the Bush administration. But I digress.
I spent the morning at my usual post reclining in the cockpit with my back slouching against the bulkhead, hat pulled down to eye level so I can focus with intense concentration on the action of the rod in the holder and the line in the water. By the way - I have independent confirmation that I was at my post fishing, as Debbie took a picture of me there, apparently under the mistaken impression that I was sleeping. Nothing could be further from the truth. I was concentrating. I will update this post with said picture later as evidence.
Of course, no one can maintain that level of intense concentration indefinitely. After several hours I decided to take the action that all fishermen know is guaranteed to bring fish. I went below and made myself systematically unprepared for a fish to be on the line. I removed my safety harness and put it away. I booted my laptop and rendered my camera inoperable by beginning to download photo's. I stuffed a sandwich in my mouth. At that exact moment - I heard the scream of the drag on the reel and Jim called out "Fish on!" My plan was working perfectly.
By the time I got the safety harness back on and made my way to the rig, we had seen the end of the jump, and 3/4 of the reel had already spooled out. (Comment JDG: This was the biggest fish ever!! Seriously, ESPN Big Game Fishing Stuff! HUGE!) I slid the drag to the maximum level "strike", but to my chagrin, the reel continued to spool out. There was very little line left on the reel. Scott handed me the gloves, and I was able to add enough drag with my hands to stop the line from spooling out. That is the way it stayed for a while, fish on line, I am holding the line, pole bending, little line left on reel. There was no hope of reeling line in. Then the line popped and the fish was gone and all the line with it.
Then I noticed a secret button on the reel that would have permitted me to increase the drag more than I had it set.
6) DON'T BOTHER TO LEARN THE EQUIPMENT YOU ARE USING UNTIL AFTER YOU HAVE MOBY DICK ON THE LINE.
I don't think it would have made a difference in the end result, but it probably would have lasted a little longer.
7) DO NOT BRING A BACKUP LINE. I MEAN, WHAT ARE THE ODDS OF HOOKING A FISH THAT CAN SPOOL OUT YOUR ENTIRE LINE?
Chris has another rig on board. A much lighter open face reel. I have transferred that line to the big brass reel. It looks like the 10 lb test line that my Dad uses to catch bass and pike in Big Shag Lake.
Yeah. That should work.
8) DON'T HOOK A FISH RIGHT AT SUNSET!!
Jim hooked a 2ft Dorado on the handline this evening right at Sunset. A bit late to be dealing with fish cleaning etc. Not to worry, in his rush to land this one before it also found a way to escape, he pulled the hook right out of its mouth while it was planing across the waves behind Morpheus at 7 knots.
9) MORE TO COME TOMORROW...WE ARE SURE...

x-posted on Morpheus Sailing and MW Mobile Blog
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Pacific Cup '08 - Update from Morpheus

JG Post
Long periods of boredom, interrupted by a few moments of excitement. That really does describe this route home from Hawaii. You have to enjoy the journey, otherwise this would drive you crazy. To date, I think we are all enjoying the journey.
Current Conditions
- 1571nm from San Francisco
- 640nm from Hawaii
- 10 knots of wind
- Heading NORTH
- Boatspeed 7.5 knots

Events of Note over past 48 hours...
ALTERNATOR ISSUES
You don't know what you have until it's gone!! It's really pretty scary when you think about all the things onboard this boat that help us get home and require electricity. Ranked in my priority order...
- Autopilot
- Water
- Navigation Instruments
- Compass Lights
- Starting the engine
- Refrigeration
- Nav. Lights
- Lights
The list goes on and on. Anyway, I'd been getting the sense that we were not getting the normal charging output from our alternator during the last charges of the race, and the first few days of the return. Nothing terrible, but things didn't seem up to spec. Two nights ago though, we started the engine with the batteries quite low and I looked at the alternator output only to see a big ZERO charging amps!!! (of course it was just about midnight)
What followed was two hours of pouring over alternator and regulator manuals. Following suggested trouble shooting processes, and ultimately tracking down a broken wire that should have been connected to the alternator. Cheers of joy were probably heard for miles as we all knew that if we could not solve this, we'd be pulling a U-turn.
The solution seemed simple but was a bit more complex as it turned out. To reconnect the wire we needed to re-crimp a new end fitting on and reconnect to the alternator. To do that it was best to disconnect the alternator circuits from the batteries. To do that meant throwing the battery breaker, and that left us in the dark. Humm...no autopilot and no compass lights in 18 knots of wind. That could be and was interesting. We ended up with me steering and Deb holding a flashlight on the compass dome for 20 minutes while Mike and Scott took care of the repair work below.
It took two tries, but we got it right with no additional troubles. When the engine was started we ended up with about twice the charging amps as before. Perhaps we were dealing with a loose connection for some time??

FISHING ISSUES
Here again is an area that has thrown us a few surprises. We've been fishing with both Chris' big ocean rod and reel, and my handline setup. To date....no fish. In fact, we've become so frustrated that Mike will soon be writing a blog post entitled..."How not to catch a fish!". We believe that we are becoming experts at this.
So far, we've lost two lures, and entire reel of fishing line, and a hook without landing a single fish.

YOU SHOULD HAVE SEEN THE ONE THAT GOT AWAY
Just to give you some idea of what you will hear from Mike, you can expect to hear all about how he used his $26 lure to hook the biggest fish ever seen by anyone on Morpheus. I'm here to tell you, he is definitely not exaggerating. This fish was huge. Absolute ESPN Big Game Fishing Channel stuff!! The thing jumped in the air shortly after being hooked and while none of us saw the fish, we did see the biggest spray of water ever as a result of a fish. There was water thrown at least 6-8 feet in air, and perhaps 10 feet across. This fish was gigantic!!!
Mike's sad story to follow.

NEED MORE NEWS OF THE WORLD
- Olympic updates/results
- News
- Stock Market, bank failures, etc.
- Sailing results (Aldo)
- Stories of the Paccup Crew's re-entry into the real world.

That's it for now. Expect we'll have the engine on and be making somewhat of a right turn sometime in the next 24 hours.
-Jim
x-posted to MW Mobile Blog
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Pacific Cup '08 - Quoth the Booby

It is Scott's watch. Late afternoon. Scott is sitting in the companionway watching for squalls. Otto the autopilot is at the helm. The captain and first mate are sleeping below. I am in the cockpit, back resting on the bulkhead, facing aft, listening to Amy Winehouse "Back to Black" on the iPod, and watching a big sea bird circle the boat. The bird corrects course in mid-air, matches the speed of the boat, and lands above the transom sitting on the rescue kit mounted to the lifeline.
So there he is, less than 10 feet away. I am looking at him. He is looking at me. We are looking at each other. The bird decides I am no threat and starts preening and grooming himself. Blue beak with orange at the base of the beak. White body with some gray. Feet are webbed, yellow orange, like a duck. [I took pictures of course, and will update this post with same when we get back to the land of the big intertubes. In the meantime feel free to ID the bird - Deb guesses from the description it is a Blue Beaked Booby.]
The bird and I stared at each other for almost 30 minutes as Morpheus pounded through the swells. Then it got weird. The bird talked. You know - like a parrot. Now I don't expect anyone to believe this, I almost didn't believe it myself. But I was there, and the bird was clear as a bell.
As I look at the bird, I recall the story told by the race crew of something that took place only a week or so ago, at just about this distance from Hawaii. My understanding is that Pete was at helm, and he was attacked by a large seabird. The bird dive bombed Pete several times, each sweep coming closer until the bird's wing feathers were brushing against Pete on each pass. This was no ordinary bird, as Pete swears he saw the glowing red light of malevolent evil shining out of its eye sockets. It was a demon bird, sent from the gates of Hell itself, or maybe from Hula Girl (everyone knows that Cayard sold his soul to the devil - aka Larry Ellison). Fearing for his own everlasting soul, Pete cut short his watch, and scrambled below. There he waited until he was sure that the bird had left before coming back topside.
At least, that is how Pete tells the story. It sounds a bit different when related by other members of the crew. Ask them.
But I wondered, could this be the same bird?
Finally the bird tired of my company and left, but the spoken words emanating from his beak were still ringing in my ears. I was so shaken that I could not sleep, and was moved to describe the episode in verse:
Quoth The Booby
(with apologies to Edgar Allen Poe)
Upon the Morpheus, after main sail tending,
I sat and pondered the night watch pending.
While I lounged in the 'pit - too well fed -
I heard a flapping, just above my head.
There I saw a seabird soar
flap again and land on the transom floor.
The sun and salt spray burned my eyes,
But with no worrisome impending gybes,
we stared at each other - me and the bird so bold -
A blue beaked booby with eyes so cold.
"Speak!" I said, "What do you seek?"
Quoth the Booby - "Where is Pete?"

x-posted at MW Mobile Blog and Morpheus Sailing Blog.
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Morpheus Blog Entry via Sail Mail

MW blog entry -06-August-08

We have been at sea for 48 hours 2 minutes 36 seconds as I hit the period on this sentence. We know because Scott has a stopwatch feature on his watch, and started the clock the minute we left the harbor. I have taken to asking Scott how long we have been sailing every few hours. By end of the trip I will be asking every 15 minutes. It is a nice watch. I look forward to adding it to my collection. At some point I expect him to just give me his watch.

Jim will have to update you on the specifics of course selection,speed, wind conditions, and general progress but it has been a pretty easy run so far. I'll just supplement Jim's log with some random shipboard observations.

FOOD
We are eating well. Generally granola or grapenuts for breakfast with yogurt, fresh bananas and dates. Our first night out Deb prepared baked chicken with a vegetable rice medley, which became a delicious chicken salad for lunch yesterday. Last night it was a Mexican style Lasagna. Which brings me to the next topic:

SEA SICKNESS
Nothing to report, no one got sick. Deb, Scott, and I all used a patch. I didn't think I would need it, but stuck one on anyway - just for the dream entertainment value.

FISHING
Two lines are out. One hand line and one on the pole. No nibbles yet, but that may be because Morpheus is clipping right along at 7-8 knots, and the fish can't catch up. Yesterday we had a rubbery squid on the hand line and a cedar plug painted like a rainbow trout on the pole. Shortly before taking the lines out of the water I had an Epiphany. No fish out here has ever seen a rainbow trout. Huh. Today we have the unpainted cedar plug on the pole, and a rappala on the handline.

SHAVING
As in - Jim and I are not. We are preparing our face warmers to fend off frostbite during the cold approach into San Francisco. Scott decided to shave and offers a cautionary tale. Bouncing around inside an enclosed space with sharp instruments in hand while attempting a a delicate and precise operation like shaving - well - lets just say that I am questioning Scott's judgment. No matter - No harm, No foul. And I must admit the end result is quite striking. Kind of a picasso-esque avant garde pattern of shaved and unshaved squares across his face. Its a good look.

Debbie reminds me to conserve sailmail bits, so I'll end this here. More later.

Postscript: Deb wants Rob to know that he is in trouble. Something about leakage around the mast onto Deb's bed. Jim promptly threw Rob under the bus, saying it was Robs job to repair that leak. Understandable. Rob's not here. Jim is.

Out.

x-posted at Morpheus Sailing Blog and MW Mobile Blog

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Pacific Cup '08 - News of the World

You are all very quiet. Could use some entertainment out here....
Andrew???
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Pacific Cup '08 - 1946 Miles to Go

6:30pm PDT
13 knots of wind
TWA = 60
Heading = 10
Just short of 24 hours and 150 miles out of Hawaii. Not bad for spending the first 12 with a single reefed main.
Woke up early this morning and rigged the hand line while Mike was still asleep. Had hoped to catch a fish before he even woke up, but my normal success rate remains constant. Have now been dragging two lures for 8 hours with no luck.
All onboard are slowly getting used to life at sea. Last nights 18 knot winds have changed to today's 12 knot winds and that's making the process pretty easy. No seasick crew to date. Just several very sleepy ones!!
Making great progress. More reports later.
-Jim
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Pacific Cup '08 - 2015 Miles to Go!

7:30am PDT
19 knots of wind
TWA 60 degrees
First 12 hours of the trip are in the books. All have gone through their first watches and all goes well. No sign of any seasickness, although I may have sensed a bit of something in Mike's case. If he's feeling "off" he's doing a good job of dealing with it.
Had a good afternoon of kiteboarding on the sandbar. Had been shut out my previous two trips and was bound and determined to make it this trip. Good thing the winds just barely cooperated today, or we'd be there until they did!!
We've left aprox. 24 hours behind the bulk of the group heading home. Will be fun to see how many we can catch over the next two weeks.
Right now its reefed main and no jib so only about 7 knots. Just keeping it comfortable and letting everyone get their sea legs.
Hope our transponder is working. Is it giving you 4 hour updates or 6??
-Jim
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Pacific Cup '08 - Dueling Morpheus Blogs

Mike Wallach has been and will continue to blog about our trip at http://eatarf242.blogspot.com/

Check it out!

-Jim

Pacific Cup 2008 - Shore Leave - almost over!

Time to get back on the boat and start thinking about heading home.

What a fantastic week ashore here in Hawaii. KYC did another great job of hosting the Pacific Cup finishers, and we've all been running pretty fast.

I think everyone had a great time most of the crew was able to stick around for the majority of the week. Was great to have the time ashore after 10 days on the boat.

It will be nice to get back on the boat and take a break from the non stop parties and celebrations.

Not much time now, so I'll just post some pictures and video to provide a sense of what we have been up to since finishing.

.

Pacific Cup '08 - Best Pacific Cup Blog Entry Ever

Pacific Cup '08 - One Day Later...

Morpheus crossed the finish line yesterday at 3:00am just ahead of a group of boats and another set of squall clouds! The adventure was over, but our day was just beginning.

At the 25 mile checkin, the race committee asks you how many people you have onboard. To many this seems a strange question, but we knew the code. They need the number to figure out how many Mai Tai's to meet you with at the dock. We answered that there were 32 onboard expecting, a laugh and a request for a correction. Instead, the radio operator confirmed 32 onboard, and our hopes soared!!

One of the boats behind us was "Pegasus". When they crossed the finish line, they found that their spinnaker halyard (which had probably been up for 7 days) was stuck at the top of the mast. With a reef aprox. one mile beyond the line, that's not really a good thing. In the confusion that followed our escort boat wandered off to help them, and we were left with the choice of waiting or finding our own way through the channel. The KYC Bar and perhaps 32 Mai Tai's were waiting, we found our own way in!!

The rest of the day becomes a bit of a blur, we made it to the dock without hitting anything, drank 16 Mai Tai's, and then found that the KYC bar was CLOSED!! How does that happen?? Nuff said.

We established our pole position just outside the bar door, and took full advantage of that position from the time the doors open until we left the club for our new "home" in the afternoon.

Little can be said about the hours that followed. Several supply runs to the store down the street followed between swims in the ocean, lots of online catch up, and some well deserved naps!!

Pacific Cup '08 - Almost There

This will probably be the last update for the 2008 Pacific Cup.
If last night was nice, this is twice as good! Perfect sailing conditions of about 20 knots, spinnaker up, pole back and heading right for the mark.
Looks like we'll be somewhere about 2-3 hours too late to catch the Hula Girl and her crew. Congratulations to them, they did what they needed to, and a bit more, to win the race between our two boats. Now, both of us will spend some time after our finishes watching Recidivist and Sabrina behind us. Both of those boats have a good chance to correct our in front of us, and perhaps even Hula Girl. Time will tell.
Onboard Morpheus it really has been a great trip. Most of the regulars agree this is the most talented and compatible crew yet. No issues or complaints onboard, and perhaps some of us are just a little bit sad to see the finish line so close.
In any case, I need to get up on deck and enjoy what little is left of this great trip.
Thanks for checking in on us!
-Jim
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Pacific Cup '08 - Don't tell Debbie!

3:00am PDT
267 Miles to Hawaii
Five years ago, I convinced Debbie that we should get a boat to do some cruising with the kids, and an occasional ocean race.
I may not have understood it at the time, but while the cruising is and has been nice, I found tonight that the real reason we have this boat is so that I can drive it downwind in 20+ knots of breeze in big waves towards Hawaii surrounded by thousands of stars, and a few big squall clouds. Avg. speed well over 10 knots, top speed somewhere north of 18 knots.
What a fantastic watch I just finished!
Here is another huge thank you to Carl Schumacher for designing Morpheus!! She is just what we hoped she'd be. One of these days we'll get her the victory she deserves.
We had to sail more than 3/4's of the race, but have finally gotten what we came for. The next 24 hours of sailing will be the best of the trip.
-Jim
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Pacific Cup '08 - Great Squall Sailing...a wrap...and one less kite!!

Sorry for the very short update this AM. It's been a busy day for us. Great sailing right now. REALLY great sailing!
So...we'll save the details for the bar, but the bottom line is that last night at about 3am, as we prepared to gybe in front of yet another squall we ended up wrapping the kite around the headstay. Once, twice, three....five times!! Couldn't get it to unwrap regardless of our best ideas until about 30 min later when we went ahead with the gybe. (Not many have gybed a "reefed spinnaker" like we did last night!) At that point, the same wind dynamics that wrapped the thing worked backwards and out came the wrap!!
We dropped the spinnaker to fix a small tear, hoisted another, and then re-hoisted the 2A ASAP.
Hurray!! All was well and much to our relief, we had dodged the biggest bullet of the trip.
Turns out it was not a bullet after all. In fact, it was a slow burning fuse...
An hour later as we rolled into another gybe, the spinnaker split along a couple of seams that were obviously stressed and damaged during our wrap adventure.
In any case, we have our backup spinnaker in the air, and are enjoying some fantastic downwind sailing today. Great combination of wind and waves, making for some high speed runs and reminding us why we do this race!!
As for the race, our screw up cost us about 10 miles last night, and that was reflected in the position reports and standings at 9am. It's going to be difficult to move up from our current 4th in class, but we'll keep her moving and see what happens!!
See you all soon,
'
-Jim
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Pacific Cup '08 - Squalls 1, Morpheus 1

Very interesting night. Lost another chute after dealing with a wrap for a long time. Still lots of wind and plenty of tired people. All well. More later.
-Jim
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Pacific Cup '08 - Midnight - No Moon - Plenty of Squalls!

The sailing keeps getting better and better out here with each passing day. Such is the way with the Pacific Cup, and I am sure the Transpac. By the time we finish, we'll almost be ready to do it again!!
Had some fun this afternoon at Drake and JC's expense. Tim was driving and took us down a wave fast. Ended up planting the bow in the wave in front and flooding the foredeck with a few inches of water. This had not happened for a couple of days, so the guys below off watch were sleeping with the ports open. Water started to pour down on JC on the stbd side, and Drake thought that was really funny. Right up to the moment that a couple of buckets of water came in the other side and landed on him!!
This evening as we enjoyed our second night of freeze dried food, we could see a building collection of squalls off to leeward and behind. We knew we were in for a fun night and that's what it's been.
Gybe to get in front of one, gybe to stay in front, gybe back and start looking for the next one. All that while managing we hope to keep pointing the boat at or near the finish line.
It's warm now even at night, no jacket required!! Occasionally rain comes along with the squalls, but nobody seems to mind. Showers are tough to come by out here. Fresh water is welcome. Even the boat appreciates that!!
We are all beginning to look forward to the finish and KYC. But...we have a bit more work to take care of soon!!
- Jim
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Pacific Cup '08 - One Week and Counting - Best Day Yet!

Difficult for most of us to realize that we've been out here doing this for an entire week now. Without the typical shoreside daily routine everything seems to blend together out here into an extended series of sleeping, eating, and standing watches. One day vs. another is only important because once each day at 9am we get a report card for the previous day.
The story for us this morning was good news/bad news. The good news was that we've had our best 24 hour period vs. our division competitors sailing in our general area. Hula Girl gained only a mile, and Roxanne and XL seem to remain in striking distance.
The bad news is that the leaders in front continue to extend, and the inevitable has finally happened and the boats in our division behind us (we think they've been sailing in a bit more wind) have finally caught up to us in terms of corrected time. It will be very difficult to extend our lead enough to change that by the finish.
Things are close enough with Hula Girl that we've enjoyed the challenge of trying to minimize the miles lost via sailing on the favored gybe as much as possible while at the same time working towards the side of the course that we think will be most favored during the next two days.
Life onboard is now routine. We did try our first freeze dried meal last night and all seem to have survived. I think most were surprised by how reasonable it tasted!!
A bit less than 600 miles to go. Working hard to do what we can. Perhaps we will finally have a daylight finish??
That would be nice!!
-Jim
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Pacific Cup '08 - Business As Usual

Not really much to report today. It HAS been a really fantastic day on the water. Sunny, warm, a few tropical clouds floating by. Pretty perfect actually.
It would be a bit more fun with some higher winds, but I suspect all of our competitors agree with that and that more wind probably benefits them, rather than us. So, we'll just settle for what we have and keep working hard to get down the course.
Our forecasts continue to show more wind both ahead and astern, so it's difficult to see how we'll be able to catch the leaders up front, and at the same time we are faced with the challenge of holding off boats like Recidivist and Sabrina behind.
The sun has set and the squall lords are beginning their evening work. Looks like it will be a busy night of connecting the dots, using the squalls to our advantage, and trying to avoid any light winds that they leave behind.
All are well. Even after our first night of freeze dried dinner!!
More tomorrow after roll call!
-Jim
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Pacific Cup '08 - Sour Grapes?? A loser's perspective....

Notes from the other side of the judges table.
Jim Gregory turns into Simon Cowel offshore.
The introduction of alternative scoring categories at the 11.9th hour added additional degrees of difficulty that the competitors did not appreciate. Music has a major impact on the scoring and the lack of prep time here made for poor scores. On the other hand, middle aged men, shamelessly shaking the junk in their trunk for points took this competition to a neighborhood this blogger refused to visit.
JDG called this an "ugly Hawaiian shirt competition" and not an "ugly pajama set competition". His decision to enter an "ensemble" that looks as if he went to the "nightwear section" of Hilo Hatties and "and matched the tags" (aka Geranimals) in order to score an entry so putrid that he gathers huge points on pure shock and awe value is a complete and utter disregard for the rules of fair competition.
Protests pending.
Bird wins the sustainability award.
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Pacific Cup '08 - We took our foot off the throttle for an hour yesterday

Yesterday's halfway party and Ugly Hawaiian Shirt Contest was a bit different this year. After the 2006 version, people understood that this was not an event to take casually and the competition was fierce!
There were initially a couple of sad stories told by our "new guys". One said something about his girlfriend giving his shirt away to a friend because she found it in the closet and it was "too ugly" for him to wear. (sure!) Another told a sad story of normally dependable FedEx suddenly unable to find his home. (right!) Both came to understand the importance of this contest during the first half of the race. One created his own using an old T-shirt and a variety of food and galley supplies. The other borrowed what he could.
We added a couple of new "scoring categories" this year that included "presentation" and "music". Things got a bit interesting!!
How else do you describe moments like Jonathan with his face covered in war paint and fruit dangling from his ears rocking out to Eminem? Or, Drake prancing around the cabin top showing off his very excellent ugly shirt to the sounds of MC Hammer's, You Can't Touch This!! Or Rob, dressed like a background singer at a Jimmy Buffet concert??
Others will remember the wonderful sunsets, the fantastic sailing, etc. These are the moments that we will be stuck with!! (And if they fade...I've got pictures and video!!!)
So...I'm sure you want to know the results.
1st Place Jonathan Livingston 117 points
2nd Place Jim Gregory 116 points
3rd Place Drake Sparkman 104 points
4th Place Rob Moore 98 points

Now it's back to sailing!! If we lost ground yesterday, we'll make it up today!!
-Jim
PS. I messed around with the transponder using the magnet provided when I picked it up. With any luck I managed to turn it off, and then back on. In any case, the second time I passed the magnet past the box, the green light came on for the first time in days. Let us know if it's working.
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Pacific Cup '08 - Squalls to the left of us, Thunderclouds to the right...here we are, stuck in the squall zone again!!

Great sailing between midnight and 8am this morning. Plenty of wind as squalls passed by one at a time giving us the opportunity to take advantage of the increased windspeeds and the shifts that allow us to gybe (many gybes this time!) and work our way towards Hawaii!!
No problems, all going well. All that is other than the fact that we don't seem to be able to make any consistent gains on a certain SC50!!
Halfway party and the always popular "Ugly Hawaiian Shirt Contest" today at noon!! Standby for a list of the winners!!
Lot's of blue skies, good winds, and some scenic clouds to enjoy along the way. Great to be back out here!
-Jim
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Pacific Cup '08 - Midnight Monday

Well, its been an interesting day out here today.Probably the most stressful to date as we were pretty much locked into our strategy and where we were going. We just had to sit back, work hard, and see how things worked out.
The first three quarters of the day were similar to the past few with almost 100% cloud cover. There was much celebration onboard when we finally sailed under blue skies for the first time this race.
This was the day that we tried to work our way around the most southerly part of the high pressure area's light airs. How did we do?? Once again, you all are probably in a better spot to know than us. Is our transponder working again?? Only you know what our competition was doing today. Here's what we think/hope. Time will tell if we are right.
1) We saw XL gybe South this morning in relatively light air. She did this while we were pointing right at Hawaii on Stbd. So, unless she found much better winds just a bit to our South, she spend some time going away from Hawaii while we continuted to make progress. We expect to like what we see relative to her at tomorrows position report.
2) Roxanne/Hula Girl - First, we are happy it's no longer blowing 25+ as those two boats seem to have a gear that we've never seen on Morpheus. Based on what we've seen the past two days, they both like sailing higher angles than we do. If that continued today, then they both had to take a more Northerly course than we did. Our hope is that they either sailed into less air than we had, or had to gybe away when we did not and thus (like XL) sailed on an unfavorable course while we continued on towards Hawaii.
Are we right? Wrong? We'll find out tomorrow at 9am.
-Jim
PS> Our fans have been quiet lately. That is usually not a great sign. Hope to hear more tomorrow....
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Pacific Cup '08 - Transponder broken? Radio issues fixed. Doing what we came here for...

Sorry for the lack of posting yesterday. Working hard to sail fast and go the right way. Seem to be doing a relatively decent job of doing that, but can not seem to hold onto Hula Girl. Lost 60 miles two days ago, and 30 yesterday?? Their rating says they will be faster than us, but there's something else at work here. They are sailing very well.
(While you can't send suggestions our way, if you think you know what we should be doing better, please post comments to the blog. We'll enjoy reading your ideas once we reach Hawaii!)
Sounds like our transponder is not sending updates. Sorry about that. Can't explain why that would be. It's in the same place we've always attached them, and we are not aware of any damage issues. You can probably find a page on www.pacificcup.org that gives our daily 0900 position.
Had some issues with the radio yesterday. Crawled into the aft locker to find that the ground connector on the tuner was loose to the point where it was almost disconnected. Fixed that and all seems well today.
All onboard were sad to learn yesterday of Mark Rudiger's passing. I'm sure that there are lots of other sailors out here feeling the same way. Makes you think a bit and perhaps focus on appreciating what we are doing all the more.
Will spend today trying to come up with a strategy to get us in a position for possible gain on Hula Girl. All agree that waiting for them to screw up is probably not the way to go. Not willing to swing for the fences at the expense of possibly opening the door for others to pass us.
Always interesting...
-Jim
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Pacific Cup '08 - 3 Day Old Pizza

10:45 AM, 7/19/2008
470 miles out from San Francisco
Our second day was marginally more comfortable and a bit faster than day #1. All and all a good trade. Still 100% cloud cover, but the spinnaker is up, we continue in more than 22 knots of wind, and we are flying fast exactly where we want to go.
Hope it's the right place!!
Life on board is wet!! (Leslie - Rob thinks a new set of foul weather gear would make a nice birthday present.) Above decks, there is a constant spray of water to deal with, below the heater has kept us warm, but condensation is everywhere. We hope to be able to dry things out during the day!
We all miss Bob's explosive personality, and wish he was here to keep us motivated and entertained. He's always ready for any sacrifice, so long as it helps the boat!!
Pizza remains the food of choice. Does anyone know when it goes bad?? Three days out, we must be pushing our luck.
All playing well together and happy.
Jim
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Pacific Cup '08 - Johnny Ryan is actually with us!!

Position reports just showed up and we are very pleased with our results to date. It's early days and all of us are really just out here setting up for where we think we should be for the last 2 thirds of the race. The lighter boats as expected are sailing lower, gaining speed but sailing more distance. We don't gain as much by playing that game and are staying a bit higher hoping for good wind and a shorter test.
Doing 15.5 right now!!!
And that brings me to our second subject. Johnny Ryan. Johnny did the last two races with us and we are missing him this time out. But...apparently he is here in spirit as I am constantly hearing guys on deck yell out "Hey Johnny!" at the helmsman whenever they chase a wave south rather than staying on course. It's tempting, but it's not quite time for that yet!! Johnny seems to set the speed record on every distance race he does, but can often be found sailing 10-20 degrees low to do it!!
Anyway, all good here. 20+ knots of wind. "Johnny's" top speed so far is 17.3...not bad, but that will fall soon.
-Jim
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Pacific Cup '08 - Fast out of the Gate!

Morpheus here. 9pm. All good. Winds as per forecast. We are not going slowly, and its a pretty wild ride. Sounds like Niagra Falls on deck, and pretty hard to type down here. Hula Girl just ahead and going slightly more South than us. We're doing our best to keep them close.
So...let's leave it at that for now.
-Jim
PS. Our East Coast friend thinks he's been sold a bill of goods! Perhaps we didn't stress the conditions during the first two days during our sales pitch???
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Pacific Cup '08 - READY!!!!

Let's go sailing!!

Bermuda Race - Wrap Up

Some final thoughts and a few last pictures

• No matter how challenging, sailing with Gibb and Ted is always a pleasure.
• Paul Cole NEVER complains!! He just gets very quiet...
• I am going to appreciate every moment of the Pacific Cup!!!
• Thank god for today's high tech foul weather gear!
• Fleece is the greatest invention ever.
• Onboard thinking is often not as clear as pre-race analysis.
• Best to share a firm pre race plan with the entire crew and then diverge from that plan only with very good reasons.
• The search for the perfect skilled and compatible crew continues and is worth the effort!
• Any boat going offshore should be able to heat water for coffee.
• Swan 42 decks are too slippery by design or manufacture. Swan should fix!
• Your boat captain or paid hands should work harder than others, while setting a positive example for the rest of the crew. Otherwise why are you paying them?
  
  

Rob - The race is over you don't have to sleep there any more!

Rob can't beleive how good a Dark & Stormy Tastes!!

The soft cooler pillow. Worth millions during the race!!

Mutiny definitely needs better pillows.

No problem, it was easy!!

My rail dream come true!

Hey! This was in that same dream!!!

Nice job on the post race accomodations Gibb!!

Wow!! People sure do wear some interesting clothes on the East Coast!!

Bermuda Race 2008 - The Wrong Way Fast

Ok, no need to dwell on the obvious. We didn't do well. Here is the short version of what happened.

First, we won the start!!! Very port end favored with a big ebb sweeping the fleet up to the line early.









We hit the pin at the gun and tacked on to port crossing the entire fleet!!











Should have called it a race right there! Actually, that's not true. We enjoyed one of the best days of big boat racing that I can remember as our group of three NYYC 42s were stuck together like glue between the start and sunset. Lot's of hard work and fun as we threaded our way carefully through the small boat divisions that had started in front of us.

We held the NYYC 42 lead through the entire day and only began to spread out sometime after midnight on that first night!!

Little did we know that we were already heading the wrong way, and options for recovery were going away fast!!

We had chosen to sail in a fast upwind mode. Not really worrying about pointing, as much as going fast and getting down the rhumbline. Our ultimate goal was to work West of the rhumbline in order to reach the edge of a favorable eddy on the way to the gulf stream. (red line) Our forecasts had convinced us that a 20+ degree lift was on the way, so not wanting to tack 90 degrees off the course to Bermuda, we and our NYYC 42 competition waited for it as we worked our way towards Bermuda.

Unfortunately, that lift never came and by the time we figured that out, it was too late to recover. We ended up missing the +3-4 knot eddy completely, and entering the gulf stream itself to the East of Rhumb in an section moving to the Northeast. (green line)

We were dead, and worse that that, we knew it!!




While the conditions remained relatively moderate for the entire race, it was all uphill and to have any chance at all we needed weight on the rail night and day.







Sleeping below was discouraged strongly, and crew moral suffered when some chose to ignore the skippers request and were regularly spotted asleep below.

A rare site! Danny was the winner of the Golden Pillow Award for the race.












Most of us toughed it out through a couple of the most awful cold and wet nights I can remember on a boat.

Our alcohol stove caught on fire the second night out, so that was the end of warm food, and without the ability to boil water for hot drinks we froze on the rail.

Huge compliments and thanks to the Mutiny crew members that toughed it out those nights!! Undoubtably, that experience will be the source of many hilarious stories once we put some time between us and the race.


The last evening prior to the finish the shift to the Southwest came through (bigger than forecast) and we were finally able to enjoy some fast and comfortable reaching conditions on our way into the finish line.








SUMMARY

What we did well

• We worked the boat hard, made all the sail changes that were needed, and made huge sacrifices to comfort in order to maximize the boats speed through the water.

Where we went wrong

• Obviously easier in hindsight...
• Missing that warm eddy north of the stream was 75% game over right there. We should have realized that and taken whatever steps were needed to ensure that we did not miss it. Even boats that tacked away 24 hours after the start to hit the eddy (Celeritas) ultimately made out via the benefits of the eddy itself, and hitting the stream in a far superior location.
• Having missed the eddy, we should have tacked to the west prior to the stream. This is what both Conspiracy and Barleycorn did, and it paid off big and allowed them to pass us and establish a 10-20 mile lead.
• Finally, there was no need to tack on the day prior to the finish. Again this is easy in hindsight, but the sw shift that filled in would have allowed us to reach the finish line without tacking and that may have been enough to allow us to beat both Conspiracy and Barleycorn. We didn't want to get stuck on the outside of the wheel and have to tack later at a less optimal angle. I guess at this point, we should have simply rolled the dice and prayed. Oh well....