Position: 16 degrees, 50 minutes south; 144 degrees, 41 minutes west

This spot couldn't be more beautiful. The word "azure" might have been created to describe the color of the water here. We're in about 30 feet over coral and sand and about 100 yards off a sandy atoll which is covered with palm trees. Azure, ice blue, turquoise all describe the color of the water we are in.

Getting here was a little challenging. After the "exit" from Raroia which was pretty exciting, we had a long day with no wind. We motored. Not fun. Then after dinner a front moved through. By now, Ann was getting some sleep as it was the second evening watch around 0100. I thought I saw some unusual cloud formation, so checked the radar. Red, red, red, across the screen. Darn! Double reef the main, close the hatches, the usual drill. Also per usual just as I finished and was putting my jacket on, it started raining. This wasn't just a short squall, the rain lasted almost an hour. The good news though is that it brought wind, so we could finally sail.

We "buddy boated" with Orcinius who has joined us on this leg. We sailed the whole 24 hours here within about three miles of each other. Last night Ann and Lisa on Orcinius were on the first evening watches at the same time on their respective boats and played a trivia game over the VHF radio. Anything to stay awake in the wee hours.

After leaving in such dramatic fashion yesterday at 0815, we were looking for something a little easier today. We sailed along this island and got to the pass around 1000, which was two hours before low tide and 26 hours after leaving Raroia yesterday. Big standing waves and lots of tide action. No bueno. No way were we going through the pass until things changed. We dropped sails and just floated in the current about ½ mile outside, just loitering for two hours waiting for slack water. It worked. At noon, we decided to take another look at the pass. It had changed from a roaring rapid to a placid lake. It only stays that way for a short time, so we dashed in congratulating ourselves on our developing technique. Atoll entrances can be more dramatic than you really want, so it's nice to know that we're able to identify the calm time.

Once inside the atoll, we turned right around a "bight" formed by a coral reef and tucked into a nice spot a little sheltered from the south wind. It's a little bumpy-about 15 knots of wind and 2 foot wind waves, but not too bad. We're in sand and coral. I dove the anchor to see what it looked like. It's butted up against a big coral boulder, so we're not going anywhere as long as the wind doesn't shift around. On the other hand, I'm not looking forward to getting it back up, but we'll deal with that later. Following the chain back to the boat, there are a couple of large coral formations that the chain could tangle on, so I used the new technique of "buoying" the chain so it hangs in the water floating just above the coral instead of dragging on the bottom and wrapping around the coral as we swing back and forth at anchor.

We had Mahi ceviche for lunch and Ann cooked pasta for dinner. We've been watching the shooting stars since after dinner. Quite a show tonight. I saw one that I thought was the moon coming through the clouds, it lasted so long. I happened to look at just the right time and though, "Wow, I didn't know the moon was out so early". Then the glow turned into "sparks" shooting out the side of the cloud and it burned out toward the water. Pretty dramatic. It seemed so close, I am guessing it might have been space debris. (Jerry, I'll bet you can find if any entered the atmosphere on this day)

Tomorrow we'll go explore the atoll (hopefully bringing back some coconuts that we can use for meals and do some snorkeling. This place is so beautiful I imagine we'll be here a few days or longer, so we'll likely have more to describe tomorrow.

Left Raroia for Tahanea

Position: 16 degrees, 45 minutes south; 143 degrees, 17 minutes west

We were up at 0600 because this trip is 140 miles and we needed to be out at slack water which was about 0730 (Hide slack). We need to in turn, get to Tahanea by slack water there tomorrow. After doing this one today at high tide, I think we might wait offshore for the low tide at Tahanea. They say it's best to enter and leave the atolls on slack low water. "They" are right. We got to the pass at 0815 and there were standing waves. It was white water, but fortunately there wasn't a lot of wind or ocean waves, so not as bad as it could have been. However, if it had been any worse, we would not have gone out. Orcinius is going with us to the same place, so we were following them out and it was quite a thrill watching them hit the standing waves and swerve back and forth with the current. There were boils all around pulling you first left, then right. Turns out, they were in awe as we went through as well. Neither boat thought of getting a picture-which probably tells you how busy we were navigating out through the crazy water. If there hadn't been a range marker to help identify the channel, I might have gone onto the reef. The interesting thing is the white water was in the deeper channel and you had to go right through the standing waves to get out. The calm water was running over the very shallow reefs on either side. Very counter-intuitive. If you go for the calm looking water, you run aground! Past the calm looking water on either side of the pass the ocean waves were breaking on the reef, so all in all the whole experience definitely woke us up.

The rest of the day has been pretty boring. Very little wind, so we've been motoring as we want to make this a one day, not two day trip. Strange wind direction right now. It's coming from the west. The predominant winds down here are easterlies. We haven't seen a west wind since dropping below the equator. Oh well.

Dinner was (wait for it)….Mahi! This afternoon, I pulled one of the bags with four fillets out of the fridge. I cut up two fillets and made ceviche for tomorrow. It's marinating in lime juice right now. I marinated the other two fillets in soy/teriyaki/ginger/wasabi, seared then steamed them and served over rice with the marinade poured over the whole thing. Yum, yum and yum!

Beautiful stars out now as we thread our way through multiple islands on our way to Tahanea. It's supposed to be a stunning, "classic" South Pacific atoll and we have high hopes to spend several or more days there just playing in kayaks, trying out our standup paddleboard and snorkeling.

We'll let you know how that goes.

We took an easy day here anchored at our first atoll. We really didn't do too much of anything. After an easy morning-I made an omelet and lots of coffee-we inflated the dinghy, put on the outboard and went ashore. Not a lot ashore. A small town but no stores. This is mostly a town that houses pearl industry workers. A lot of this atoll is pearl farms. You can see them in the distance and every day around 1530 the workers come back from work by boat.

The best part of the day was tide pooling on the ocean side of the atoll. We walked across-about a 300 yard walk and were on the ocean side. It was low tide, so there was lots of exposed coral. Not too many seashells, but it was like a treasure hunt. Every once in a while you'd see something shining like an opal against the dull white broken coral that makes up the beach. A cowrie! They are gorgeous and we collected a dozen nice ones (with no critters inside).

The other highlight of the day was the arrival of Orcinius. It turned out they decided not to stay longer at Oa Pou but instead just headed down here. We heard them the last couple nights on Seafarers Net, so they were not unexpected. In fact we radioed them last night to set up Mahi Mahi dinner for tonight. So after our tide pooling, we got back to Charisma around 1630, changed, collected the fish and went over to Orcinius for a delightful evening. Cocktails, dinner and good conversation. What fun. Oh, and left over birthday cake - yesterday was Lisa's birthday!

The biggest challenge for today was coming back in the dark in an inflatable dinghy among the coral. I had established a course when it was light so I had an inkling where we needed to go, but it's still kind of eerie knowing that any moment, if you are off course, the coral could rip out the bottom of the dinghy. And we have seen sharks in this bay!

We've decided there's not a lot holding us here, and there are much nicer atolls ahead, so tomorrow at first light we're heading out for an atoll called Tahanea. It's about 140 miles, so an overnight. Oh well, as Blue Rodeo Mark says; "Nothing's easy".

Position: 16 degrees, 02 minutes South; 142 degrees, 28 minutes West

We saw land at about 1000 this morning. Raroia. Funny thing about the Tuamotus, they are atolls so don't have tall mountains or trees. Just coral, sand and palm trees. We didn't see the atoll until we about 7 miles away versus any of the Marquesas which are visible for at least 20 miles if not more.

It was pretty exciting to make landfall in a new island group. It was also nerve wracking. These atolls have a reputation of being "ugly" to enter. The tide is emptying and filling through a very small gap in the coral and they can develop fearsome tides that can overpower even a strong boat engine. It's not unheard of for an 8 foot standing wave to develop in the pass that can swamp you if you're not careful.

So, it was with the proper amount of caution, fear and recklessness that we entered this morning. We had been slowed down a bit the last 24 hours and thus just got here at 1100, which was over an hour past our estimate of slack water on the ebb. I decided we would try it anyway and if it looked at all problematic, we'd turn right around and wait "outside" until the next slack water at around 1500.

So…we furled the jib and started the engine while about a mile offshore. I lined Charisma up on the entry. It's about 100 yards wide between two breaking reefs so a little intimidating. Looking through the binoculars, I saw whitewater. OK, we're not going. Well, the whitewater doesn't look too bad, we'll try it. No, let's not. Yes, it's worth a try. All this was going through my mind. I finally decided the pass was large enough that if it got hairy, we could pivot and head out. In we go. I'm carefully watching the depth sounder and knot meter. Depth to make sure we wouldn't end up in shallow water up on the reef. Knotmeter to make sure the current wasn't taking us on a sleigh ride. The currents have been known to exceed 8 knots around here. That's at least a knot faster than Charisma can go under power. The good news: depth looked OK and the current looked about 2 knots and it was still ebbing (I still don't know why. It should have been in a full on flood by then). The bad news-we were having to make at least a thirty degree correction in order to go straight. I'm right at the edge of my comfort zone, but it's looking good. Let's keep going. As we got to the "commitment zone" where turning around wouldn't be an option, things were looking good. Here goes nothing!

All in all, it was virtually a non-event. A little tricky with the side current, but easily handled. No massive whitewater. Once inside, we turned right and followed the very obvious coral heads that were menacingly lining the path toward the little village where we wanted to anchor. We got a quick lesson in how to "read" the water colors for depth. Deep blue-good/deep. Light blue-OK, but get ready. Pale blue-you're treading close, slow down and get ready to stop, it's less than 15 feet deep. Sometimes,much less. Yellow/brown-If you see this it's too late. This is the coral near the surface. You don't want to see this, you'll hit it.

After motoring along the reef about a mile, we found a nice little spot to anchor. There was a swath of sand about 100 feet long and 40 feet wide. It is surrounded by reef, some of which is breaking the surface of the water, but it's a good anchorage if we can hit it just right. We circled twice just to get the feeling for how we were going to line up and on the third pass, slowed down. With Ann driving and me at the anchor in the bow, I directed us right up to the front of the sand where there was a large coral boulder. I signaled "stop and back", Ann put us in reverse and I dropped anchor. It hit the sand spot on and we dragged chain back down the middle of the sand strip. The anchor dug in and we snugged up with about 40 feet to spare behind us where there is coral sticking up and breaking the surface. As we were waiting to make sure the anchor set, two fairly large black tip reef sharks cruised by to say; "hi". We're going to have to get used to those guys if we're going to do any snorkeling. They are not supposed to be aggressive or dangerous, but just the look of them….

One more thing and this is more a tip to the future cruisers reading this. There is a large coral boulder about five feet high right toward the last 30 feet of our anchor chain. Usually this would be a concern as the chain might wrap around the coral and make hauling anchor very difficult without diving. BUT! We learned a new technique from an Aussie couple in Anaho Bay. You set the anchor, then pull up the last 1/3 (or whatever is appropriate) of chain and attach a float to the chain. We're using a boat fender for the float. You set the fender/float so that it holds the chain just above the obstruction. So instead of the chain wrapping as you drift, the float lifts it up over the obstruction and there's no entanglement. We're in 30 feet and the coral rock is about 6 feet tall (a typical height for coral). So after setting the anchor with the usual scope, I hauled in about thirty feet, set the fender/float line for 18 feet (for margin of error) and hooked it with a SS carabiner to the chain, then let the chain back out and set the snubber. Later I dove the anchor to check the whole rig out and darned if it doesn't look pretty good. The float is holding the chain just above the coral. It would definitely have wrapped without it. I'm pretty pleased with this new trick and will use it again. Charisma also seems to ride to anchor better with the extra "spring" that the floating chain seems to give (sort of a super catenary).

That's our day. Tomorrow, we inflate the dinghy and go ashore to explore, then "Orcinius" gets here. We talked with them on the shortwave today and were pleased to hear they are just behind. We invited them over for Mahi dinner. They are coming and bringing the wine! Yay.

Another day in paradise.

Position:09 degrees, 19 minutes South; 140 degrees, 17 minutes West

We're back at sea on a three and a half day run to Raroia in the Tuamotu chain of islands. Wilson's got the steering under control and we doing 5.5-6.5 knots with 14-18 knots wind and a 20% furled jib. We're taking our time because when we get to the island, really it's an atoll which means a "hollow" island surrounded by reef, we have to wait for a favorable tide to go through the pass into the lagoon inside the reef. We left today at 1630 and we're looking for a 3 ½ day passage getting us there in the very early hours. We'll then be able to wait around outside until it looks safe to enter. The guides say to enter at slack water after the ebb, so when we figure out when the ebb is, we'll do the calculations. I think it's sometime around noon but we're working to confirm that.

It's an absolutely gorgeous night of sailing. Not only is the wind moderate but it's about 75 degrees F so shorts and a tee-shirt are all that are needed to stay warm. The waves are about 5 feet and quartering so they are rolling us a fair amount, but we were getting tired of rolling in the anchorage and going nowhere for it.

That's about it for tonight. This starts "leg six" and the Tuamotus are a whole different experience. Folks who are ahead of us say (on the shortwave radio) that they don't want to leave. Just sand, some palm trees, no people and snorkeling among the reefs. Sounds nice. Can't wait.

We were going to leave today, but it was raining so hard this morning, we decided we'd stay. We're in no hurry to leave this beautiful place. In any case, it gave us some time to do a few more boat projects. The most pressing was to find whatever leak has been causing the bilge to have more water in it than it should. I figured either a fresh water tank leak or the stuffing box. I marked the dipstick on the fresh water tank before we went to bed and checked it in the morning. No leak there. That left the stuffing box. Usually easy to check but when cruising, the lazarette is full of stuff and I have to completely unload it to climb down there and check the prop shaft/stuffing box. I've been putting that one off. The leak accelerated the project, so out came all the stuff and down I went. Sure enough, the drip, drip had the cadence of ½ second. It's supposed to be more like one drip every 30 seconds at rest and once every 10 when running, so I loosened the locking nuts, tightened the box and screwed the lock nuts back down. Hopefully that'll fix it. You feel a little helpless when you find more water in the bilge than is supposed to be there.

The sun finally came out around 1300, so we decided to go for a hike. More like a climb really, but first-lunch. We opened a jar of canned tuna that Orcinius gave us. They caught two Yellowfins about a week ago and canned a bunch of the fish. Wow. This is what canned tuna is supposed to taste like. We may have just become spoiled.

For the hike, we invited Orcinius (Lisa came, John had boat work) and Gotta Go (Bruce and Craig) who just got in today. Great hike. For those who have been here; we went to the beach at Daniel's Bay, hiked up and to the right and followed the ridgeline around and out to the ocean. Stunning views of the sheer cliffs and mountains all around as well as the ocean complete with a rainbow in the midst of some passing squalls. On the way back, we collected some mangos off a tree we found. Looking forward to adding those to the breakfast menus.

Now we're waiting for Gotta Go. They are coming over for cocktails and dinner. I'm making prawns in my coconut curry sauce and steamed bananas. All over rice. Busy, busy social calendar.

Up till 0100 last night and awake and at the fuel dock at 0700 this morning.  We're fueled, washed down and almost put away.  We'll be leaving in an hour or so for Punta Mita for the night, then the big jump starts manana.

Watch for updates here.  We'll try to drop a line every day at least to give coordinates.

Hiva Oa is our next landfall.

We motored the six or seven miles over to Nuevo Vallarta this morning and got our Zarpe.  The Zarpe is basically our exit papers from Mexico.  Very important since there has been a rumor that someone got to the Marquesas after sailing the 2500 miles or so and were not allowed to enter because they didn't have a Zarpe (see photo below of the doc and the nice immigration folks who checked us out and inspected the boat.

 

There are five or six other boats in the marina who are ready to leave too.  Seems there's a favorable wind pattern for the next five days or so and we're all rushing to get final work done and provision the fresh vegetables.  We took delivery of about 20 lbs of vaccum packed frozen meat this morning and the veggies will be acquired at 1700 at the Friday Farmers Market in a few hours.  You can feel the stress on the dock as the boats are rushing to get all this stuff ready.  We were up last night after midnight and probably will be tonight as well, but we are ready and will leave tomorrow morning.  Some things on the list just won't get done, but the important ones are covered.  You're never as ready as you'd like to be.  At some point, you just go.

 

So, follow us...We'll get back to blogging every day or so as we voyage across the Pacific.  I'm trying to get the position reporting program to reliably work.  If I can, great, but if not, I'll add Lattitude/Longitude numbers and with a little effort on Google Earth, you'll be able to track us if the program won't.

 

As we're getting ready to depart, your test is to identify these craft made devices given to us as Bon voyage gifts from our friends on S/V Kanga >

>

 

Yay!  Now we can really use the Ham bands as we're crossing.

With that done, now all we need to do is change the oil and filters and finish provisioning.  Current plan is to leave a week from this coming Thursday (April 5th).  We could leave earlier but the Pacific High isn't settled yet, so while we could get some good wind for the first few hundred miles offshore, the trade-winds are really light.  The folks who have already left are complaining about little wind and rough seas.  We can wait a bit for a more comfortable ride.