Location: 42° 10S, 136° 58E
Tuesday 12:00, 03.13.2007

The Schooner Maggie B’ noon position on March 13th was 42° 10S, 136° 58E. We are motoring towards Tasmania in essentially no wind as the latest high is right over us. We should have some wind from the North tomorrow as the high moves East past us. It is overcast but with good visibility, there is a long swell from the SW but no waves or chop.

We have come 1384 NM from Fremantle and have 414 to go to the SW corner of Tasmania.

One of our most interesting recent failures is with our Danforth steering compass. It locks up from time to time and is no longer dependable. It appears as if the part below the card has come loose in some fashion. This comes as quite a surprise as one would think that it would be just about the last thing on the boat to fail. We’ll just have to drink the alcohol in it and rely on the GPS.

Today was rather boring. If you are sailing, you are always working to optimize all the elements, to take advantage of the free energy resource. Motoring, you put the autopilot on and rumble along.

We celebrated the quiet day by first cleaning the boat and then having a movie party. After lunch (ginger and garlic shrimp with rice and salad with basil vinaigrette dressing), we set out a plate of apples, cheeses and chocolate, strapped the computer to the bulkhead, and watched My Fair Lady (Harrison and Helburn version, natch). The nice additional touch was that we were able to connect the computer to the Bose sound system, so it was almost SurroundSound. Yo Ho for the Life of the Sailor!

All is well.