What remained: a storm jib, a small triangular sail designed for use in heavy weather, stored below deck and therefore protected from the worst of the capsize damage. Half a broken spinnaker pole. A sextant, dry enough to function. A watch, found working in the bilge. Canned food — sardines, fruit cocktail, peanut butter — stored in lockers that had remained sealed during the capsize. A limited supply of fresh water. A rifle. The hull itself, which was floating.
And her own knowledge, whatever of it had survived the head injury.
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## The Decisions That Mattered
The first structural decision was navigation: where to go. San Diego, the original destination, was approximately 3,500 miles away, to the northeast. Without masts and without engine, covering that distance on a jury-rigged sail would take far longer than her food and water supply could support. Hawaii, the nearest substantial landmass, was approximately 1,500 miles to the northwest. It was the only realistic destination.
The second structural decision was whether the destination was reachable at all. Missing Hawaii — arriving north or south of the island chain, or falling short before reaching it — meant sailing into open ocean with no next landmass for thousands of miles. The Hawaiian Islands are small relative to the Pacific; hitting them from the east requires precision. Without GPS, without Loran, without any electronic fixing aid, the precision had to come from celestial navigation: measuring the positions of the sun, moon, and stars against the horizon and calculating from those measurements where you are on the globe.