Half a Month in the Ocean
As of today, I have spent two weeks on the water. I have crossed the 180th meridian, or the International Dateline, and entered the Western Hemisphere. This happened on the 19th of December, and as a result, I was able to live the 19th of December – St. Nicholas the Wonderworker’s saint’s day – twice over. First in the Eastern, and then in the Western Hemispheres.
As you can see from my path, I am not exactly spoiled by the weather. I am in the centre of a small cyclone, where the wind circulates 360 degrees, the waves are chaotic, and the boat is buffeted from side to side. It is impossible to travel forward. I am trying, at least, to keep her at these coordinates, so that I am not swept again into the Eastern Hemisphere I fought so hard to leave. I am forced to move in circles. I am not using the sea anchor.
I will have to withstand these conditions for another day. On Saturday, the wind will change to a more favourable South-Westerly. According to the log, I’ve travelled 600 miles, which is slightly more than 10% of the entire route.
I did have plans to cover a greater distance in these weeks and be east of Chatham Islands by now, but the might of the Ocean is humbling for any person, especially if you are aboard a rowing boat. Thank God for everything – I am alive and well, the weather is difficult, but it could be worse.
In the Ocean, you rejoice and pay attention to any small changes – for example, now it’s almost full Moon. In the city, you don’t pay much attention to these sort of things, but here, in the ocean, it is very important: the visibility is good, the deck is well lit by moonlight at night and the mood is more cheerful. I was able to boil water and cook hot food – also a cause for celebration. Everything is perceived differently here than on terra firma. Every morning I thank my friend Mikhail Yanchenko for preparing capsules with good ground coffee for me.
Today I also launched a seawater desalination unit and re-filled canisters with fresh water. The freshwater maker worked well and produced about 25 litres per hour. The water is cold in these latitudes and the performance drops (when tested in Europe, the output was 30 litres per hour).
The ocean is still deserted, I have not seen a single boat in the last 12 days. It seems that the entire ocean-going fleet is gone. In the Atlantic, you see a ship or yacht every day.
47’03 South latitude and 179’32 West longitude
Fedor Konyukhov