[password] radioactiv
[position] 33 55.219S 174 08.008E
[weather] last night around 1 or 2am we lost our wind and started motoring
[speed] 6.5
[heading] 168
[status] You just don?t get magical nights like last night often, and Sasha knew it. After a hearty dinner of Spaghetti Bolognese Mike set the night shift roster. After a few nights of captain favouritism where Sasha netted only one 2 hour shift. She fronted up and said she could do two shifts, both Ross and Tony the crew laughed. Sasha ended up with the 6pm to 8pm shift, Ross was scheduled to do 8pm to 10pm, Tony after that, then Mike who decided to only have one shift last night (well deserved - as let?s be honest he carries us all) and then Sasha was back on at 2am till 4am with Ross finishing up with the 4am to 6am shift. But by the time Sasha got to the helm, after dinner and chatting etc, it was already almost 7pm - half of her scheduled shift was already over. Sasha settled in but told the lads that she would start her 2 hours from that point and the boys shuffled off to get some shut eye. With the sun set, the cabin lights dimmed, along with the chart plotter brightness. Sasha settled in to finish her third audio book of the passage - ?The Five Dysfunctions of a Team? by Patrick Lencioni. Yes, Sasha is weird and loves business management books, a passion she has had since uni. If you have read (or listened to ?The Five Dysfunctions of a Team? I/Sasha highly recommend it, I literally laughed out loud at the fictional characters within the fictional tech start-up executive team, they were so realistic and reminded me often of people I have worked with in the past. The book is a story, that weaves within its (at times) amusing but always interesting plot the principles that make up a good team; T.C.C.A.R is how I am going to remember the model, that stands for Trust, Conflict, Commitment, Accountability and Results - all things that should exist within a team for it to function effectively.
Sasha was so engrossed in the the story and the readers entertaining accent of the English introvert who was heading up product development that she stayed on helm till just after 10pm. So many awe-some things happened during those 3 hours, Sasha watched the moon rise, big round and orange. Then at one point she saw a sudden flash in the sky, and caught the end of a shooting star, as she was registering what she just saw she realised all the stars seemed to be moving at pace across the sky, it wasn?t until her eyes adjusted that she realised a very bright large satellite was hurtling past at great speed. She quickly paused the audio book, and changed the app on her phone to the Sky Guide, to just check whether she was seeing a comet, because it was too bright to be a satellite surely? But alas, nothing showed up on her star guide, and Sasha shifted from the helm seat (on the starboard side) to the port cockpit seat to watch the bright light speed away over the horizon travelling south in front of MOONFISH.
At that point Sasha checked the time on the plotter, it was just coming up to 10pm, she considered waking up Ross, but decided to stay a while longer, knowing full well this would be her last night at sea for a long time. The main and head sails were in full use, MOONFISH was regularly hitting 8 to 9 knots, and the sea was as flat as an ocean sailor could wish for. Sasha knew these were ideal conditions and that she should relish every moment. Besides, the berths inside were quiet, the lads were fast asleep, she had the whole ocean to herself - or so she thought. About 5 mins into her luxurious mindfulness of being fully present in the moment, out of the corner of her eye she saw lightening quick disturbances in the water to the starboard stern. At first she dismissed them as unusually large flying fish - of which there have been thousands on this trip, with some so keen on meeting Team MOONFISH that they have flown straight into the cockpit, leaving only a message of ?I was here? in smelly fishy scales. The remnants of one flying fish still remains smeared over our windscreen. But after hearing the surface of the water break multiple times, Sasha realised these were no flying fish. She ran inside and exclaimed excitedly ?hey guys I think there is dolphins outside!? and then grabbed the ryobi hi-beam torch and headed back out to make contact. Once illuminated it was clear a pod of dolphins had come to visit. Every once and a while the torch would pick up these highlighter orange things in the water too, which may have been small fish or jellyfish, perhaps that is what had attracted the dolphins. Sasha chatted for a while, enquired about Dippy (the Dolphin who had dropped by a couple of years ago) and sat watching them jump and dive and play in the moonlight. It just doesn?t get better than this, and in case your wondering last night more than made up for both vomits.
We?ll be enjoying white chilli chicken with garlic stir fried rice for lunch today, and taco soup with corn chips for dinner tonight, as this will be our last day of passage. We are less than 14 hours away from reaching the Bay of Islands.
The cockpit smells of freshly caught skipjack tuna - no that is not a nice smell (why do you think I am inside typing?). But the boys are excited about the promise of tastier fish varieties and both lures are in the water as I type.
Apart from that Sasha enjoyed the first and only shower of the passage, with all three lads opting to forego such a luxury, Sasha couldn?t believe it, and thoroughly enjoyed putting on fresh warm clothes and eventually (after a tussle with a comb) being able to run her fingers through her hair again? it was so matted from the wind and the salt of the first couple of days she thought her only options would be to shave it all off or resort to dreadlocks. Thankfully after a bottle of conditioner, the minute knots of chaos eventually were tamed.
I think that?s about all for now? we are very grateful for the lovely sunny calm weather New Zealand is putting on for our arrival. We?re very much looking forward to catching up with everyone, eating our full of fresh NZ produce, even though it means the Stella Airtronic Diesel heater will need to be turned on again.

[END]