Pacific Odyssey - Leg 5

It has been a difficult day: it´s not very fun to be out here now.  The temperature is very cold, the wind is blowing hard from ahead and the entire foredeck is regularly soaked. We are wearing everything we have when we have to be on deck.  If we are not on watch, we stay below.  The sun tried to come out several times but it does not provide much heat.  We stay below around the hold or after cabin tables or in our bunks, where it is warmer. Gillian gave us a lesson in survival mandarin, the official language in china.  She has written out close to 50 phrases we may need, and taught us how to pronounce them.  She made copies for each of us.  The stove has been giving us trouble as it refuses to stay lit and the galley, hold and foc´sle are then filled with stove fumes.  After several unsuccessful tries at lighting the stove and changing the orientation of the stove pipe, we decided to move on deck in order to air out the hold and foc´sle, they were too smoky.  Jordan and Ilia spent a good part of the late afternoon and evening setting things right and finally at about 2030hrs everyone was fed and content.  The wind has switched several times, slowing us down when it goes more northerly.  Right now we are doing reasonably well at 5.8kts: hopefully we can keep up this speed and be there in 3 days.  The detailed log for February 13th, written on our final night in Okinawa hasn´t been sent.  We will continue with shorter logs while we are at sea and will send the detailed log when we arrive in shanghai.  We celebrated Chris´ 20th birthday on the 13th: you will read of the details in the log when we arrive in China.  

This is it for now, pray for a good passage, good night, Bonice.