*BREAKING* @faceman's sail boat stranded near Cabo San Lucas. His daughter is extremely ill.

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i can confirm, via a friend in SD-based coast guard.

it appears a disease was spread on the boat, and the girl may have contracted, perhaps from the father, a case of the Incurable Smugness.

I hope he doesn't mind me posting, but this was his last update:

day 12 - trade wind sailing

Monday, March 31, 2014 at 11:22
We're officially in the Northern Pacific trade winds. Earlier, when I was dreaming about crossing oceans I remember seeing a picture of Lynn Pardey on the coach roof of her small sailboat, playing guitar up by the mast with the wind gently blowing them towards whatever tropical destination they were bound for.

I'm sure many have that experience.

For us, we've been in force 5 conditions for the last three days straight now. Lumped up seas, beefy swells, small breakers, and roughly twenty knots of breeze. Our lulls are around fifteen knots, and the gusts are at twenty five which normally would make for terrific sailing but living with that kind of boat motion for multiple days on end can be a little, let's just say, tiring.

The advantage is that we're hauling ass, making one hundred mile days with severely reduced canvas, and no more do I need to come out on deck at two in the morning and strip Rebel Heart to bare poles.

The disadvantage is that the motion is brutal, especially when you do it day in and day out. Last night before sundown I visually checked the rig and saw three slide cars (slugs) had disconnected from the mainsail, on top of course. No big deal, I'll just drop her down (already double reefed), fix, and re-hoist. So now those big beefy eight foot waves with breaking crests we got to plow into for a few minutes in order to get the sail down and up.

Problem solved, sail rehoisted. Three hours later (midnight or so) I look up with a flashlight to admire my handywork and notice they are all popped off again. Cool.

The yankee (our outermost jib) has suffered a bit of damage from some flogging during sail changes but fortunately it seems to be limited to re-enforced areas. Three cheers for sailmakers and the smarts they employ of knowing where problems will develop in advance.

Charlotte made a coffee cake last night, we managed to have sex once while both children were asleep, and none of us have sustained any long term injuries other than the bruising typically associated with offshore passage making.

I'm sitting in the cockpit typing this, looking aft past the wind vane steering system at the heaped up white caps and breakers. The old sailor adage comes to mind that there are indeed only three types of wind: "Not enough, too much, and perfect in the wrong direction."

We're roughly a third of the way through mileage wise, but more importantly I'm hopeful our experiences south of 5 degrees north latitude, including the South Pacific easterlies, will be a bit less beefy and give us the chance to walk across the cabin without taking our life in our hands.

We finally saw a ship after four days of nothing; it was the first time our VHF speaker has uttered a peep as well since we cleared the Mexican coast.

Much to do, Lyra is waking up from her nap, and Rebel Heart is dutifully slicing through the water on a south westerly course.

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So is this for sure him?

definitely has to be him. Same boat name, same size, he has a 1 year old (and another kid)

they just set off to cross the Pacific a few weeks ago

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Fuck

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Crazy hope they get the girl aid first and then get them off the boat.

i give it 2 months until he brags about how you havent lived until you've put your little girls' life in danger

Hope this turns out to be a happy ending

i give it 2 months until he brags about how you havent lived until you've put your little girls' life in danger

jesus christ man, have some respect

Don't really know the guy, but hope everything is alright for his little girls sake.

i give it 2 months until he brags about how you havent lived until you've put your little girls' life in danger

this was foolish in hindsight, but i'm sure it's the result of circumstances he couldn't have predicted.

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This is awful because I know how much time he spent gearing up to do this ocean crossing. I am in the same boat (lol) as I am prepping to do a similar trip on my boat. The crush to the dream hurts just thinking about it.

and that is just the selfish part. I can't imagine the fear of dealing with a sick child out there

They had rough seas from the sounds of the blog. I hope she ok.

The must have turned around....

definitely must have turned around. I figure he burned all the fuel they had (which wasnt much) to get as close to Mexico as they could before they sent a distress signal

thank god he has a naval background and probably accounted for this in some way.

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