GO TIME.

Departure is on for 8AM tomorrow! My port clearances came through yesterday morning and I woke up to a beautiful morning in La Gomera. After heavy rain and strong wind from the South for two days, today was clear and warm with only a few wispy clouds in the sky. The weather looks good through next Wednesday and beyond, with North East winds and seas of 3-4 meters or less for at least a week and probably longer. Tomorrow's forecast map is below:



The forecast is ideal for the immediate challenge at hand, which is to get South, South, South. The weather this year has been unusual to say the least, as some storms in the North Atlantic have had smaller fingers of wind and weather that have extended far more South than usual, which has made the weather here terrible for the last three or four weeks. With that in mind, my immediate goal is to head South as quickly as possible until I get to 20 degrees or so North latitude, which is 700+ nautical miles South of my current position (~28 degrees North). Below 20N, the equatorial trade winds are much more consistent than they are up here, which will help me to accelerate Westwards when the time comes. In my mind, I'm shooting for a point at 20N 30W that is 856 nautical miles SW of here. This landmark may be a little too far West given the importance of getting South this year, but we'll see where the weather takes me. If I hit 20N a little further East that'd be ok too.

Right off the bat I'll be focusing on getting past the end of El Hierro, which is an island 30 miles or so South West of Gomera. Once I'm clear of Hierro I won't have to worry about hitting land until Antigua!

To be honest, Hierro doesnt worry me, but there are a few things that do:

1) Seasickness - I'm expecting to be deathly seasick for at least my first three days. In college I went on a short cruise (the Norwegian Majesty -- a great ship!) from Miami to Mexico and back -- I was seasick the entire time and swore that I'd never go on any more silly ocean trips. Oops!

2) Nights at Sea - I'll be able to hear the waves but won't see them though they'll all around me. I'm hoping for clear skies and a decent moon to start so I can get used to night rowing. Even so, there'll be lots of things I wont be able to explain, which will require some mental feats of strength.

3) Sleep deprivation - I've slept in the cabin plenty of times, but the constant action of the boat and stress of adjusting to life on the open ocean will surely keep me from getting much rest early on.

Well, I guess thats all for now. I hear its snowing back home, which should make for an interesting New Year's Eve. Drive safe everyone.

Next update from the ocean, but you can track my progress using the map linked through www.rowforhope.com. The beacon on my boat sends updates independant of my e-mails, so keep an eye on that if you'd like.

To the Atlantic!

Paul

P.S. If any of you party animals are still up at 3AM EST, I'd appreciate a toast!

BEARD WATCH: 12/31/08

By popular demand, here's an update on my expedition beard growing successes of late:



On top of adding to my grisled good looks, this beard will give me some protection from the sun and a place to hide snacks for easy access while rowing.

Given that I've been at it for less than a month, I give this beard a 6.5 out of 10. I've still got some work to do to match these bearded wonders of the world: http://www.beards.org/features.php

Enjoy!

Paul

More Pictures

Sorry for no update yesterday, but I dont think you missed much - its really been the same routine. On a more interesting note, here are the pictures of the big Jesus statue that overlooks the town of San Sebastian, which I visited last week (Christmas Day, I think?).




Below is a view of the Atlantic looking South - the direction I´ll be heading immediately after rowing out of the marina. The first quarter or so of the trip should be a mix of South and South West. Progress in either direction will lessen my chances of getting clipped by the remnants of a low pressure system in the North Atlantic, and increase the likelihood of catching the equatorial trades that will help me make progess West to Antigua.



In other news, the weather window still looks pretty good for the end of next week. The winds from the North East are pretty weak to start, but should build through the weekend and continue until at least Monday (probably longer), which would give me a minimum of five days of good winds to get started.

The seas will likely still be coming from the North West (remants of a big low in the North Atlantic, and the South and West wind that will be here until Wednesday), but that shouldnt keep me from picking up some Southerly mileage when I finally get going. Waves are predicted in the 2-4 meter range, which on the Atlantic is still pretty small.

In the next day or two I´ll write with some details on the important decisions that will need to be made in the first few days out and what life on board will be like (as far as I can predict) for the first week.

Thanks for your continued support during this tedius part of the expedition -- it´ll get more interesting soon, I promise!

Paul

Less than a week?

Short update today. The weather still looks promising for departure late next week. There's a good-sized low pressure system passing through Wednesday, after which the winds calm down on Thursday and start to bulid from the North on Friday and continuing through the weekend.

The challenge here in Gomera is still mostly to pass the time. I'm starting to get into a pattern of hanging around the boat in the morning, going for a run in the hills around town in the afternoon followed by a quick swim at one of San Sebastian's black sand beaches. Then its back up the hill for a shower before dinner, internet, a walk around town, and bed. Needless to say, this routine may not sound so bad after a couple of weeks out on the water...

Paul

A (fragile) window?

A glimmer of hope on the horizon -- though the forecast is 132 hours out, it looks like the weather I need to leave may finally materialize late next week. A low pressure system is forecast to blow through next Wednesday, followed by what looks to be at least 48 hours of light but Northerly wind (from the North, blowing to the South). Whooo! I hope it holds up...

Ok, on to more exciting things. This town seems to have a thing for climbing Santas, which, despite my love of Christmas, I had never seen before:



Thanks Joy for posting some pictures of what my departure will look like. A couple more are below:






I´ll also post some pictures of the Jesus statue that overlooks San Sebastian as soon as I can figure out how to get them off of my camera. You can almost see it at the top of the hill behind my boat in the first picture above.


Now, on to the more interesting stuff --

Robert, Marlene - I absolutely love the fact that they Yankees are spending money this off season, especially to pick up pitching. I wasn´t the least bit impressed with the Nick Swisher signing (highly overrated throughout baseball thanks to Moneyball, and he also killed my fantasy team two years ago). Sabathia was an average pitcher a couple of years ago, but seems to have found some magic recently. I hope it lasts. Not a huge fan of Burnett yet, but I can quickly be convinced if he steps up and wins some close games early on. I like Big Tex, but for some reason associate him with Hank Blalock, who has been spotty since getting lots of hype in 2004. With that said, it´d take a lot for him to be worse than Giambi who had a bigger contract. Can´t wait to go to a game in the new stadium. Frankly, I thought the old one was a dump, despite all the history there.

Joy - not sure what to make of your last picture. I´m pretty sure that was a close to life-sized cardboard stand-in for me that you all ate dinner with on Christmas Eve. Really weird.

Gary M - Port clearances here have been straight-forward but were complicated by issues that weren´t a fault of mine or of Antonio, the port captain in Tenerife. Would be happy to elaborate when I get to Antigua but should leave it at that for now.

LovelyLady - I never get Christmas carols out of my system. Seriously, no one should go 11 months without hearing Dominic the Donkey (Heee Haw, Heee Haw!). Haha...yeah, I did it.


Paul

A Different Kind of Christmas

Merry Christmas! It's Joy this time, writing from home in Binghamton, NY, where 3 of the 4 Ridleys are spending a somewhat strange Christmas without Paul. We talked to him earlier this evening, and he still sounds frustrated about being on land, but his Spanish is improving-- he's got "cerveza" and "vino tinto" down pretty well, but he still needs to work on the translation for "give me back my port clearances, por favor". Unfortunately, he's still got time to practice before the weather improves.

In the meantime, he made a Christmas pilgrimage to the top of a cliff that overlooks San Sebastian, to visit "Jesus" (pronounced the Spanish way, of course), in the form of a giant statue keeping watch over the town. Paul asked Him for Northeast winds at 10 to 15 knots, but so far no luck. Santa must have passed on some gossip from the bon voyage festivities....

The theme of Christmas Eve services last night seemed almost as much Row for Hope as the birth of Christ (unintended consequences of a December launch, I guess). It was great to see how supportive people are, though. Thanks to everyone who's been following the blog -- we all (Paul especially) read every comment, and the encouragement really helps! Luckily for Paul, it sounded like The Blue Marlin was set to open again tomorrow, which also helps. Nothing like a little rum and lemon to lift holiday spirits.

I hope everyone is enjoying their holidays! And Paul, we know spending Christmas away from home is one of many sacrifices you've made for this cause. We're so proud of you! And don't worry, we didn't bruise ourselves with chocolate oranges without you. We're saving them for next year, when you'll be home again and those same chocolate oranges will be nice and hard. Warm up your knees....


This is from a training row Paul did on Sunday. My dad, Nadine, Liz and I were all disappointed to leave before the actual launch, but as Paul pointed out, it will look a lot like this:



Paul's getting good at waiting and watching the ocean...

I wish I had a sane explanation for this one. I'll just say Christmas dinner was not the same without the real Paul at the table.

Christmas Eve in La Gomera

December 24th is Christmas Eve here in La Gomera too, though this will be one of the more unusual in recent memory. Of course, the restaurants (and bars!) are closed so I'm celebrating this one in my apartment with a Christmas cocktail in hand. Luckily, I've never been one to be without Christmas carols, and this year is no exception. As I write this, Celine Dion is nailing the high note in "O' Holy Night"...she's got pipes! Wow.

Next up is the Otis Redding version of "White Christmas," which I happen to listen to all year around. I highly recommend it.

Other than that, things are pretty much business as usual. The weather forecast remains terrible for at least the next seven days (through December 31st), which really boggles my mind. I've been here for almost two weeks, and in that time there have been only 36 hours when I could have left, which happened to be immediately after my port clearances were suspended by the Spanish authorities. Though of course you can never predict the weather, the North East trades in this part of the world are remarkably reliable in nearly every year but this one. In fact, the winds that I need are there as predicted and sitting 300 miles or so South of the Canaries. The problem right now is that a string of low pressure systems, most of which passed over the Northeast U.S. a week or so ago, have been stirring up the weather all the way across the Atlantic. I've talked to a few people that live aboard their boats in the marina, and the consenus is that this weather is almost unheard of, and most have never seen the strong West winds that are predicted here over the weekend.

My only consolation is that if I did get out on the 18th as planned I would have been in for a really tough first two weeks and would have been on sea anchor for all but a day or two. Maybe that's enough of a Christmas present?

Merry Christmas to all, and many thanks for the support and continued entertainment!

Paul