Those past two days, we had the same weather conditions as the day before with strengthening eastern winds… and no swim.
The main sail was lowered and Maria and Gonzo worked on repairing the reefs on deck. Every so often a big wave crushed against the hull, water got propelled straight in the air and came back down on them.
Even though they used the proper sewing needles for the job, they kept on breaking because of the multiple tough layers of the fabric they had to go through.
They repaired reef three and were down to one last needle before they could finished reef two. It was decided to stop the repair and keep the last needle for emergency use.
At the end of the day, the main sail was hoisted back and reef three was put to the test.
It was holding but pulling unevenly on the stitches, the tension wasn’t properly distributed…
View the trailer below for the upcoming Discovery Plus documentary about Ben’s epic expedition across the Pacific Ocean to discover the effects of pollution on ocean health. The documentary will premiere exclusively on Discovery Plus on April 15. To learn more about the documentary, view the following articles: Discovery Plus Releases Trailer for ‘The Swim,’ … Continued
I will keep on swimming even though I reached my goal of 300nm – our mission isn’t over and the perspective I get from under the water is too important to stop. Adam has been a little worried about my low body fat percentage and has done a great job at making sure I have … Continued
We reached the doldrums today. This is an area in the middle of the Great Pacific Garbage without any wind. Also, there are no currents shown on any of the maps we regularly get from land in this area. But for the past few days, storms passing south of us and going toward Hawaii have … Continued
Yesterday was a pretty uneventful day. Yoav shared the dinghy responsibilities with Josh and nothing really stood out. Maybe we are becoming numb to the quantity of plastic we encounter… We had 10 eggs left from the 90 given to us by the Transporter’s chef. I wish we had taken the 180 he originally offered. … Continued
The winds shifted back – they were coming from the north today.This morning we arrived on the north side of the anticyclonic eddy. With calm seas, I started my swim with Heather and David on the dinghy. We had planned to end the day with a photo session of the crew in the water with … Continued
I started my day yesterday with a phone call with Jared from Nomadica Films, the production company from last year’s expedition. We talked about the differences between this expedition and last year’s and how I was in a different mindset. Last year I focused on my performance a lot and every day I pushed myself … Continued
As of today, we have been at sea for 50 days and I have swum 265 nautical miles, but we still have about a month before we will see land.We have planned to spend another week in a new location at the core of the garbage patch. After we will start sailing north to the … Continued
We started the day with a couple of net tows around The Ocean Cleanup device, and once we were finished we said our goodbyes to the Transporter and TOC and sailed off. We have to retrieve a drifter west of us and we expect to get to the area in about two days.There was a … Continued
Last night, I went for a night swim. I put on a second layer of wetsuit on my torso with a hoodie and slide into a dark world. It was surreal, all my usual reference points were distorted. I felt as if I was flying over my swim line, the space between me and the … Continued
Last night the crew shined a light on the water. They wanted to collect lantern fish. During the process a couple of squids came up to get the fish at the surface. This gave me an idea, what if I swim at night with light shining around me, what would I be able to see? … Continued
We have settled on a new plan and route after leaving our rendezvous with captain Charles Moore. We have decided to travel about 200 nm west-south-west to get to drifter F. We will still be in the core of the patch. After reaching this new location, we will move north in the direction of the … Continued
Josh and Adam were up early in the dinghy with the drone and our net was deployed to synchronize our activities with the satellite fight over. Those footage will be used by Nikolai, the scientist working on refining his ocean current model. David and Hannah on the dinghy, spotted a turtle in my first hour … Continued
Hello Ben and Team. It’s good to be able to follow you again here. It sounds like it’s really starting to get challenging now! So many folks around the world are still cheering you onwards on your Mission and keeping you in their thoughts constantly and sending positive energy and goodwill your way every day. Hopefully you will have some calmer and kinder weather and ocean conditions to make easier headway without having to keep up a battle against the odds.