Pacific Odyssey - Leg 5

We left Guam at noon with strong winds and big seas within 20 minutes of departure. We raised the trysail, foresail and jumbo but soon lowered trysail and raised a double-reefed main and the jib. The wind is just forward the beam: there is lots of sideways and fore and aft motion and lots of spray over the rails but we are sailing along at 8.2 kts. This continued until this evening: the winds seem to be slackening. The main and the jib are down for the night, and the trysail is up again. It´s good to do so much sail handling, everyone learns faster and we have many eager trainees waiting to be a part of it. A fisherman unloading his fish gave Elske 4 huge yellow-fin tunas this morning. Chase, Scott, Jordan and Elske cut them up and Scott and Chase made fish nuggets for lunch and fish burgers for supper. There will be more for tomorrow´s lunch, it´s excellent. The Farrens family came to the ship to say their good-byes and trainees and crew bought final cold drinks and ice cream. Tonight the sky is clear and several trainees were starting to pick out constellations with Jose.  The moon is full and sheds its light over the sails and the sea, very beautiful.It is exciting to think that in 8 days we will land in Japan: it has always been the destination at the furthest extremity of this offshore voyage.  It is difficult to imagine and we discuss this in the stern as we try to stay dry, holding on to something as the ship heaves back and forth, making its way through the ocean. Until tomorrow, good night, bonice.