Ponce

June 19, 2019

This time I’m witting from the cock-pit, with the sun behind.  Antares is facing south and I am facing the trade winds, which are blowing, making the sound of an oboe.  We are not sailing though, we are on the hard.  Antares was hauled out yesterday morning.  The impact with the USO was not trivial after all. Water was slowly, very discretely, climbing the keel through sections of bare fiver glass.  Repairs will take a couple more days, at least, and I have run out of time. I have to be in Quito-Ecuador on the 21st to join my wife and daughters.  

l feel discouraged and frustrated.  Maybe if I had taken a different, more direct, route I wouldn’t be in this situation.  I wrote to Webb Chiles seeking words of wisdom and some consolation.  He just finished a grueling passage from Panama to San Diego, and I was unable to execute this one, much shorter, as planned.  He answered, but didn’t try to comfort me:

“When asked before a passage what I am going to do, I always respond that I am going to do what the wind lets me do. I don’t know whether I would have gone north or south of Puerto Rico.  I probably would have gone north if the wind let me, but either way a boat was going to be beating to windward much of the way.  I am in Evanston now, but looking forward to being back on GANNET week after next, even though I will be painting more than sailing.  Still I’ll be on the water.”

I guess I could have done things differently and a better, more daring, sailor would be approaching Grenada by now.  But I’m not giving up.  Will be back here on July 28th and continue the trip, if the wind let’s me…