Relaunched On Thursday (7 October) Under My Own Power

Day: 3 — Position: N21 14.0’ W160 07.8’
Distance from Waikiki Yacht Club: 128M
Distance to Northern Marianas: 3139M
Water temperature: 80.6F - 27.0C

RECORDS as running totals
Solo ocean rowing career total in days at launch: 925, now 928
Overall career total in days at launch: 1008, now 1011

—-oOo—-

I delayed my launch until Thursday the 7th partly hoping to time my arrival at the longitude of the Marianas during the first half of January. We shall see if I can pace myself over the next few months. After I completed the essential tasks on my rowboat, it was time to get back in the saddle. 

The last annoyance was still the water maker, my  primary challenge ever since I received this vessel. I had already changed the raw water filter with a shorter one and positioned its mount lower in the hold. It turned out that the filter needed to be even lower to work properly. I removed the mount, I extended the intake hose leading to the filter, placed a 90-degree barb to the filter intake and as such, I was able to lay the filter housing against the hull at the bottom of the hold. With a bit of manipulation, I burped all the air out of the housing and had an air free lead into the desalinator. Now all I do is turn on the system and I have fresh water! I hope that this fix keeps working over the next 5-6 months.

I installed a new chart plotter, I made new hinged flaps using fiberglass for my deck scuppers to keep waves from washing the deck. I reinforced the cracked base of my spare oar stands using G-10 backing plates and while I was at it, moved them outboard an inch. My oar shaft had been hitting the spare oar in rolling seas; now I have an improved upper range with my oar handle. 

The hatches received thin plywood plates painted white to provide shade. Otherwise due to greenhouse effect, the cabin was turning into a sauna and the storage holds on either side of the footwell were heating up unnecessarily. Now, I can trust that the food in those side holds will not be compromised.

During that whole time, my rowboat had a slip at the Waikiki Yacht Club, courtesy of my sponsor Staff Commodore Michael Roth. He greeted me with the club whaler by Diamond Head buoy when I arrived on September 10th then guided me all the way to my slip. This was critical for my safe entry at night through the Ala Wai Channel into the harbor. He made sure that I had a guest pass and that the club was my home. Then he was a phone call away each time that I needed my rowboat towed outside the harbor to test my water maker improvements.

I am grateful for the friendship that Michel Swenson offered who became my host from the day I landed at Waikiki. He provided me a bed, a house which became my base of operations and a vehicle to travel to the club and to run errands for food or parts. He was an elder Brigand from Brussels American High School, class of 1971. I was eight years his junior, having attended 9th through 11th grades with the class of 1979.

Jeff Smoot and his wife Beth Harden knew of me from the climbing community in Seattle before they moved to Waikiki. They became regular visitors to the yacht club to keep me company. We even took time one day to walk together the trails inside the Koko Crater Botanical Garden.

I slept on my rowboat Wednesday night to get organized in the cabin. Else it takes a lot of rummaging after departure around the cabin and the outside holds trying to find odd elusive items. I woke up at 5 a.m. on my day of departure and at a leisurely pace, went through a landlubber’s routine of showering, fixing coffee and having a substantial breakfast. 

Club staff member Pete Gaskel was there right on time at 7 a.m. to drive the club whaler to accompany me through the Ala Wai Channel. Michel, Jeff and Beth also arrived in a timely fashion. Michel held on to my bowline as we moved the boat downwind out of her slip. I put my oars out, took in all dock lines and fenders then at 07:27 HST, I asked Michel to release me. I would row from there out into the harbor fairway then through the Ala Wai Channel to open water. It felt good to feel the oar handles press against my fingers again.

These friends all got in the club whaler with Pete at the helm then waved me off an hour later. After they returned to the club, I was alone again with a spectacular view of Waikiki from the water. The easterly trade winds were descending down from the cloud laden hilltops, blowing offshore in my favor. Sun was shining through same clouds, outlining their gray features. Before I lost cellular coverage I posted images to social media and made sure to call Nancy at home. From then on our calls are much less frequent and only by satellite phone.

It took me seven hours to row past the longitude of Barbers Point at the SW corner of Oahu. The power plant for the island with its tall smoke stacks is located at this leeward point for the trade winds to carry away the fumes. The mountain silhouettes of the island stayed on my eastern horizon for another 24 hours until Friday afternoon before disappearing in the haze.

Note that no ocean rower or any other human powered vessel has ever ventured west of Hawaii with the intention to travel to Asia. All have routed southwest toward Australia for good reason.

This leg of my Pacific crossing which I estimate will last well into March, will be even more challenging than the 80 days from Crescent City to Waikiki. Navigating the large eddies and strong currents on my westerly course will take guidance from my friend Jason Christensen (https://racingthewind.com) and the University of Hawaii researchers Dr Nicolai Maximenko and Jan Hafner. Winter storms which form in the western Pacific will travel east, passing north of my course, threatening to draw me north. The same storms will bring northerly winds in January trying to press me south when I am west of the Marianas. These challenges will not be trivial.

Please keep me in your thoughts and share our website and our cause with your circle of friends and influencers.

Erden.