Panama to Gambiers by way of Pitcairn

Pacific crossing! 4268 nm over 29 days, with a total of 26 days, 16 hours offshore (excluding a few days' stop at Pitcairn island). We flew the spinnaker for a day or two in the Bay of Panama in winds around 15 knots true until the spinnaker halyard popped. The Quantum A3 spinnaker was retrieved intact, but the ATN sock was ripped in several places, leaving us with white sails for the rest of the trip. After discovering that the attachment of the first reefing line to the main was about to rip off, we spent the rest of the trip either on jib only or with a double-reefed main. Often we single- reefed the jib as well, as almost every night, and sometimes during the day, we would get 5-10 minutes of 25-30 knot gusts without any warning. We had to hand-steer a total of 12+ days due to autopilot failure. Hand-steering was much easier on the beam, but we ended up sailing at wind angles ranging from 60 degrees to 170 degrees on this trip. We hove-to a few times to rest, including one night one day out from Pitcairn after an intensive day of downwind hand-steering through 25 knots of wind and 13' seas. Heaving to in those conditions was not ideal as the boat wanted to rest at 90 degrees and abeam of the swell. Overall the swell on the trip was jerky, with multiple components, and rarely less than 6', even during our 4 days in the doldrums of the ICTZ. Winds were 15-22 knots true, mostly in the easterly tradewind direction, except for a surprising southwest component for a few days around Pitcairn. There were only a few nights where squalls were a problem, with gusts up to only 35 knots. The lulls down to 8-10 knots were more problematic when hand-steering. Overall, not the spinnaker-flying on a smooth downwind swell we were hoping for, but at least it got us to paradise!