Transpac!

Paul Ward

Biggest passage yet! It’s hard to try and put it all into words but it absolutely flew by. Stardust is an awesome boat and triple-handing her is a breeze. Some highlights! - Breaking our 24hr record, now 236 miles! Not so much crazy top speeds on this trip, but great moderate wind on the beam where Stardust sails best. Our mast head anemometer died 1,000 miles in, necessitating an emergency mast climb to put our spare on (that we literally just got in Panama). Luckily we had smooth 3-4ft waves that we ran with minimum engine speed and an hour later we were as good as new. The most incredible night sky I’ve ever seen in my life. Taking a photo from a moving boat isn’t easy but hopefully it somewhat does it justice. Making friends (more like enemies) with boobies around the Galapagos. One night we had 13 on board and nothing we could do would get them to leave. They were fearless! The fishing report is incredible. Not so much in numbers, but size. These are the biggest fish I ever caught in my life. Day 5 hooked my first blue marlin around 200 pounds, and day 7 hooked up yet again to one at least twice the size, and a 90 minute fight. A few days after that, a nice pair of 50 pound yellowfin tuna around sunset. All of that came to an insane 3:15 hour fight with another yellowfin, I’m estimating to be 120-150 pounds. After taking a week break from the fishing, I hooked up to the marlin pictured as we were coming into Taiohae, which being the smallest (130lbs) we decided to keep half and give the other half away.

Boat & Crew

Stardust

Outremer, 45

Paul Ward

Owner