Seas the Day
Miriam Payne (25, from East Yorkshire) and Jess Rowe (28, from Hampshire) are on a world record attempt; a non-stop and unsupported crossing of the Pacific. Most Pacific rowers complete just 2800 nautical miles to Hawaii; however, the challenge being undertaken by the ‘Seas the Day’ team will take up to 6 months to complete, covering 8,000 nautical miles from Peru to Australia. Based on their current rate of progress it is projected they will finish in October.
They are rowing up to 15 hours a day – two hours on, two hours off – adjusting the pattern as they go. When they are not rowing, they will be eating (around 5,000 calories per day) or attempting to sleep in between cleaning the boat, checking and maintaining equipment and of course the use of their water maker too.
Along the way, they will navigate shipping lanes, face 30ft+ waves, battle blisters, salt sores, sleep deprivation and are likely to encounter sharks and more whales.
The team is aiming to raise £50,000 for The Outward Bound Trust, a UK-based charity which helps children develop lifelong skills through adventure.
Their boat Velocity, a 9m long Rossiter 2 Ocean Rowing Boat is laden with safety and communications equipment, 200+ days of food including specially formulated Better You vitamin sprays for each of them to help recovery between rows.
Ships log: Over 6,000 Nautical Miles Rowed, and over 120 days at sea!
Wow, we can’t believe it’s been over 120 days at sea already, even more so if you count the first attempt! We are also fast approaching the 6,000 miles rowed and 2,000 miles to go mark
The time has gone incredibly fast, but it also feels like the Pacific has been our home for ages, in a great way. It’s going to be rather strange when we eventually step on to land again.
The best news we have is that, after 9+ repairs, we finally have a solution to the pipe situation on Salty, our water maker. Our land team has been in contact with Jim, from Mactra Marine, regularly. Jim is a legend in ocean rowing as he’s responsible for saving many an ocean rower with water maker issues! He’s figured out that we can bypass the accumulator, therefore, shortening the distance from the pump to the intake. This means we now have enough rated pipe and don’t have to worry about any more burst pipes. It is such a weight off our shoulders! We now won’t have to hand pump our water unless our batteries are really low, or a different issue presents.
We are often asked how we cope with the both of us rowing all day and then going into our two hours rest, 1 on the oars, shifts during the night. The answer is with difficulty! We’ve had a couple of very tough nights where we seem to flop from side to side from passing out. I’ve even fallen asleep on the bucket a few times. After nodding off, it can be rather disorienting opening your eyes to find the horizon is not where you left it!
Our boring diet has been a source of constant conversation on board, and what our first meal on dry land might be. After over hundred days of eating freeze dried rations, it’s starting to take its toll.,,, We are having to force feed ourselves a lot of the time. Our only respite has been from the Home Harvest mini greenhouse which we have on board, and this amazing bit of kit enables us to supplement our dried food with fresh greens every 5 days or so. I’m dying for a simple slice of toast with butter and a cold beer – but I’d take anything normal!
Ships Log: Day 93 - Tuesday 5th August
SLOG SLOG SLOG … in the words of Simon Rowell, our weather router.
It has been HOT, we’ve had quite a few days where there’s been absolutely no wind at all. It’s so peaceful being in complete silence on the Pacific. With just the sound of the oars clunking in the gates and dipping in the water. Although lovely, it makes for hard rowing. We’ve had to push harder to get the boat moving which still weighs over a tonne, leaving us a little more achy than usual and a little more exhausted … if that’s even possible!
We’ve adjusted our course to 264 degrees to aim for Cairns and will be adding a further 500 miles to our expedition. This may sound like a lot, but it will likely be the quicker route. We’ve done a stock check of our food on board and will still have more than enough to carry on with our 5,000 calories per day until completion.
To head to Cairns is a little more complicated navigationally as we’ll be passing some of the Pacific islands quite closely. The planned route at present takes us south of Samoa, North of Fiji, through Vanuatu and North of New Caledonia, before we’ll need to make a passage through the Great Barrier Reef. With our lack of power and inability to turn the chart plotter on we’ll need to be very careful as we navigate these challenges.
Ships log: 25th July
We’ve had a bit of a problem with the tracker over the past week or so as it’s been stating we’ve only travelled 10 miles a day which is incorrect … fear not — we are still rowing! The problem has now been fixed so the mileage should be accurate now. You’ll now see that we have less miles to row than have been rowed.
My goodness — it feels pretty wild to have passed the half-way point of the entire Pacific Ocean. It really does feel like the world is so small. We’ve pretty much rowed a quarter of the way around our planet.
Mentally, it feels like we’ve reached the top of the mountain and we’re on the home stretch now. As much as we’re counting down the miles, we really don’t want the expedition to end. We’re loving our little nautical home.
Half- way was celebrated on deck together reading through letters we’d been given by loved ones, our support team and from Southbourne Junior School, while watching the sunrise.
Milestone treats included cans of refreshing magnesium water from BetterYou and Percy Pigs from our ocean rowing coach (Duncan Roy). For supper we had instant mashed potato and canned sustainable tuna from our rescuer (Alec Hughes). This was topped with a bumper crop of radish sprouts from our Home Harvest mini greenhouse.
We’re sure the second half of the row will present new challenges, but we’re ready to tackle them head on. I wonder if we’ll need to dip into any of the three spare rudders in the bow!
A red footed booby who took a rest on board for several hours – and he didn’t even try to eat our tuna lunch!
