Dean Crowell, Barbara's husband, hopes she will get to Kauai before the race officially ends on July 17. Barbara is hoping to do somewhat better than that. "This is my first time around," she says. "Next time maybe I will focus on speed. I'll be flying twin headsails - no spinnaker. It's the tortoise approach, but I am looking forward to seeing everyone under the legendary tree."

Growing up in Colorado, Barbara learned to sail on gusty reservoirs. "My friend Alice Alldredge and I would take either my family's sailing dinghy or her family's Hobie Cat up to Horsetooth Reservoir for the day. We learned to cope with variable conditions and enjoy being on the water."

In 1990, when Barbara, Dean and their two daughters, Helane and Piper, moved to Washington, D.C., it was an opportunity to learn to sail on open water. "Dean and I took sailing lessons at Annapolis Sailing School. My goal was to charter a bare boat in the Caribbean. We did that over Christmas break in 1991. When we came back from the BVIs, we resolved to buy a boat. Bristols caught our eye and in 1992, we purchased Islander. She is a Bristol 34, built in 1975, designed by Halsey Herreshoff.

In 1993, the Department of State assigned Barbara, a Foreign Service Officer, to the U.S. Embassy in Paris. She took the opportunity to sail Islander short-handed across the pond. During Barbara's three-year tour, Islander was berthed in La Rochelle and the family sailed her on weekends in the Bay of Biscay. After her tour was over, Dean and Barbara took Islander through the rivers and canals of France. In 1999, Barbara sailed Islander along the coast of Spain to Vilamoura, Portugal, then back across the Atlantic to Barbados with crew.

"The Caribbean family vacations I imagined never materialized, so I sailed Islander short-handed up to Ft. Lauderdale in 2001 and had her trucked out here. Now is the opportunity to begin to explore the Pacific. Sailing single-handed is a new experience for me. I had plenty of wind for my qualifying sail. The sea was lumpy and it was cold out, but after 300 miles or so, I began to relax." Barbara plans to sail Islander back from Kauai with crew in early September.

Navigation: 3 handheld GPS. One is also a GSC, which allows me to send "globalgrams." I plan to send out at least one of these short emails every day to family and friends and, of course, to SSS. Steering: Monitor windvane with M-Rud and Navico Wheelpilot 5000. Food: Hot chocolate, granola, apples, cabbage salad, nuts, minute rice, instant mashed potatoes, canned vegetables and canned fruit (which I never eat on land, but find extremely appealing on the water), cheese (preserved in wax covering), crackers, olives, canned vegetable pate and tabouli salad. No refrigeration on Islander. I think of provisioning for crossings like a long backpack trip, without weight restrictions. Special thanks: Lina and Bruce Nesbit for their endless encouragement and expertise and my husband, Dean, who has supported my sailing adventures for over a decade.