October 7th: Hot tuna

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20 06.02 S
165 59.77 W

Sailing Genoa & Mainsail
8.7 knots
Wind: strangely NW 300T at 14 knots
Seas: 1-2 meters (super smooth ride!)
Crew: Colby sleeping, Brett Helming, Peter philosophizing, Mac reading & Cyrus joking with crew... I am writing.

Comments:

He walks to the back of the boat in his classic Maine plaid shirt and surf shorts. It is time for Brett's shower and he comes to the back swim platform for his 'laundry bath'. It works for all of us. He just bathes in his clothes... shampooing his hair and his shirt in the sunset. He hangs his clothes on the lifelines to dry and changes into what he calls his 'sun sanitized shorts'. We all have this routine... salt water bucket showers with a fresh water rinse to save fresh water (we can do that now with the warm ocean). I spent the sunset alone on deck, a soft orange hazy dip into the ocean behind horsetail clouds. One cloud breaks free and looks exactly like a whale. So much that I call Cyrus up and said, "do you see the whale?" He looks up and smiles... 'A humpback!' he says. it is perfectly the shape of a humpback. We are on their route. Humpbacks usually migrate from the Cook Islands area to wards Tonga to give birth. We did see a few in the cooks but so far, it seems that large blue flying fish have taken over and the humpbacks have not paid us a blue water visit. It seems plausible that flying fish may take over the world. They are everywhere. We hope to find more humpbacks in Tonga (cross fingers here). I have only seen them in the sky since we began this leg.

Cyrus and I come on deck with the sky slightly lightening up.. we can tell we are sailing into a new time zone as the sunrise is getting later in the morning. We say good night to Colby and Peter and set out the squid lure, which, by the way is called "Hot Tuna"... so yes, we put out the hot tuna and discussed the rogue fish who has been toying with us. Soon after, we catch the culprit. Or at least we caught a large Wahoo (or Ono for you Hawaiians) weighing about 35-40 lbs. It was gorgeous and Cyrus and I pulled off a dance of sorts as you must do when you are under sail, reeling in a large fish, changing wind angles so to slow the boat, preparing the back of the boat for a fish landing, pulling large buckets & wetting the deck so you don't create a TON of work by getting wahoo slime on the teak and yes, there are only 2 of us up. We land the beautiful creature and there is Brett, knife in hand, ready to get slimy. The fishing rod woke him and he sprang to work, filling 4 large gallon ziplocks with steaks and fillets. MMMMMM!!! The sail is smooth and quiet, curious tropic-birds flutter around our rig looking like glorious long-tailed angels... everyone is in great spirits.. the sailors are sailing again.

Wahoo recipe to follow~

Brooke

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