F'ing Boats

Pacific ocean. 600 miles south east of Vanuatu

A fairly booring day with winds easing though of course coming from the exact direction we need to go.  Excitement was added then the engine start battery was dead just 10 minutes after the engine had been running (shut down to drain fuel/water separator).  Parallelled the genset batt to start it and seems as though the 12v alternator has died as it isnt ouputting any juice.  Toby and I looked through the manuals to discover that there is an emergency 24 to 12 volt Newmar converter (same as on visions), but we then dicovered it has been left on preumably for years and is deas so we are stuck running the genset and main engine in order to charge the start batteries.  Wind has in the meanti me built and we are pounding pretty baddly as we try to make miles north to get across this frontal boundary and into light southerlies.