From great sailing to slow motoring

Last night and much of yesterday was really pleasant sailing. Overall, the wind has made a huge shift from ENE to WNW, while we are trying to travel East. ENE was lousy as it forced us to the south. But as the wind shifted we had about 18hrs of really nice sailing with the wind from the North and NW. A light wind of 8-12kts from the perfect direction with relatively calm seas and the sun shining. Really great.

Then the wind continued to shift until it was almost directly behind us, causing the apparent wind to decline to almost nothing and forcing us to motor again. At the same time the sky became overcast. So we're now motoring along with the wind almost directly behind us while rolling in a NW swell which causes the sail to slat (or more accurately slam) back and forth, back and forth, back and forth. We've double reefed the main so that there is not much sail area, but if we take it down entirely to stop the slatting, then we'll roll really badly, so we endure the slatting and hope it doesn't break anything in the process.

We're motoring slowly so that we get better mileage. At just 1800rpm, rather than our usual 2300, we make about 6kts versus our usual 7kts, but we burn only 1gph versus our usual 1.5gph. 85% of the speed for 66% of the fuel is a good trade off when we're low on fuel and trying to avoid arriving in the middle of the night.

During the really nice sailing yesterday, while the sun was shining, we took our last shower in the cockpit. The hot shower water in the bright sun felt great, but the moment I turned off the water - zing - very crisp air - where is my towel!

Not too much to report now. It's absolutely pitch black on deck. There is a thick overcast so the sky is simply black, not a hint of light. I'm using the masthead tricolor light even though we're sailing because it provides much better long distance visibility if anyone is looking our way. I don't think a big ship really cares if we're sailing or motoring, more important to just be seen. A couple of ships have passed far behind us, no close encounters. As I write, another ship is passing to the north of us, but won't come any closer than 17 miles. Also no tsunami debris. We did see one fishing float, but those are pretty common everywhere, just bobbing along.

It's pretty cold in the cockpit at night and we're both bundled up with lots of wool and Patagonia products. Yesterday we began using New Morning's diesel fueled heater to heat the aft cabin and the salon. In the tropics we used it for hot shower water, but this is the first time since we departed Maine in 2008 that we've used it to heat the interior of the boat.

The forecast is that tomorrow the wind will shift back to the NW and begin to build so we'll be able to resume sailing. By Thursday evening we're supposed to have 20-22kts for our final dash into San Francisco. That should make for some exciting, and chilly sailing.

ETA: Friday morning