The Oregon coast is lauded as being one of the most scenic in the world. This is an attractive draw for ROAD tourists. From the point of view of sailors heading south, it is not useful at all. The sea cliffs and boulder-strewn beaches offer no succor to the unwary sailor who fails to keep a prudent offing. Also, the few harbors there are cannot be entered safely in the very conditions likely to make life on the ocean very unpleasant.
We left the Strait of Juan de Fuca for sea in the leftover swell from a major storm; what an awful motion! The forecasts nonetheless offered a good few days for progress before the next low pressure system - and included no gales or storms. The weather was described as "unsettled" though, settled weather only being offered far in the future.
Of course gale-free forecasts often get changed and today there are warnings of up to 40 knots of wind from the south off Oregon. Fortunately our route far offshore avoids this scrunched-up area of high winds and seas near the coast but still leaves us with somewhat lighter southerlies to impede our progress.
At the moment we are slowly heading almost due west for the day to get further from the nasty weather. This jog westward will only show up on our blog map as a shorter day's run because the blog map draws straight lines between noon positions. Sometime this evening, we will again put the wind on the starboard side of the boat and resume our progress to Monterey Bay, California. These weather systems appear every three days or so. By the time Saturday and Sunday roll around, we will be far enough south to avoid their contrary influence.
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At 23/04/2014 18:49 (utc) our position was 44°04.32'N 127°08.44'W
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