Only 2000 More Miles

by Bob

We're in the race! Yesterday morning we motored out to the starting line. The monohulls took off at 1:00, and we took off 10 minutes
later. They said that this was because the multuhulls are in a different division. We suspect that after they saw us drive the boat
a the other day, they wanted to keep us away from the good boats. I think that cruel and unfair. I barely even damaged the dock when
I hit it.

So ten minutes (or eleven) after the monohulls took off, we crossed the Transpac starting line playing Stars and Stripes on the
sousaphones. I might mention that we were also the only two people on The Minnow.

We headed to Catalina Island, where we were to "leave it to port." That means we had to go to the right of it. We were going just a
bit to the left of our desired course because we could go faster that direction. It is almost always more fun to go fast than slow.

As a result, we had to tack into the wind in order to make the corner and miss the rocks. Before we tacked, all of the monohulls
were to our right, in our general neighborhood. After we tacked, we noticed they had all disappeared. It was obvious that they had
all sunk. But later in the night we encountered some of them, so they apparently just disappeared around the corner.

We just took an hour or so to drop one spinnaker (Thumper) and raise another (Whomper). It took a little extra time because we had
to raise it twice. Then we did some major trimming and sail changing (halfway across the boat). Now we're flying at almost 9 knots
in 12 knots of wind.

Last night I stayed up until about 5:00 am sailing. I didn't touch a sail or a rope the entire night. I just looked around for
boats, ships, and other obstacles. There was a rock out in the middle of the ocean I didn't notice until we were past it, but we
cleared it by 5 miles. I picked up the buoy on radar and assumed it was a slow boat. It would have been really embarrasing to wreck
the boat during a race.

Mike and I were looking around today and spotted six boats, most of them heeled over at a pretty good angle. I suspect they had the
people riding on the side, getting splashed and having good excitement. I got my leg splashed once today, but that's the only
dousing of salt water I've enjoyed so far.

Yeah, yeah, we're wimps. But we're in first place in the multiull division. There is only one other multihull. They don't start
until Sunday.

We took two sextant "shots" so far, per race requirements. I'm not sure what good they do since we took them at difference places
and times. We're required to do four, so maybe I'll quiz Melinda for some details and do some properly.

No fish so far...