Tuesday 8/14/2012 - Neah Bay, WA to Astoria, OR
The next morning, the winds were blowing hard from the south, which made our exit from Neah Bay a bit uncomfortable - especially with the swell and current in opposing directions. The forecast down the coast was going to change from south winds, to 10-15 knot winds from the west in the late morning to 20-25 knot north winds late in the evening. One concern was the swell, which was forecasted to increase from 5-8 feet from the W/NW. We had a bumpy ride out of Neah Bay, but once about ten nautical miles out, the wind switched from the west and the ride was much smoother. We put up the sails and sailed all day on a beam reach. It was sunny with good wind. Sweet!! It was the best sailing experience we had the entire trip. We had to thoroughly rinse all of our dock lines that day - they reaked of dead fish and bird poo from the overnight in Neah Bay. In the early evening the conditions started to change - increased wave swells and strong winds from the North. We dropped the main and reefed the jib. Lesson learned, we should have reefed the main and rolled up the jib. With a reefed jib, there was quite a bit of rolling motion. We stayed with the reefed jib until the winds became so shifty that the constant deflating and slam of inflating changed our minds. We fired up the engine at 0130 and furled in the jib. We motored for the rest of the night, and put up with the rolling motion from the northwest swell. Even with the winds there was a dense fog and mist. We kept a close eye on the radar - there was plenty of shipping and fishing traffic to keep us awake and on task. Neither of us had much rest when we were off watch - the conditions were too uncomfortable. The phosphorescence behind the boat is magical.
