The summer soltice has come and gone but as we push north, the days are still, for us, getting longer and longer. Or perhaps I should say, the nights are getting shorter! As I write, we're inching towards 51N, hampered by NNE wind. Nights now aren't getting completely dark even with our continuously cloud-enshrouded sky. By 1 am (we're on GMT -11) there is a definite glow in the eastern sky though it has only been marginally dark a few hours.
We are now well east of Dutch Harbor and moving towards the Gulf of Alaska with about 878 nm to Sitka Sound. The water temperature has risen a couple of degrees and that's made a big difference in the comfort level in the cabin. It's still chilly but it doesn't feel as much like a walk-in refrigerated steam bath as it did 1000 nm ago.
For a few days we've been dealing with a high pressure system and its light winds. It has been a struggle to keep moving in the right direction sometimes. By this time tomorrow we expect to have better winds, but we will believe that when it happens. Meanwhile, we're dealing with maintaining our little vessel, getting sufficiently rested and well fed, and staying chipper.
On the list were a new V belt for the engine water pump, replacing the failed starting motor, and soldering a corroding shield wire line on the power cable of the radar.
With light winds at night we can hear the chittering nearby of a sea bird, perhaps a northern fulmar, whose stocky build we have seen in daylight hours. We were visiting again last night by a fur seal who frolicked in the shallow swell, zipping and reeling through the water like a torpedo, sending up a phosphorescent glow, and periodically surfacing and emitting a sharp POOF of air.
At 6/22/2017 and 18:04 UTC (GMT) our position was: 50°57.46'N / 158°30.14'W.
We were traveling 091T degrees true at 3.8 knots.
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