The first day

Yesterday, at the start we had a beautiful SW breeze, starting with the #1 genoa, and quickly shifted to our code zero spinnaker, and then later to the S2. We were reaching all afternoon about 7.5 knots. We saw lots of gray whales and had several within spitting distance of the boat. At sunset the wind promptly died and we have covered only about 15 miles in the last 12 hours. Ouch! Lots of dolphins surrounded us at sunrise, so maybe our luck will change. At 7:30am we are right on the Mexican border.

Side note: When I was packing I pulled out my deck shoes and discovered they had self-destructed and gone to pieces. A quick trip to the Columbia outlet store at 7pm yielded nothing in my size. However, there was the same shoe in women's sizes - found one that fits perfect. You will probably hear about this from other crew members over the next couple days. They are bright pink! You've got to be brave to sail a race like this (with pink shoes).

Jeff