Hikianalia Report: October 16, 6:00 AM HST, clear skies, starry night …

With clear skies and good stars, the steersmen had golden opportunities to practice holding a course and everyone is making big improvements daily.  We had all the stars and the planets available.  The canoe was surfing at top speeds of 15 knots on a regular basis and doing really well. Her performance in a following sea is kindly to a large degree.

Orion and Sirius Rising in the East

Sail Data

• time: 2012-10-16 16:00 UTC/GMT (06:00 HST Oct 16)
• position: 32 degrees 28.1 minutes S 164 degrees 37.8 minutes W
• course: 075 degrees True through the night
• speed: 8.0 knots
• weather: clear most of the night with passing cumulous clouds, air dry and cool
• wind: W 10 to 20 knots
• sea state: W swell 8 to 10 feet, NW swell 6 to 8 feet, N swell 4 to 6 feet
• vessel and crew condition: all ok (Faafaite also)

Education Data:

•  Lots of stars throughout the night making it easy to steer.  Our heading for the night was the border of Aina/La Koolau.  Early on, Alpha and Beta centauri were used off of our man overboard pole. Then we used the star Menkar off the port manu and Canopus (Ke alii o kona I ka lewa) off the front of the bench on the starboard side.  As the 10pm-2am watch went on, Hamal was used off of one of the shrouds and different stars were used off the port manu and also the mast as the sky moved in a northerly direction.  Those stars included Makalii, Kapuahi (Aldeberan), the planet Jupiter, and finally all the stars in the constellation Orion. From 2 to 6 am, we steered by Puana, A‘a Kahiki, Regulus, Venus to the east; Kamaile Mua and Kamaile Hope to the south; Fomalhaut and Grus in the west; and Jupiter and Makali‘i to the north.
• Animal Life: A squid was found on the back ama side of canoe.
• Sea Birds and Sea Life: Fewer are seen this far out to sea in this area.
• Marine Debris: None observed overnight.