As some of you know, I am gearing up for a race next summer where I sail, solo. from San Francisco to Kauai, Hawaii. Before my sailing association lets you do that race, you have to complete a 400-mile passage, solo, in the boat you're going to use for the race. Thus, since the Singlehanded TransPac happens in even-numbered years, the Singlehanded Sailing Society puts on a 400 mile ocean race in the odd-numbered yeaars to help people qualify.

It starts on Wednesday.

I have a solid boat...though small, and I'm not "worried", but of course there's always a degree of anticipation and concern when doing something like this. I'm well prepared in every way except one...I haven't sailed the boat very much. However, my boat is really pretty simple,and while I won't get maximum racing speed out of her, I can keep her going in the right direction, no problem.

I finshed up most of the big jobs this weekend, but I really only have until Tuesday morning to get everything together, here. Tuesday AM I go to work, but leave work at about 2:00...dash home load sandwiches, fruit, tea and a beer into the cooler grab my bags and go. That starts an afternoon of running around like a crazy man, picking up last-minute details....like my liferaft!. My sailmaker didn't finish my storm trysail until Saturday night, so I have to go getthat,too. So I'm condemned to tearing around Tuesday afternoon, getting the very last-minute stuff together.

All of the high priority projects this weekend got done, they just took half-again as long as I thought they would, so I got the bare minimum accomplished. There's nothing like having to crawl into the boat, all the way to the back of the quarter-berths, for every single little screw you have to take out and replace. I can't hold the nut from outside, so I have to crawl back there with my two vice-grips, clamp on the nuts, then back out and go up into the cockpit to twist the head of the thing with a screwdriver. It's incredibly cramped back there, and geting in and outis amost imposible for a big guy like me. It'd be fine if it was once, but no...its, like 8 - 9 - 10 times. I only have two vice grips. It takes FOREVER to get 8 screws removed, replace hardware, and tighten them down, again..like two hours for eight screws. OYYYYYYYY.... So a couple of jobs remain undone, but nothing TOO important.

I need tonight to make sandwiches, hang with Joan (I didn't see her all weekend) finish my lap-navigation board,etc. I'm gonna be working like a crazy man tonight. I can't go 400 miles out into the Pacific without having reviewed my medical kit and renewed the stuff in my abandon-ship bag, or without having the cantilever arm for my autopilot fixed. Those areon the list for tonight, though I looked over the first aid and abandon-ship stuff this morning.

Here's the weather report for later in the week, 20 - 60 miles out from the Central-Nor California coast. We leave on Wednesday.

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POINT ARENA TO PIGEON POINT TO 20 NM-
POINT ARENA TO PIGEON POINT 20 TO 60 NM OFFSHORE-
307 AM PDT MON JUN 25 2007

...SMALL CRAFT ADVISORY IN EFFECT THROUGH TUESDAY AFTERNOON...

.TODAY...NW WINDS 20 TO 30 KT. WIND WAVES 4 TO 6 FT. NW SWELL
6 TO 7 FT AT 8 SECONDS.
.TONIGHT...NW WINDS 15 TO 25 KT. WIND WAVES 3 TO 5 FT. NW SWELL
6 TO 7 FT AT 8 SECONDS.
.TUE...NW WINDS 15 TO 25 KT. WIND WAVES 3 TO 5 FT. NW SWELL 6 TO 7 FT
AT 8 SECONDS.
.TUE NIGHT...NW WINDS 15 TO 25 KT. WIND WAVES 3 TO 5 FT.
NW SWELL 6 TO 7 FT. PATCHY FOG.
.WED...NW WINDS 10 TO 20 KT. WIND WAVES 2 TO 4 FT.
NW SWELL 5 TO 6 FT.
.THU...W WINDS 5 TO 15 KT. WIND WAVES 1 TO 3 FT. NW SWELL 4 TO 5 FT.
PATCHY FOG.
.FRI...W WINDS 5 TO 15 KT. WIND WAVES 1 TO 3 FT. NW SWELL 4 TO 5 FT.
PATCHY FOG.
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I don't much like the "patchy fog" but the windspeed is nice. I should finish...hopefully...around midnight, plus or minus 3-4 hours, Saturday. With luck this should be a nice sail. That'd be nice, I already "paid my dues" on the trip up from Santa Cruz. I'm sure glad we didn't go this PAST week, it was blowing high holy hell out there....gale warnings all week.

If you want to follow the race, you can check up on me by visiting http://www.sfbaysss.organd visiting the forum. Position entries should be in the "LongPac 2007" forum. We've been having problems with the forum provider, so it may not be "up" when you visit. Give it an hour and it seems to pop up and be available.

Alan