Day 5 Bora Bora to Tonga via the Cooks – points of sail we don’t like

Day 5 Tuesday dawned and we had wind but we also had 2m confused seas on the beam. If we had to list the three ways of sailing we don’t particularly enjoy it would be: 1. Upwind in open seas with waves 2. Goose-winging dead downwind(sail on each side of the boat) causing the boat to roll badly 3. Seas from the beam. As the day progressed the wind started to go more and more aft and we had no choice but to steer south to try and keep our sails full of wind or they flap badly – it’s often called ‘slatting’ in sailing.

To cheer ourselves up we decided it was scrambled eggs for breakfast with chopped up bacon. Chopped up bacon as there was no way you could eat it on the side while rolling around and it would soon be enjoyed by some fish in the deep blue. Ever since we’ve left Europe the eggs have always been top notch and we love them. Morale booster.

As the day wore on we tried our best to not end up steering to New Zealand but it was hard work and we were trying all sorts of tactics to stop the sails flapping. Games were back on the schedule – backgammon, monopoly deal and a new game called catch the dice before it flies off the boat.

Come sunset we had quite a number of birds come and survey the boat. They were most fascinated by the water towable generator with it’s 100ft of cable spinning away. Perhaps they fancied it as one heck of a good looking worm. Much to our surprise one bird landed on the stern sitting on the guardrail. And Penelope has been there ever since and is still there as dawn approaches. How she does it is beyond us – incredible balance in these rocky seas. We’ve had the odd bird land on Adina and hitch a ride but last time birds were sitting on Adina was Pelicans in the Galapagos. They found us a nice resting place or a fabulous point from which to look for fish.

Come midnight we turned the engine on to steer ourselves towards our destination. Once it’s light we’re going to get the spinnaker pole up and goose-wing as the winds are right behind us. So the genoa will be to port held out by the spinnaker pole and the main sail will be on starboard pinned out with a preventer line. Goose-winging? I believe that’s also on our list of least liked points of sail. 140 nautical miles to go – battle on!