Day 5- sweet sleep and underway again

Time: 1500 Zulu (noon PV time)
Position: 18-deg 38-min N 110-deg 02-min W
Wind: NW 10-knots Seas: NW 2-3-ft
Course: 233 T Speed: 5.1-knots
Rig: 100% jib
24-hr distance traveled (actually only 2-hrs of movement): approx 8-nm

Who knew we could possibly sleep 12 hours in a row?! As we sat down from our joint repairs over lunch with exploded boat insides surrounding us, we completely agreed that it was worth the time required to stay a night and regain some sleep and strength for the long push to come. That decided, we exhaustedly got the boat re-organized and pulled out our full bed (which we thought we wouldn't be seeing for a month, what a treat!). We settled in for an early evening as the light of the setting sun made the island's colors (a mix between arid Mexico and lush volcanic Hawaii) pop and accentuated the energy of the waves crashing so hard into the steep isolated shores that a mist erupts. Chris managed to get up in the night for a quick Grapenuts fix (thank you Kenta Anae!) and HF radio time to check-in for our PacSea roll call and contact his dad. At the same time, Grizzly took a long bath and Shawn groggily listened in. For the rest of the night, all three of us snuggled down and slept hard until we saw the pink light of sunrise creeping into the sky marking another day.

We both awoke extremely well rested and even took a little extra time for a morning "coffee talk" over our steaming mugs of milky tea. After our Amigo Net check-in we got a little anxious to get underway and started the process of strapping everything down for passage-making. At 1000 we brought Rocky aboard once more, and as we motored along the 100-ft contour on the south end of Isla Soccoro, proceeded to detatch him and bring him aft for stowage in the starboard lazarette. Once we had the 100% jib raised (and after re-rigging our jib down-haul which we had managed to foul when we reattached the tack of the jib) we sat back to eat a papaya-pear-coconut salad, and listened to our newly tuned rig under sail again. Sweet, sweet sounds of a normal rig stretching and groaning in the swells minus most of the previous creaking and crackling reports with which Tao had been telling us all was not quite right. So, after a 33-hr unexpected (though welcome) respite, we are again sailing westward, away from the blue hole in the sky surrounding Isla Soccoro.