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The latest! Doug Cabot reports Vikings have passed halfway mark of crossing.
Author: Doug
Lat/Lon: 64 deg15min N lat, 60deg 36'W long
Location: Davis Strait
Course: 270 mag, 230 true
Speed: 5 knots
Weather: Sunny
Sightings: Pilot whales, green flash
Log Date: August 07, 1998
Friday 2 pm
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On our watch - to which I awoke after a solid four hour sleep, or twice as much as I'd gotten, total, in the whole three days previous - the wind was dead or nearly so. After an hour of watching the sail slat back and forth in a mild swell, under foggy grey skies, we dropped the sail and took advantage of the break to work on some projects. Hauled out the rudder and changed the withe, going now with Terry's constrictor hitch stopper instead of a block. Raked the mast back a little, tightened all the stays and shrouds. I did a little housework, picking up and stowing drink supplies, cleaning out bin B, setting up water jugs and filling the bottles.
Then Terry and I took off the rake [accent over e] and re-seized its lines where it wraps the yard and was showing wear. Finally, just as our watch ended and the others crawled out of the tent, the breeze picked up and we raised the sail.
This morning's midnight-to-six shift was terrific. It had been blowing so much and I had been sleeping so little that I was afraid it would be a long, tough night. But as usual, I found myself happier to be out of the tent, dressed, than inside and trying to sleep while the boat pitches, slams, and shudders.
Along the northern horizon, the glow from the sunset lit up a long open patch under the clouds; and over the next five hours, sunset blended seamlessly into sunrise as the glow, moving slowly east, faded and then grew.
It was, meanwhile, dark enough to see stars (or at least planets), for the first time this summer. The full moon rose, and with it, a bright star that I figured to be Jupiter. In the morning, the sun was joined by Venus.
All of us wore our Mustang suits except Homer, whose yellow raingear seems to do him fine. Ah, youth. It was not raining but there was a good cold 15-20 knot wind, and the swell sometimes splashed or simply poured over the windward gunwale. Terry chose to sleep through this shift, leaving only Starboard Watch: Homer, John G, Erik, and me. When I wasn't on either of the two official posts - bow watch or the helm - I kept warm and alert by pumping the bilge, making log entries (course, speed, position, etc.), and just dancing in place.
Homer came through big with a 3 AM meal of Top Ramen and Hob Nobs.The wind laid down slightly, slowly, and the swells lost some of their size and chop, as the night wore on.
By sunrise we had a gentle wind and gentle waves. The colors of sunrise: a broad band of dark orange, fringed with shades of blue and green and grey, that finally concentrated itself into long patches of blood orange on the underside of the cloud ceiling.
And then, the Green Flash. I had heard about this phenomenon from a number of people but felt about it the way I do when friends tell me I snore: Yeah, whatever, show me. The part of me that did believe (in the Green Flash, that is: I still maintain that I don't snore), imagined some sort of general blink of light at the moment of sunset or sunrise; like the flash from a camera, something bright, total, and instantaneous.
What I saw, at 5:22 this morning, was not that. Instead, it was a super-concentrated, emerald-green beam of light which blazed out in one even pulse. It seemed to me like a drop spilled as the sun tipped its cup over the horizon. It burned for a second or maybe two: longer, according to John Gardner, than any he's seen before; and then it burned away into the brighter yellow of the sun's leading edge. I was pretty much beside myself and 'm afraid I woke everyone on Port Watch with my shouts.
Yesterday morning for two hours we were joined by a pod of pilot whales, at least thirty of them, which rose and dove in groups all around us. I took that as a good omen. And now this, a Green Flash, as we pass the halfway mark on our crossing.
Heave away, boys, I think we're meant to make it there.
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