Saturday, March 31, 2007

Big Journey Ahead

Sailing downwind on Chasch Mer, a Santa Cruz 50.

July 2007 is the month for the Transpac Ocean race from Long Beach to Honolulu, some 2,200 nautical miles. One of many international ocean races, the Transpac has been around since 1906. This year the race is attracting competitors worldwide as well as local sailors here in Hawaii. s/v Chasch Mer will be one of many local yachts sailing in the race. This May I will be a member of a delivery crew sailing Chasch Mer to the mainland in preparation for the race. It's a long and hard sail, roughly 20 days and nearly all upwind. Besides being long and difficult, it will also be a unique passage for Swashbuckler Productions as email at sea and a tracking beacon that automatically publishes the yacht's position to the web will be available. So, daily updates will be published directly to swashbuckler.blogspot.com as well as a map monitoring the yachts progress. I'm very much anticipating the journey, but in the meantime I've got a thesis project and learning module to keep me grounded.