Our final leg on our journey Eastward is well underway. Silver Fern departed Aitutaki on Sunday afternoon, heading out into 25-30 knots, and the sea state to match. All things considered, we’ve been extremely lucky with our weather this far into the trip, with some truly beautiful sailing from Tonga all the way to the Cook Islands. But the time came to finally pay the piper, so out into our 25 knots we went.

We had to start our journey heading pretty far southeast, as that’s all the wind direction would allow, making the first 24 hours of the sail pretty bumpy onboard. The crew has been doing an amazing job staying positive and working together, taking the time to move around the boat properly and manage sail evolutions safely. We’ve become extremely practiced in putting in and shaking out reefs, we could almost do it with our eyes closed!

Despite the upwind bounce, we have still managed to eat extremely well the past few days onboard. Some of the most memorable meals for me personally being Michael’s halloumi burgers, Andrea’s chicken fried rice, and of course, Drew’s fresh tuna sushi for lunch! On the other hand, I’ve tried my hand at boat baking, which was not so much of a success story. My banana bread ended up as more of a pudding and upside down on the floor in one of the waves.

As it always does offshore, the days seem to have blended together, with everyone in the routine of the watch system watching the miles to our waypoint slowly tick away. Despite all the discomforts that come with sailing offshore, this upwind battle especially not short of them, the magic of being offshore is still ever present. Leaving all the noise and worries that life on land can have, our world has become much smaller to just the 72 feet of steel we have here on Silver Fern. Life simplifies to keeping the boat safe and moving forward, cooking meals and getting sleep. Friendships and comradery have formed in the chaos and mess of all living together in our floating home, relationships that probably never would have happened otherwise, but now will last a lifetime.

Cheers,

Liv

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