A tough call by the delivery crew:

Update on a decision by the delivery crew. More immediate progress toward Astoria, but what is ahead for wind?

This from the crew:

Hello everyone,

Day 6 is coming to a close and we made a decision to change tactics. After studying the 500mb charts and the gribs for the next 8 days, I have made the decision to alter course and go below the high emerging on the NE corner as it fractures and forms an E-W ridge at 45N. This has been a tough decision because it goes against all the conventional wisdom of heading north. However, the 48-50 latitude in a week looks downright lousy. We would have great winds for a couple of days and it would die out and leave us floundering to the finish. By going south of the high, I hope to motor if necessary to get in position to broad reach to the CRB. I know Peter is going to lose sleep over this. Sorry, Peter.

Our position at 3 pm hst on 7/30 is 36d13m N by 150d19m W.

Scott and Stephen made breakfast this morning of bacon and pancakes. Great job! It got everyone going.

Every other day, we put on our harnesses and grab the bucket. We start at the front of Riva and give it a good salt water rinsing. It is amazing how thick the coating of salt becomes after a couple of days. We could scrape it off and get enough to use for cooking (actually, we are running out of salt and may have to resort to our deck supply).

We have inventoried our water and fuel and we are in good shape. We have used about 30 gallons of water out of one tank and have tank #2 in reserve. Fuel is also in good shape. We have about 3/4 of the main tank, 30 gal reserve tank, and 36 gals on deck. We have run the engine for 42 hours at 1200 rpm when sailing and at 1800 rpm when we need to motorsail. The fuel consumption curve appears to confirm our burn rate.

We just saw a tuna boil and Ryan and I saw a huge fish jump 10 feet out of the water chasing another fish. We think it may have been a large tuna or maybe a billfish. We are dragging lines hoping for something a lot smaller.

Riva is so smooth through the water. We have been sailing all night at 8-9 knots on a beam reach in 10 knots of apparent wind. The seas are very calm which I think is due to our proximity to the high. Whenever we drop below 8 knots, it seems as though we are not moving. However, we put almost one hundred miles good toward home overnight. That was a real morale booster to the crew. I did caution them that the elation may be short lived as we move into very dead air later tonight and possibly for the next 2-3 days. We don't plan on motoring until the boat speed is below 4 knots. It doesn't pay a good dividend to motor if you are sailing as it does not give you the best bang for your buck. So, as long as we are plugging we won't be chugging.

Dave

Hey everyone! Well as you know, we changed course and are now heading straight for Portland. I hope it pays off. We still have not found the cake mix. We just saw a HUGE sea turtle swimming in the ocean. It was really cool. Our wind is keeping us moving at about 6-8 knots and we are heading for home now. Hope everyone out there is doing good!

Signing off Greg

I think most of the details have already been said by Dave and Greg so I don't have too much to talk about... It feels really good to be moving toward home even if the wind is going to lighten up. we are projecting crossing the halfway point tonight or tomorrow which means brownies with frosting! (since we can't find the fabled cake mix). Greg and Dave are up on deck now trying to squeeze every bit of boat speed out of the 8-9kts of wind that they can, keeping the boat speed around 7-7.5kts. Gonna lather up with sunscreen and go see if I can help. Miss you all a bunch, see you all soon!

Scott out!

I want brownies, an to taste the other wine i was given by a girlfriend of mine in Hawaii. I promised myself not to drink until the half way point and i feel healthy as a fox. That's all i have to chime in fer the current moment. cheers to all!

Ryan signing off