Hawaii

At last I have an update for everyone - in the hurry to leave Newport Beach I did not get around to making a parting post. It was all the usual rush, but we managed to get away without any dramas. The owner of the Sea Spray boat yard, Paulette, helped out immensely by letting us use her car and even doing a lot of the food prep in her kitchen.

The trip was, on the whole, not the greatest passage ever. The first 36 hours were on the nose, most of the rest was 10-15 knots straight up the backside forcing us to lay in long tacks, and on one occasion we were completely becalmed. The passage was slow and rather frustrating, but of course there was some good sailing in there. Coming into Hawaii we had up to 40 knots and were clocking 11+ knots over the ground, all good fun until we blew out the mizzen sail.

We had a few problems on the trip, such as:

• Main engine full of sea water.
• One genset refusing to run.
• House batteries completely dying.
• Alternator not working.
• Main halyard winch failing.
• Shaft brake disintegrating.
• Blowing out the mizzen sail.
• Mizzen running backstay mount pulling out of the transom.
• Collapsed spreader on the main mast.

I guess a 2500 mile shakedown trip is going to throw things at you. I decided to head to Hawaii to repair the things we could not en route, and have been here nearly a week. We have cleared and will be heading out tomorrow for Tonga. Duff, Kim and Paul have left the boat in Hawaii and we have three new crew on board, Simon, Ross and Jordan, who are working out really well.

Assuming I can find time before we leave I will post some pictures and video of the leg shortly.

Cheers,

James,