Sarah’s sea log is being sorted as we speak, which means that hopefully she will be able to blog directly to the website rather than having to go through Whisper.pr. She is nine days into the journey and has already managed to row 336 nautical miles which is really good progress. The tracker is being modified so you can see the distance that Sarah has covered.
A message from her earlier this morning read:
hello from day 9!stonking row 2day,nice big follow in seas.soaking!just shipped oars 4 day.happy with progress.excitd 4 choc this wknd!
Hi Sarah
Hey fantastic progress, I was going to say keep it up, but its bloody obvious your going too. Don’t gorge too much on that football sized easter egg I floated out of whitby last weekend for you. Just remember to look after the boat I may want to borrow it when your done. Nick
Great to hear you are 336nm off shore…
Would love to see the tracker show a ‘how far to go’ type result. Is that possible, support team?
Guess with the Easter break coming up you will be hunting for Easter bunnies and looking for a hill to roll your painted hard boilleds down!…. Not too many other chicks that far out to sea!
Keep on rowin’
Hope the seas stay smooth with the wind and currents from astern.
Graham
Hello Sarah,
It’s dissertation time for me again so needless to say i am swatting up on your website and all things harry potter! am loving wearing your t-shirt and sharing your story with all who ask 🙂 I am still amazed at your progress and very proud!
Much love, xxx
Hi Sarah,
Sarah, row that boat ashore………….hallelujah.
Sarah, row that boat ashore………….hallelujah.
The ocean is deep and the ocean is wide…….hallelujah.
You’ll soon be on the other side……..hallelujah.
Great stuff….enjoy easter.
Heidi and Lorne.
Go fot it, Sarah – I hope the Easter chocs give you more strength !!!
Great progress that you are making Sarah. Those chocolate bunnies got their sea legs too? Did a girl ever need an excuse to eat chocolate – I guess you need the calories:) happy days! Susie
Hi Sarah, every one at Welland Vale cheering you on, we are nearly working as hard as you, 7 till 7, though this will finish long before you do. Hope you are enjoying it! Best wishes from us all. Jo
Hello
you have done sooooooooo well already and getting your boat back on to the track would have been very hard!!
i sail my self but only a little boat and i love it
good luck
Iona Taylor
Hi guys – when you are tweaking the Tracker, could you also cause it to put in a small marker every 24 hours, so we can see progress on a daily basis? I already do this on my G/E track, but your fix would save me doing it my end.
I see Tropical Cyclone Jade has been lashing Mauritius over the last few days and is now heading east, but I am sure it will fizzle soon. Are cyclones still likely to be a possibility in that area, by the time (three months) Sarah gets there?
Remora,
I have been thinking about doing this and probably will sometime this weekend or next week in the Google Earth kml file. This is not part of the web-tracker though and is just something I created to help here. I just need to sort out the time to have the script automatically add a daily addition to the file marking the days.
Sarah, great job so far, looks like you have straightened your course out a bit and are getting out of the costal influences. Now it’s time to hit high gear and hammer out some miles.
Robert
Fantastic progress Sarah! Great to see you have finally broken free of the Leeuwin current. Freo was definitely the right decision. Were they right, is the rowing the easy bit? Have a great Easter. From all of us (the people, horses, cat and mice) – the mice with heads
The ‘progress fixes’ may already be there but something might need a tweak at Marinetrack ?
When I access the tracker, the initial image shows all the hourly fixes (arrow in orange circle) but within a second or two, they all disappear. Sometimes they are seen briefly on zooming in.
This effect seen on different PCs running different Operating Syatems and with different Anti-Virus applications – so it is not finger trouble at this end.
I’ve heard some girlie excuses for ‘having to eat chocolate’. Enjoy your Easter Bunnies Sarah – I guess if you don’t consume them they might start breeding in the cabin.
CMG starting to look much better.
Noticed today that the tracking on google earth includes daily positions. Can any one explain / help me out. If Sarahs position on day 9 is 30.54Lat (to two decimal places) and is 30.89 on day 10, does that mean she has made 35 (ie 30.89 minus 30.54) ‘minutes’ progress west(ie 35 nautical miles)? I appreciate the progress may include deviations north / south in that period, but is the course made good west 35nm?
Thanks for the info if any nautical people out there can explain.
Guess the surge forward was from all the chocs!! Never mind all this technical stuff about currants! (unless they are in the hot cross buns!)
Graham
Don’t know about the nautical stuff BUT she has had a dip in the sea today, and with heavy rain is now having a choc and film nite!!
She sounds happy and good!!
Mum
Graham Hadley, that is roughly correct. At the equator one minute equals one nautical mile but the further towards the poles you go the less distance it is. …HOLD THAT thought… you are reading latitude(N/S), you want longitude(E/W) for that estimation. Since after all Sarah’s goal is westward. So roughly you could say Longitude 112.01 E on day 9 minus 111.14 on day 10 would make it 47 NM. But in actuality it is more like 41 NM made good.
Hope this helps you understand.
Also a note about the days in the G/E. They start at the beginning of a new day based on GMT which is during Sarah’s morning. This was done because of a lazyness on my part when it comes to writing the code to generate the G/E file.
Anyway, I agree, it must be the choco and some stashed hot cross buns providing that surge.
hi Sarah, fab progress so far. It only seems 2 minutes since the boat show when you were staying with us. Amazed at your willpower with the chocolate, would have gone in the first few days with me. JJ and I having pub lunch on the Solent and thinking of you as ever. Much love George and cousin J xxx
Hi Sarah
Things seem to be going really well since the restart – well done – keep the focus (and enjoy !!)
Vanessa and her mum are off tomorrow to cross another ocean. The Caribbean and their little boat is only 77,000 tons !!
We are all thinking of you
Richard
Thanks for the G/E “fix”, perfect!
News just in – Olly, whose rowboat was being forced closer and closer to New Zealand’s west coast, has announced on his VOR site that his journey is finishing up.
Hi Sarah,
Happy Easter! And what a memorable one for you…. I’ve been in Wales for a couple of days you’ve made wonderful progress since I was last able to check your blip and your blog. Thought of you as we watched seals and fulmars from our ‘little’ boat round Ramsay island -although it was a bit of a QE2 compared to Dippers! No albatross or dolphins for us though.
Sounds as if you’re gobbling up the nautical miles – hey, a mariner will eat almost anything I guess? Hope there is somme festive choc aboard as I can’t think of anyone who deserves a pascal tuck-in more. Maybe your so-called ‘Spring Clean’ was really an egg-detecting operation – to ping any oeufs hidden by the support crew for your Ocean Easter Egg Hunt.
We’re all thinking of you, best Jane
Graham H was wondering how to measure Sarah’s daily progress. In Google Earth (the best choice to view Sarah’s journey) there is a ruler in the toolbar to measure a wriggly path, or straight line and you can choose klms, miles, nautical miles, etc.
To Robert Nixon – is there a way to show the lines of Lat and Long in Google Earth?
and (thanks and pleases of course) could you include the temperature at time of report in one or even both versions of the trackers?
…. and now that Olly Hicks is heading for land so early, I reckon Olly’s fans will want to continue their life at sea, via Sarah.
Hey Sarah I’ve seen the massive progress you have made incredible stuff BTW I’ve never ever known a braver person than you well done and keep up the work!!!!!
ONLY 111 DAYS ill ask my grandparents to come visit when you have finished all the luck in the world Tore.
P.S don’t let the Easter bunnies bite!!!!
HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA
Hi Sarah. Been in France for a week and only just picked up the internet – your site was the first place I checked. Holy Moly – are you sure you didn’t take that outboard engine with you after all? Great progress. Perhaps next time, I’ll row around UK…!! Please ignore Spike’s jibe about my fishing prowess, I’d like you to know I caught a minnow last summer so I’m on my way…. Thanks for your email and update on the moon and stars – glad they are exactly as I remembered the. Smelly Badgers says “bon voyage et bon chance”. Geoff.
Thank you Robert, very helpfull, as too was the comment from ‘viewer’ on the measure function on GE. Today I can now see, using the Lat calcs that Sarah has travelled 12nm West (approx) but has actually covered 14.5nm using the path measure function.
Good to here you’re not too smelly any more Sarah!But did you know everyone viewing on GE saw you skinny dippin! Enjoy your choc and movie. You’re earning it.
Graham
degrees and minutes are shown as minutes, degrees then decimals of minutes. So you will never have 30.89. At 30.59, the next minute rolls you into 31 degress. Same as time. Hey do you think that’s wehre time comes from? Yes. earth rotates 360 degrees in 24 hrs ie 15 degrees per hr which is why at 115E we in Perth are UTC (GMT) plus 8hrs.
Anyhow. minute of longitude is not a mile except at the equator and s progressively less until at the pole it is nil. Best way to measure Sarahs progress is take a right angle to her position from the rhumb line shown on the tracker and use the scale. I reckon she’s made 300 miles CMG (course made good) even though she’s probably traveled 450 to do so. So at average of 30 miles per day that still sets her up for 100 days complete passage, but progress may be a bit better away from teh coastal current. Northing at present is due partly to wind but wind becomes more favourable north of rhumb line than south of it. Cyclone season ends May.
Happy Easter Sarah, hope you have enjoyed some mini eggs, keep up the good rowing, you are doing so well.
Much love
C & K
Hi Sarah,
Great to see your progressing so well and that the weather gods have been looking after you. Can I ask why you are now so far north of the Rhumb line?
Hi Sarah,
Greetings from Mauritius. Hope you are not too tired to enjoy Easter in the middle of the ocean.
All the best
Rene
Well done Sarah, looks like you’re making good progress.
Enjoy the chocolate, and good luck.
Happy Easter !
Hi Sarah – well done your doing great. I hope you did your time trial today – we did! Happy Easter to you and enjoy your chocolate. Thinking of you always, love Emily and Jamie x
“Happy Easter” to you Sarah —
Keep up the mighty work — Well done indeed –
Tim (now off Balikpapan)
Happy Easter Sarah from Mauritius.
Went fishing for calamari under the full moon yesterday. On the south-east coast, near Mahebourg where your Tracker hits Mauritius.Looked in your general direction and pictured you out there.
Cheerio
Marcel
P.S: The Calamari in Rum sauce was beautiful….