Sorry for the radio silence, folks.
I'm back in Reno and am slaving away at writing the last couple of posts about my summer adventures. Ok not really, I'm trying to adjust to non-sailing life. It's bittersweet, but at least I can shower in freshwater whenever I want.
Ben is still in Tonga, we'll see how this transition goes for the blog.
Stay tuned, posts are percolating.
Thursday, August 22, 2013
Monday, August 19, 2013
Nuku'alofa
The best thing about Tonga is the people (are the people? It's too early in the morning for correct grammar.) They're so friendly and are always willing to talk to you. The opening line is "Where are you from?"
The worst thing about Tonga? Mosquitos. Holy skeeters, I'm being eaten alive wherever we go.
We've just been hanging around the boat, fixing and cleaning things and packing up whatever Ben wants me to take back to the States. It's been really great to just chill and not have to run around and see EVERYTHING before I leave.
After 3 months of sailing I realized (once we were in Tonga) that the passage from Niue was my last sail! So I made Ben take me out for a couple of day sails to see the whales (not too close, please) and make sure I had learned how to helm Kyanos. Check and check.
It's really difficult leaving Ben and sailing and Kyanos, but luckily I'm excited about finishing up school in Reno and seeing all the folks back there.
The worst thing about Tonga? Mosquitos. Holy skeeters, I'm being eaten alive wherever we go.
We've just been hanging around the boat, fixing and cleaning things and packing up whatever Ben wants me to take back to the States. It's been really great to just chill and not have to run around and see EVERYTHING before I leave.
After 3 months of sailing I realized (once we were in Tonga) that the passage from Niue was my last sail! So I made Ben take me out for a couple of day sails to see the whales (not too close, please) and make sure I had learned how to helm Kyanos. Check and check.
It's really difficult leaving Ben and sailing and Kyanos, but luckily I'm excited about finishing up school in Reno and seeing all the folks back there.
A particularly cool sunset while on passage to Tonga.
Wednesday, August 14, 2013
Sail to Tonga
The sail to Tonga was somewhat. We left Niue reasonably on time. Even while we put up sail and dropped the mooring we were debating the going to the northern group of island (Va'Vau) or the southern group (where I fly out of). Since I have a track record of missing my flight while visiting Ben and Kyanos (ok it only happened twice in San Diego) we tentatively decided to go to Nuku'alofa, the main city in Tonga.
We started out with the spinnaker when we dropped the mooring ball--to give the folks on Spruce a show Ben sailed off the mooring ball with the spinnaker in 3 knots of wind. It wasn't a very fast paced show, but it looked pretty cool.
Adventure #1 on passage: sometime during the first night the spinnaker got wrapped around the forestay. Ben can usually fix this with some creative steering but that thing was STUCK. It took hours of steering around crazily to get it to a point where Ben could climb the forestay to unwrap it. That's right, he climbed the forestay. At night. With a wrapped spinnaker.
I didn't start a timer when he went up the forestay but after what seemed like forever of him working on it while gripping the forestay with his legs and one hand, I looked at a clock. Over 30 minutes later, he finally came back to the cockpit completely wiped, but at least the spinnaker was down!
Adventure #2 on passage: at 4:10 p.m. on the second day we were still 160 nm from Tonga, so Ben put up the little working jib to slow us down with the plan of arriving not tomorrow but the next day. When I offhandedly made the comment "you know once you change sail, the wind is going to pick up and we'll make over 7 knots" which really kind of ticked him off...
But sure enough, what happened as soon as the sun went down? Squall city, and with that high wind we were doing 7 knots.
A night of fast sailing meant a day of hard sailing to make it to Tonga before sundown. We might have even turned on the engine just a teensy bit once we were in the bay so we didn't have to anchor after sundown.
Adventure #3 on passage: a whale hit us. We did NOT hit the whale--it hit Kyanos!! We were sailing into Tonga while the sun was almost setting watching humpback whales breach and spout in the distance--absolutely breathtakingly beautiful animals. I was just heading up to the bow to be on whale/reef watch when we felt a WHUMP! that felt like a rogue wave hit the starboard beam. When we turned to look a HUGE tail came up out of the water, slapped the lifelines and topsides, then slammed back down into the water, soaking us. We watched in disbelief as the whale floundered a little at the surface then slid back into the water and was gone.
For a full 5 minutes all we could do was stammer "A whale just hit us. That was a whale." Kyanos didn't seem to be damaged--the bilges weren't running and we couldn't see anything wrong with the hull...
Once we anchored we though about jumping in to check on stuff, but the water wasn't as clear as in Niue and I think I spotted a shark...or some little grey torpedo shaped fish. So we opened a bottle of wine to celebrate another mostly successful passage.
We started out with the spinnaker when we dropped the mooring ball--to give the folks on Spruce a show Ben sailed off the mooring ball with the spinnaker in 3 knots of wind. It wasn't a very fast paced show, but it looked pretty cool.
Adventure #1 on passage: sometime during the first night the spinnaker got wrapped around the forestay. Ben can usually fix this with some creative steering but that thing was STUCK. It took hours of steering around crazily to get it to a point where Ben could climb the forestay to unwrap it. That's right, he climbed the forestay. At night. With a wrapped spinnaker.
I didn't start a timer when he went up the forestay but after what seemed like forever of him working on it while gripping the forestay with his legs and one hand, I looked at a clock. Over 30 minutes later, he finally came back to the cockpit completely wiped, but at least the spinnaker was down!
Adventure #2 on passage: at 4:10 p.m. on the second day we were still 160 nm from Tonga, so Ben put up the little working jib to slow us down with the plan of arriving not tomorrow but the next day. When I offhandedly made the comment "you know once you change sail, the wind is going to pick up and we'll make over 7 knots" which really kind of ticked him off...
But sure enough, what happened as soon as the sun went down? Squall city, and with that high wind we were doing 7 knots.
A night of fast sailing meant a day of hard sailing to make it to Tonga before sundown. We might have even turned on the engine just a teensy bit once we were in the bay so we didn't have to anchor after sundown.
Adventure #3 on passage: a whale hit us. We did NOT hit the whale--it hit Kyanos!! We were sailing into Tonga while the sun was almost setting watching humpback whales breach and spout in the distance--absolutely breathtakingly beautiful animals. I was just heading up to the bow to be on whale/reef watch when we felt a WHUMP! that felt like a rogue wave hit the starboard beam. When we turned to look a HUGE tail came up out of the water, slapped the lifelines and topsides, then slammed back down into the water, soaking us. We watched in disbelief as the whale floundered a little at the surface then slid back into the water and was gone.
For a full 5 minutes all we could do was stammer "A whale just hit us. That was a whale." Kyanos didn't seem to be damaged--the bilges weren't running and we couldn't see anything wrong with the hull...
Once we anchored we though about jumping in to check on stuff, but the water wasn't as clear as in Niue and I think I spotted a shark...or some little grey torpedo shaped fish. So we opened a bottle of wine to celebrate another mostly successful passage.
After talking to some folks, we've come up with a few theories about that whale (which we named Frank). We might have gotten too close to a calf and the mom was peeved or it could have been sleeping. I think it was sleeping since it didn't hit us all that hard.
Sunday, August 11, 2013
Niue, Day 2
Even though we checked into the country yesterday, we're checking out today since the customs guys don't work on the weekend. We want to get a good weather window to Tonga, and I can't afford to miss my flight...so we can't spend as much time here as we want.
Customs check out took so long since so many boats were getting ready to leave this weekend, I'm so glad we rented the motorcycle for two days instead of just today! Even with two days to see the island it feels rushed.
After customs we hopped on the bike and started to go around the island. There's so many little "Beach Treks" down to different caves and beaches and snorkeling spots that we barely got halfway around the island.
Enough words though: enjoy some pictures!
Customs check out took so long since so many boats were getting ready to leave this weekend, I'm so glad we rented the motorcycle for two days instead of just today! Even with two days to see the island it feels rushed.
After customs we hopped on the bike and started to go around the island. There's so many little "Beach Treks" down to different caves and beaches and snorkeling spots that we barely got halfway around the island.
Enough words though: enjoy some pictures!
Love all the different colors of water. And the water clarity!
How can a huge hunk of coral be so green?
Spelunking. Not really a fan of it without ropes.
Break time to snorkel and enjoy the view.
Awesome arch.
Such cool formations in the coral.
Ben climbing while I say "If you fall I'm not picking the coral bits out of your leg hair."
Our transportation for the two days: wonderful little motorcycle!
Saturday, August 10, 2013
Niue, Day 1
Takin' care of business today.
We checked in with customs--loads of paperwork to fill out--and in Niue the customs agents actually meet you at the dinghy dock.
Note about the dinghy dock: since the island is just a hunk of coral there aren't any great places to tie the dinghy. So there's a crane that you use to pick up the dinghy, deposit it onto a cart, cart it to a parking spot and drag it off the cart to the parking spot. Nifty way of keeping the dinghy safe when you're on land.
The customs agents were easy going and pleasant. And they speak English! After French Poly and the gendarmes this is a definite plus. They were really thorough in making sure we didn't bring any fruit or vegetable waste ashore or deposit it into the ocean. Since we don't have any fresh fruits or veggies after 7 days at sea, those questions were easy to answer.
After customs we headed over to the yacht club to talk to the folks about the mooring fees and all that. They were super nice, easy going, and pleasant. We actually spent a good chunk of time there chatting with Ira and Brian about what to see on the island and how to see it.
We made some new friends heading out of Bora Bora--folks on S/V Spruce. Sue, Andy, and Spruce are from the U.K. and offered to send updates to Osprey and Dragonsbane via SSB for us. We had a couple chats with them and discussed renting motorbikes for a little bit to see more of the island.
When we stopped by the tourist information center to reserve a bike we also inquired about a dental appointment for Ben. On the passage he suffered from an abscessed tooth--which can be really dangerous if the infection spreads to the bloodstream. They had an opening that afternoon for a consultation (which, by the way, are only $18 NZ!)
On the way to the appointment the Chief of Niue Police, Tony, picked us up to give us a ride and showed us a shortcut "through the bush" for the way back. He was really chatty about being chief in such a small community (pop of Niue: 1500) and was genuinely interested in our adventures, too.
The dental appointment went really smooth: it's just a cracked tooth that will need to be fixed sometime down the road. Another plus--the consultation only took 5 minutes and was no charge.
After all this I was exhausted and ready for a nap so we went back to the boat before cocktails and appetizers on Spruce. I don't know about Ben, but I had an absolute blast getting to know Sue and Andy. We chattered non stop from 5 til past 10 when I started to fall asleep.
Tomorrow: the motorcycle!
We checked in with customs--loads of paperwork to fill out--and in Niue the customs agents actually meet you at the dinghy dock.
Note about the dinghy dock: since the island is just a hunk of coral there aren't any great places to tie the dinghy. So there's a crane that you use to pick up the dinghy, deposit it onto a cart, cart it to a parking spot and drag it off the cart to the parking spot. Nifty way of keeping the dinghy safe when you're on land.
The customs agents were easy going and pleasant. And they speak English! After French Poly and the gendarmes this is a definite plus. They were really thorough in making sure we didn't bring any fruit or vegetable waste ashore or deposit it into the ocean. Since we don't have any fresh fruits or veggies after 7 days at sea, those questions were easy to answer.
After customs we headed over to the yacht club to talk to the folks about the mooring fees and all that. They were super nice, easy going, and pleasant. We actually spent a good chunk of time there chatting with Ira and Brian about what to see on the island and how to see it.
We made some new friends heading out of Bora Bora--folks on S/V Spruce. Sue, Andy, and Spruce are from the U.K. and offered to send updates to Osprey and Dragonsbane via SSB for us. We had a couple chats with them and discussed renting motorbikes for a little bit to see more of the island.
When we stopped by the tourist information center to reserve a bike we also inquired about a dental appointment for Ben. On the passage he suffered from an abscessed tooth--which can be really dangerous if the infection spreads to the bloodstream. They had an opening that afternoon for a consultation (which, by the way, are only $18 NZ!)
On the way to the appointment the Chief of Niue Police, Tony, picked us up to give us a ride and showed us a shortcut "through the bush" for the way back. He was really chatty about being chief in such a small community (pop of Niue: 1500) and was genuinely interested in our adventures, too.
The dental appointment went really smooth: it's just a cracked tooth that will need to be fixed sometime down the road. Another plus--the consultation only took 5 minutes and was no charge.
After all this I was exhausted and ready for a nap so we went back to the boat before cocktails and appetizers on Spruce. I don't know about Ben, but I had an absolute blast getting to know Sue and Andy. We chattered non stop from 5 til past 10 when I started to fall asleep.
Tomorrow: the motorcycle!
Friday, August 9, 2013
Niue Check in
Where to start?
Niue is awesomely wonderfully enchanting.
Let's begin at the beginning. My introduction to Niue. We came in after dark--well we could see the island before the sun set but we had to go around to the west side to Alofa to anchor. I didn't realize how big Niue actually was but it took us quite awhile to get over there.
At first glance Niue isn't inviting. It's the world's largest piece of coral. So the entire island is just a hunk of grey rock. Flat, corally rock. But once we explored a little we discovered it wasn't all that flat and it had some serious jungly greenness.
Besides seeing the island, the best thing about landfall after 7 days at sea was the smell. Bora Bora didn't smell all that great, to be honest, but Niue. Oh man. Imagine the most wondeful flower fragrance you can then multiply it by 10. Then maybe by another factor of 10. I cannot get over how GOOD this island smells! (Side note: the flower smell even permeates when you're on land in the middle of the "city".)
When we pulled in after dark the bioluminescent stuff in the water was bright and gorgeous, the stars were spectacular with the new moon, AND there were dolphins playing in our bow wake as we approached the anchorage.
The new moon, while helpful for stargazing, did present the problem of darkness while trying to pick up a mooring ball. I stood on the bow with the spotlight trying to catch sight of the reflective tape on the buoys around the other boats. The other cruisers had been thoughtful enough to turn on the mast light (anchor light) so we could see where they were--and that gave us a vague direction to head towards instead of completely relying on the chart plotter.
Once we spotted a mooring buoy the rest was nice and easy--Ben's so good at steering that I'm pretty sure I could have snagged the buoy by hand if I could have reached it.
By the time we cleaned up all the lines and covered the sails it was past ten. On passage I had the early watch so it was waaaay past my bedtime but I still stayed up to share a celebratory beer with Ben.
1100 miles in the can! (Maybe more with the detour to Palmerston).
The plan to see Niue in just a few days is to rent a motorbike and zip around the island on that. (Note I'm writing this after the fact so my mother doesn't worry TOO much about us. Which is more worrisome--an 1100 mile sail or a motorcyle?)
Niue is awesomely wonderfully enchanting.
Let's begin at the beginning. My introduction to Niue. We came in after dark--well we could see the island before the sun set but we had to go around to the west side to Alofa to anchor. I didn't realize how big Niue actually was but it took us quite awhile to get over there.
At first glance Niue isn't inviting. It's the world's largest piece of coral. So the entire island is just a hunk of grey rock. Flat, corally rock. But once we explored a little we discovered it wasn't all that flat and it had some serious jungly greenness.
Besides seeing the island, the best thing about landfall after 7 days at sea was the smell. Bora Bora didn't smell all that great, to be honest, but Niue. Oh man. Imagine the most wondeful flower fragrance you can then multiply it by 10. Then maybe by another factor of 10. I cannot get over how GOOD this island smells! (Side note: the flower smell even permeates when you're on land in the middle of the "city".)
When we pulled in after dark the bioluminescent stuff in the water was bright and gorgeous, the stars were spectacular with the new moon, AND there were dolphins playing in our bow wake as we approached the anchorage.
The new moon, while helpful for stargazing, did present the problem of darkness while trying to pick up a mooring ball. I stood on the bow with the spotlight trying to catch sight of the reflective tape on the buoys around the other boats. The other cruisers had been thoughtful enough to turn on the mast light (anchor light) so we could see where they were--and that gave us a vague direction to head towards instead of completely relying on the chart plotter.
Once we spotted a mooring buoy the rest was nice and easy--Ben's so good at steering that I'm pretty sure I could have snagged the buoy by hand if I could have reached it.
By the time we cleaned up all the lines and covered the sails it was past ten. On passage I had the early watch so it was waaaay past my bedtime but I still stayed up to share a celebratory beer with Ben.
1100 miles in the can! (Maybe more with the detour to Palmerston).
The plan to see Niue in just a few days is to rent a motorbike and zip around the island on that. (Note I'm writing this after the fact so my mother doesn't worry TOO much about us. Which is more worrisome--an 1100 mile sail or a motorcyle?)
Thursday, August 8, 2013
Welcome to Niue
We left Bora Bora on July 30th and had a really wonderful passage to Niue. I somehow managed to add the days wrong and it was only a 7 day, 6 hour passage...not 9 days. The math person can add, really. I had an earpatch to prevent seasickness and didn't really feel all that sick but did end up feeding the fishes a couple times.
The winds were mostly cooperative with only one day/night of high winds and only a couple hours of light winds. I got to change some headsails (no rollerfurling on Kyanos!) and didn't have any fiascos in the kitchen!
Ben cooked some pretty kickin' meals--the most memorable for me being bacon sandwiches. Bacon, bbq sauce and baguette: YUM! We had stocked up on a lot of canned ready-to-go meals in Bora Bora. They're not the healthiest but they taste good and they're easy :)
Other than some whales circling the boat near Palmerston and some dolphins Ben saw, I didn't see all that much wildlife. That's ok since it's "whale season" here in Niue. Meaning we should see a lot here. Hopefully humpbacks!
The winds were mostly cooperative with only one day/night of high winds and only a couple hours of light winds. I got to change some headsails (no rollerfurling on Kyanos!) and didn't have any fiascos in the kitchen!
Ben cooked some pretty kickin' meals--the most memorable for me being bacon sandwiches. Bacon, bbq sauce and baguette: YUM! We had stocked up on a lot of canned ready-to-go meals in Bora Bora. They're not the healthiest but they taste good and they're easy :)
Other than some whales circling the boat near Palmerston and some dolphins Ben saw, I didn't see all that much wildlife. That's ok since it's "whale season" here in Niue. Meaning we should see a lot here. Hopefully humpbacks!
In Niue.
Made it to Niue after a 9 ish day passage. It's a wonderfully beautiful island that smells amazing. The people are super friendly, too!
Thrilled to spend a couple days here. So much to see I might not waste it online updating the blog. Sorry folks!
Tuesday, July 30, 2013
Hiking in Bora Bora
There's a couple of cool looking peaks in Bora Bora, and we'd heard that at least two of them are hikable. (Ben says the other one is summitable since we have climbing gear but I'm not sure I'm hard core enough). So we decided to hike what we could. A couple of folks have gotten lost, hurt and even died on the mountain without guides, so all the locals in the tourist trade will tell you to hire a guide for about $40-50 per person. Eesh. That's a lot of money.
Of course being independent Alaskans we decided to just take a whack at it ourselves with a bunch of other cruisers. Barb on Sea Whisperer did the hike the day before we planned to, and she gave us the ins and outs. She said it was actually more intense than some hiking she did in Nepal! I was a little worried to do it in just my little minimalist running shoes but those were the sturdiest shoes I brought with me.
The hike turned out to be beautiful--and reminded me so much of hikes I've done at home (ok, minus the devil's club, alders, low treeline and all the other Alaskan stuff. Plus all the tropical stuff). It was really steep in places but nothing was too scary or intense. And it was beautiful!!
Once we got to the top we looked longingly over at the next peak and thought we maybe saw a trail up it. Turns out there was a trail--but it was STEEP! No such luck on the third peak, but the second peak's view was breathtaking.
The internet is too slow to post pictures but I will soon.
Of course being independent Alaskans we decided to just take a whack at it ourselves with a bunch of other cruisers. Barb on Sea Whisperer did the hike the day before we planned to, and she gave us the ins and outs. She said it was actually more intense than some hiking she did in Nepal! I was a little worried to do it in just my little minimalist running shoes but those were the sturdiest shoes I brought with me.
The hike turned out to be beautiful--and reminded me so much of hikes I've done at home (ok, minus the devil's club, alders, low treeline and all the other Alaskan stuff. Plus all the tropical stuff). It was really steep in places but nothing was too scary or intense. And it was beautiful!!
Once we got to the top we looked longingly over at the next peak and thought we maybe saw a trail up it. Turns out there was a trail--but it was STEEP! No such luck on the third peak, but the second peak's view was breathtaking.
The internet is too slow to post pictures but I will soon.
Saturday, July 27, 2013
Fell Behind
Well I fell a little behind on writing posts. It's pretty easy to sum up the past ten days though:
We sailed to Raiatea in great winds--again I had to hold Ben back and tell him it wasn't a race, we didn't need the spinnaker, we were fine doing 7.5 knots for such a short hop...
Raiatea has amazing archeological sites to wander around and see, so we did that and some hiking.
We sailed to Taha'a in great winds--again I had to hold Ben back and tell him it wasn't a race, we didn't need the huge genoa up, we were doing find passing Dragonsbane and Osprey...
In Taha'a the winds picked up so we stayed close to the boat but did manage to have a lot of potlucks and celebrate Mark's birthday (he's on Compass Rosey).
While making the buns for his birthday dinner (we had quinoa burgers) the stove went out and it's impossible to light with a dinky little lighter when it's hot. So I pulled out the propane torch and lit 'er up no problem.
The next night we had a happy hour on Osprey and for the mixers I cracked open a coconut to mix with juice. It's really easy to open those suckers if you use a cordless drill. I was immensely entertained to use power tools for food prep.
After nearly a week of waiting out really gusty winds (we saw gusts up to 50 knots!) we sailed to Bora Bora. It was great sailing and again I convinced Ben to run with less sail. His favorite sail might be the spinnaker but I'm in love with our little miter cut jib. It works really well in high winds with little to no flogging.
We're in Bora Bora getting ready to head to Tonga. We might go as early as Monday, but probably Tuesday the 30th. Hopefully we can find the time to do some hiking and movement before being cooped up on the boat for 1000 miles.
We sailed to Raiatea in great winds--again I had to hold Ben back and tell him it wasn't a race, we didn't need the spinnaker, we were fine doing 7.5 knots for such a short hop...
Raiatea has amazing archeological sites to wander around and see, so we did that and some hiking.
We sailed to Taha'a in great winds--again I had to hold Ben back and tell him it wasn't a race, we didn't need the huge genoa up, we were doing find passing Dragonsbane and Osprey...
In Taha'a the winds picked up so we stayed close to the boat but did manage to have a lot of potlucks and celebrate Mark's birthday (he's on Compass Rosey).
While making the buns for his birthday dinner (we had quinoa burgers) the stove went out and it's impossible to light with a dinky little lighter when it's hot. So I pulled out the propane torch and lit 'er up no problem.
The next night we had a happy hour on Osprey and for the mixers I cracked open a coconut to mix with juice. It's really easy to open those suckers if you use a cordless drill. I was immensely entertained to use power tools for food prep.
After nearly a week of waiting out really gusty winds (we saw gusts up to 50 knots!) we sailed to Bora Bora. It was great sailing and again I convinced Ben to run with less sail. His favorite sail might be the spinnaker but I'm in love with our little miter cut jib. It works really well in high winds with little to no flogging.
We're in Bora Bora getting ready to head to Tonga. We might go as early as Monday, but probably Tuesday the 30th. Hopefully we can find the time to do some hiking and movement before being cooped up on the boat for 1000 miles.
Photo courtesy of Brian on Osprey. Kyanos is on the left, Dragonsbane on the right. We have our awesome little miter cut jib up and we're kind of speeding past these guys.
Sunday, July 14, 2013
Spicy Spicy Sauce
Cooking on the boat requires oodles of creativity. You're really lucky if you have a lot of fresh ingredients and even the canned goods are sometimes precious little gems of food that end up being hoarded. A lot of my cooking so far is looking through cookbooks for recipes that look tasty while hoping I have enough ingredients to make it taste somewhat similar. I rely on cookbooks quite a bit compared to cooking at home since the pantry contents are so different.
Luckily at least half of the time my experiments turn out tasty, and they always turn out edible...well except for that one rice pudding fiasco between the Tuamotus and Tahiti. This latest blunder with mushroom chipotle sauce turned out edible and delicious enough to be funny.
Using the recipe for Mushroom Chipotle sauce from the Cruising Cuisine cookbook as a loose guide I sauteed some onions and garlic, set that aside and started chopping chipotle peppers. They're a smoked jalepeno pepper that can be super spicy. I didn't realize that Ben usually uses one to spice up an entire pot of beans. I also didn't realize that a "can of chipotle peppers" is usually around 4 ounces. I found a can in the dry storage and just started chopping and putting them all in the sauce (at this point it was just chicken bouillon, a can of green chiles and a can of mushrooms. The recipe called for a whole can and to simmer it down to about 1/3 of a cup.
At this Ben looks up and his eyes bug out--I had just used a 10 ounce can of chipotles. When you tried a bite it burned an actual hole into your tongue.
I really really didn't want to waste all those primo ingredients so I dug in the fridge and found leftover beans and corned beef and added that. Still too spicy. So I served it over rice and just ate it as fast as I could and tried to ignore the burning sensation in my stomach. Ben managed to eat a bite or two. You know it's spicy when he can only handle two bites: his curry usually makes me cry it's so spicy.
That night I just kept thinking about that mushroom sauce and how wasteful it was. When I woke up I dug through the pantry and found a can of tomato paste and rechecked the recipe. That was supposed to be in there. Oops.
So I served about a tablespoon of that over some potato frittata and it was almost palatable. Still scratching my head about what to do with it all I decided to add more beans. So after soaking a couple cups of black beans and bummed some cans of tomato paste and diced tomatoes from Dragonsbane I had a sort of chipotle chili that they helped us eat. But there were still leftovers.
The day after chili, Dragonsbane cooked up some burritos and I used the chipotle chili as a topping and there were STILL leftovers. On day four I added macaroni noodles--Ben and I finally polished off that sauce with some chili mac. By this time we were sailing to Raiatea.
Looking back at it, it wasn't such a bad thing on a boat to have this never ending tasty thing that could be tweaked meal to meal. I'm brainstorming something like that for the passage to Tonga. Maybe something a little less spicy, with fewer beans.
Saturday, July 13, 2013
Tahiti to Huahini
Well the quick little sail over here that should have been uneventful was a little bit eventful.
At the pass in Tahiti Set Me Free was ahead of us and doing almost 8 knots on a reach (a certain point of sail) but as soon as we turned around Moorea and started going downwind we started speeding. It was pretty fun to watch the lights of Set Me Free get closer and closer then further and further away.
When we turned downwind Ben put up the spinnaker pole as a reaching strut with the genoa and the mainsail on the other side in a wing-on-wing setup. This is a great little setup when things go well and the wind is steady, but this time the swell was just big enough to flop the mainsail around a little. It got stuck under the first set of spreaders and wasn't doing much of anything and we needed to be able to move it around just in case the winds picked up. When Ben tried to get the sail unstuck it just ended up getting a little more stuck on TOP of the first set of spreaders. Well poo, this isn't good.
To get the sail unstuck Ben climbed the mast. In the dark. With a sail plan up that I couldn't change in case he went overboard since the spinnaker pole is too heavy for me. He did at least clip his lifejacket harness to a shroud. And he had a headlamp. So it wasn't completely and utterly insane but I was kind of freaking out. Maybe a little.
He couldn't get the sail unstuck in the dark but we got lucky--the winds didn't get out of control or change too much before daylight. We were in view of Huahine when Ben climbed the mast again and got the sail unstuck no problem and no damage! Well we did lose a batton but that showed up against the toerail during post-sailing cleanup.
We approached the pass in Huahine and the winds were right on the nose which meant we would have to tack in the middle of the pass. So Ben took down the sails and started the engine. I was just starting to sit back and have a nice relaxing trip through the pass when I made the mistake of teasing Ben about turning on the engine. Big mistake teasing a stubborn sailor about not sailing. So off went the engine and up went the sails. And up went the wind speed.
(To our moms: it wasn't a scary pass to sail through, there weren't any coral heads to run into and the water was clear enough that we could see whatever reef we were speeding towards)
On the inside of the pass were our buddies on Compass Rosey--Mark, Rob and Bri (the same Rob and Bri that sailed with us in the Tuamotus). The direction of the wind and path of the tacks we took brought us REALLY close to them so they got some great pictures of Kyanos under full sail, pointed like mad. (Ben interjected just now that we weren't THAT close but I could see the coffee cup in the cupholder in front of their wheel).
We tacked here and there through the anchorage (all the boats we got close to smiled and waived. One might have called us crazy but I was too busy cranking in the sails to listen) and found a great spot near Osprey. The holding wasn't all that great since the sand was really hard, but the water was shallow enough that Ben dove on the anchor and set it by hand. So we were anchored in about 15 feet of water with sketchy holding--did I mention the beautiful reef behind us that would be really bad to run into?
As soon as we got a little settled Osprey came over and discussed the really big winds headed our way. They left and we had lunch and then Set Me Free came through the pass; they were only a couple of hours behind. Osprey's plan is to head over to an anchorage that's a little more protected and out of the wind. We did plan on following them but accidently took a 4 hour nap--we woke up around sunset and decided to stay put. We'll move tomorrow if the winds are that bad here but for now we're hunkered down.
Friday, July 12, 2013
Change of Plans
Well there's been a change of plans, of course. I'm going to Tonga! Instead of buying a plane ticket from wherever I am back to Papeete for my flight on August 18th I'll fly out of Tonga sometime before I need to be back in Reno.
When we crunched the numbers it turned out to be the same amount to buy a ticket out of Tonga as fly back to Papeete. Tahiti is great and all, but I'm ridiculously excited not to have to come back to Papeete. It's just not my type of city.
Since it's all decided and we have a tentative schedule to keep up with now, we're heading to Huahine tonight. If we leave at sunset we should get there sometime tomorrow morning. We're hoping to catch up with Osprey.
When we crunched the numbers it turned out to be the same amount to buy a ticket out of Tonga as fly back to Papeete. Tahiti is great and all, but I'm ridiculously excited not to have to come back to Papeete. It's just not my type of city.
Since it's all decided and we have a tentative schedule to keep up with now, we're heading to Huahine tonight. If we leave at sunset we should get there sometime tomorrow morning. We're hoping to catch up with Osprey.
Wednesday, July 10, 2013
Water up
After getting the rudder put back in there was a lot of work to get the boat back in sailing shape. We're heading to Huahine in the next couple of days, which means getting water at the dock since it's potable and free. There's a great spot that sailboats can pull up to that's out of the way and relatively easy to get in and out of. The only problem is that there are a couple of tenders parked there right now for big megayachts. These tenders are over 40 feet--which is how long Kyanos is! Basically their dinghies are bigger than our boat. Ben scoped out different spots we could pull into and picked out a space that Kyanos would fit. Funny thing about this space--it's in between some megayacht sailboats.
Pulling in there was entertaining for everyone--and maybe a little stressful for Ben. The big yachts were stern-to the dock and we pulled in real close to an all black sailboat, turned on a dime and ended up with our port side next to the dock perfectly between the big sailboats. The crews of those boats were on deck watching our every move to make sure we didn't get too close but we didn't even get near it.
Ben pulled up to the dock so smoothly that I just stepped off Kyanos onto the dock and tied her up (trying not to laugh at the fact that we had to step UP to the dock and the megayachts need ladders down to the dock). We quickly filled our water tanks while keeping a watch out for dock security since we weren't sure if they'd get mad at us for filling up there. We even waved a few gendarmes (French police) that were walking by boarding the mega yachts. When the marina security did walk by he laughed and gave us a thumbs up.
After filling up the tanks we gave Kyanos a good freshwater wash down. I'm pretty sure the megayacht crews were jealous that we did all this in less than an hour.
When we pushed off from the dock (we would have sailed but the wind was right on the nose) the crew on the all-black sailboat were really friendly, waving and yelling "Hope to see you around!" We got really lucky they didn't complain about the teeny little boat from the wrong side of the dock. It was actually really fun to mess with them a little.
Here's Kyanos next to her big sisters. Can you find her?
Pulling in there was entertaining for everyone--and maybe a little stressful for Ben. The big yachts were stern-to the dock and we pulled in real close to an all black sailboat, turned on a dime and ended up with our port side next to the dock perfectly between the big sailboats. The crews of those boats were on deck watching our every move to make sure we didn't get too close but we didn't even get near it.
Ben pulled up to the dock so smoothly that I just stepped off Kyanos onto the dock and tied her up (trying not to laugh at the fact that we had to step UP to the dock and the megayachts need ladders down to the dock). We quickly filled our water tanks while keeping a watch out for dock security since we weren't sure if they'd get mad at us for filling up there. We even waved a few gendarmes (French police) that were walking by boarding the mega yachts. When the marina security did walk by he laughed and gave us a thumbs up.
After filling up the tanks we gave Kyanos a good freshwater wash down. I'm pretty sure the megayacht crews were jealous that we did all this in less than an hour.
When we pushed off from the dock (we would have sailed but the wind was right on the nose) the crew on the all-black sailboat were really friendly, waving and yelling "Hope to see you around!" We got really lucky they didn't complain about the teeny little boat from the wrong side of the dock. It was actually really fun to mess with them a little.
Here's Kyanos next to her big sisters. Can you find her?
Friday, July 5, 2013
Rudder Chaos
We have a working rudder!! Well, almost. There's a bunch of stuff to put back together but at least the rudder is where it's supposed to be instead of on the bow.
The anchorage was really calm in the morning so Ben was fired up to throw that sucker back in and called over to Dragonsbane. They were already on their way into town, but would be back in the afternoon. This turned out to be a good thing when Ben found more work to do on the rudder before putting it back in ("Of course there's more work. It's a boat," he says).
In addition to more work on the rudder we found the time to run pick up our propane tanks-yay for the ability to cook! Of course when I went to make cookies I found out that we're out of eggs. Anyone have a good substitute for eggs in recipes? I can usually fudge my way through a recipe with fewer eggs than it requires but have no idea what to do with no eggs at all. Luckily when Dragonsbane came over they brought me eggs.
Around 3:45 the rudder was at least back in the water, with blue webbing and red webbing wrapped around it to stabilize it side-to-side, two fenders strapped to the top since the top is heavier than the bottom and one anchor strapped over top of it to lend some weight to the whole thing. Adam was in the water with dive gear; Ben and Jacques were in separate dinghies holding onto it and trying to get it in from there; Arthur from the Black Pearl and I were in the boat holding onto the blue and red webbing.
After several failed attempts with that setup Jacques got IN the water and straddled the anchor to guide it while Adam was underwater playing with his BCD to either sink or float the rudder as necessary. Ben was in the boat guiding the rudder into the lower rudder tube where the new bearing is. We were trying our hardest not to get the rudder shaft partway in then having it lever and break the new bearing.
It was now about 4:45 or so, and sunset is around 5:15 so we were losing daylight fast. We had to time our attempts in between any boat traffic that made the boat rock, or worse, hobbyhorse the boat and slam the stern into the water. On one really close attempt we got the system down to almost a science--Jacques would yell "Red, tension! Blue, slack" while Ben was telling him "More towards you" so he could guide the rudder. The try after that we finally got the rudder in, but not all the way up. Arthur and I hauled on the webbing, Adam pushed from underneath, Jacques pushed from the water and Ben clamped a C-clamp on the very top and hauled from that and we were in business!
There's more work to be done as far as fiberglassing and putting the helm seat back together but as of right now, we have a rudder again!!
Here's some pictures of the chaos as well as one of my small contributions: putting together the upper bearing.
The anchorage was really calm in the morning so Ben was fired up to throw that sucker back in and called over to Dragonsbane. They were already on their way into town, but would be back in the afternoon. This turned out to be a good thing when Ben found more work to do on the rudder before putting it back in ("Of course there's more work. It's a boat," he says).
In addition to more work on the rudder we found the time to run pick up our propane tanks-yay for the ability to cook! Of course when I went to make cookies I found out that we're out of eggs. Anyone have a good substitute for eggs in recipes? I can usually fudge my way through a recipe with fewer eggs than it requires but have no idea what to do with no eggs at all. Luckily when Dragonsbane came over they brought me eggs.
Around 3:45 the rudder was at least back in the water, with blue webbing and red webbing wrapped around it to stabilize it side-to-side, two fenders strapped to the top since the top is heavier than the bottom and one anchor strapped over top of it to lend some weight to the whole thing. Adam was in the water with dive gear; Ben and Jacques were in separate dinghies holding onto it and trying to get it in from there; Arthur from the Black Pearl and I were in the boat holding onto the blue and red webbing.
After several failed attempts with that setup Jacques got IN the water and straddled the anchor to guide it while Adam was underwater playing with his BCD to either sink or float the rudder as necessary. Ben was in the boat guiding the rudder into the lower rudder tube where the new bearing is. We were trying our hardest not to get the rudder shaft partway in then having it lever and break the new bearing.
It was now about 4:45 or so, and sunset is around 5:15 so we were losing daylight fast. We had to time our attempts in between any boat traffic that made the boat rock, or worse, hobbyhorse the boat and slam the stern into the water. On one really close attempt we got the system down to almost a science--Jacques would yell "Red, tension! Blue, slack" while Ben was telling him "More towards you" so he could guide the rudder. The try after that we finally got the rudder in, but not all the way up. Arthur and I hauled on the webbing, Adam pushed from underneath, Jacques pushed from the water and Ben clamped a C-clamp on the very top and hauled from that and we were in business!
There's more work to be done as far as fiberglassing and putting the helm seat back together but as of right now, we have a rudder again!!
Here's some pictures of the chaos as well as one of my small contributions: putting together the upper bearing.
Thursday, July 4, 2013
4th of July
Happy Birthday, US of A! We didn't even realize it was Independence Day until some folks from Sweden asked us, "Isn't this an important day for Americans?" Oops. It's so easy to lose track of the days out here!
Ben has a little bit of prep work before we can put the rudder in. The wind has died a little bit, but it's still choppy water and gusty sometimes. The big wind blew through Moorea as well as Tahiti and Set Me Free's bimini blew up, again. Ben had already fixed one part, which was the part that stayed together. So Joe is trying to track down some screws to use in place of the toggle fasteners that attach the bimini to the dodger.
Since they're anchored pretty close I decided to take some screws over to practice driving the dinghy in worse weather than usual. Ben simply told me not to let the bow come up too much--if the wind caught it I could easily flip. Thanks for the reassurance.
I got the motor started all right (one pull!) but had some trouble finding a good throttle level in the chop and gusts. There was one instant where I was sure I'd flipped it but managed to jump to the front of the dinghy and bring the bow down. Of course that meant I'd let go of tiller and had to jump back there and try to get back on course.
A couple more circles around Kyanos and I had a system down well enough to get to Set Me Free. I'm sure he was laughing inside, but Joe coached me with where to steer to end up at their swim deck. Getting back to Kyanos was a piece of cake--point at the bow and let the wind take the dinghy to the stern. Whew.
Ben confessed later that he saw me start to flip and ran below so he didn't have to watch it. But it all turned out...
If it's calm enough tomorrow we'll throw the rudder in! The dudes on Dragonsbane offered to help since they have dive gear and they're both pretty muscley dudes:
Ben has a little bit of prep work before we can put the rudder in. The wind has died a little bit, but it's still choppy water and gusty sometimes. The big wind blew through Moorea as well as Tahiti and Set Me Free's bimini blew up, again. Ben had already fixed one part, which was the part that stayed together. So Joe is trying to track down some screws to use in place of the toggle fasteners that attach the bimini to the dodger.
Since they're anchored pretty close I decided to take some screws over to practice driving the dinghy in worse weather than usual. Ben simply told me not to let the bow come up too much--if the wind caught it I could easily flip. Thanks for the reassurance.
I got the motor started all right (one pull!) but had some trouble finding a good throttle level in the chop and gusts. There was one instant where I was sure I'd flipped it but managed to jump to the front of the dinghy and bring the bow down. Of course that meant I'd let go of tiller and had to jump back there and try to get back on course.
A couple more circles around Kyanos and I had a system down well enough to get to Set Me Free. I'm sure he was laughing inside, but Joe coached me with where to steer to end up at their swim deck. Getting back to Kyanos was a piece of cake--point at the bow and let the wind take the dinghy to the stern. Whew.
Ben confessed later that he saw me start to flip and ran below so he didn't have to watch it. But it all turned out...
If it's calm enough tomorrow we'll throw the rudder in! The dudes on Dragonsbane offered to help since they have dive gear and they're both pretty muscley dudes:
Wednesday, July 3, 2013
Big winds!
We're back in Tahiti currently weathering out some crazy winds!
This morning the all knowing internet told us that the new rudder bearing ordered from Denmark had arrived (2 days early!!) and was waiting for us at the marina office. I had really worried about having issues with customs but apparently it's not a big deal to ship stuff from Europe! We had heard horror stories about hundreds of dollars for shipping then weeks of fighting with customs to get the part, but we didn't have any problems!
After picking up the part from the office we ran into town to pick up a new propeller for the dinghy motor since ours disappeared... Running into town was no small feat. We had to row from our boat which is a looonnng ways from anywhere to the dinghy dock and then have to face rowing back. But we made it, picked up the prop from Polynesien Marine (great little store). They were insanely helpful. Instead of making us wait for them to order the part they took a prop off of a display!
On the way back to the marina the bus was hit with STRONG winds and we immediately thought of this random private mooring Kyanos was on. Was she ok? Goodness the rest of the bus ride was stressful. That didn't stop us from stopping at Carrefour for some food (our propane tanks are being filled so we have no way of cooking). Back at the dinghy dock we were looking at 4-5 foot waves and WIND. We knotted the plastic bags and hoped the food would stay dry during our epic paddle.
Ben directed me to paddle pretty hard west and let the surf and the wind push us north towards the boat. Paddling against that level of wind is difficult!! We barely got out far enough to grab Kyanos as we sailed past. A quick peek at the instruments told us the wind was holding steady at 35-38 knots (about 45 mph) with gusts up to 50 mph!! The waves were big enough to hit our dodger and splash over the deck. Ben tells me this sort of thing is much safer while you're sailing but I'm really not sure I would want to sail in this!
The mooring line was already chafed a little (eek!) so Ben switched up the line and added another one just in case the first one failed. Once we made sure the boat would stay put we realized there was a boat behind us on shore. With the direction of the wind it must have passed within inches of Kyanos while we weren't there!! We sat there listening to the wind howl watching for other boats dragging anchor or breaking mooring lines while also keeping an ear on the VHF. There were at least 3 boats on different reefs or dragging anchors. Stressful.
Hopefully the wind dies down at night so we can sleep without worrying about the mooring. Ben did manage to catch a little catnap. I managed to snap this picture: he's holding onto his new bearing! Cute, right?
This morning the all knowing internet told us that the new rudder bearing ordered from Denmark had arrived (2 days early!!) and was waiting for us at the marina office. I had really worried about having issues with customs but apparently it's not a big deal to ship stuff from Europe! We had heard horror stories about hundreds of dollars for shipping then weeks of fighting with customs to get the part, but we didn't have any problems!
After picking up the part from the office we ran into town to pick up a new propeller for the dinghy motor since ours disappeared... Running into town was no small feat. We had to row from our boat which is a looonnng ways from anywhere to the dinghy dock and then have to face rowing back. But we made it, picked up the prop from Polynesien Marine (great little store). They were insanely helpful. Instead of making us wait for them to order the part they took a prop off of a display!
On the way back to the marina the bus was hit with STRONG winds and we immediately thought of this random private mooring Kyanos was on. Was she ok? Goodness the rest of the bus ride was stressful. That didn't stop us from stopping at Carrefour for some food (our propane tanks are being filled so we have no way of cooking). Back at the dinghy dock we were looking at 4-5 foot waves and WIND. We knotted the plastic bags and hoped the food would stay dry during our epic paddle.
Ben directed me to paddle pretty hard west and let the surf and the wind push us north towards the boat. Paddling against that level of wind is difficult!! We barely got out far enough to grab Kyanos as we sailed past. A quick peek at the instruments told us the wind was holding steady at 35-38 knots (about 45 mph) with gusts up to 50 mph!! The waves were big enough to hit our dodger and splash over the deck. Ben tells me this sort of thing is much safer while you're sailing but I'm really not sure I would want to sail in this!
The mooring line was already chafed a little (eek!) so Ben switched up the line and added another one just in case the first one failed. Once we made sure the boat would stay put we realized there was a boat behind us on shore. With the direction of the wind it must have passed within inches of Kyanos while we weren't there!! We sat there listening to the wind howl watching for other boats dragging anchor or breaking mooring lines while also keeping an ear on the VHF. There were at least 3 boats on different reefs or dragging anchors. Stressful.
Hopefully the wind dies down at night so we can sleep without worrying about the mooring. Ben did manage to catch a little catnap. I managed to snap this picture: he's holding onto his new bearing! Cute, right?
Monday, July 1, 2013
Diving
I don't even know where to start: I've completely fallen in love with diving. I can't stop smiling--it's that awesome! Of course all I need as a poor grad student is to want to start another expensive sport. When I get back to Reno I'll research getting my dive certification and all that jazz.
Anyways, the actual dive. We had to be ready for the van to pick us up at 7:30 to take us to the dive shop. 7:30 isn't all that early unless you've stayed up late the night before. I grabbed a banana for breakfast and was worried about getting hungry during the dive.
After getting all outfitted with wet suit (next time I'll get a full wet suit, I went with a shorty this time and had to worry about getting cut by coral), fins (they made fun of me since my feet were so small I needed kid's fins), BCD (what? Buoyancy control device or something like that), we headed out to the dive boat and got the safety rundown from our guide, Thomas. He was in charge of me, Ben, and a Japanese tourist who didn't speak English. Part of the safety talk included where we were going: to the lemon sharks.
I've done a bit of swimming with sharks at this point--but mostly just black or white tips that are nice and small. Lemon sharks can grow to be more than 3 meters!! Combine that with not diving before and wondering how I'll do that far underwater...I was getting a bit nervous. But nervousness and stress is probably more dangerous than anything else underwater so I tried to calm down and enjoy the boat ride.
Once you strap yourself into the tanks and BCD and all that jazz it's really hard to maneuver around the boat but once you're in the water (a giant step off the boat, not a jump!) you barely feel any of the gear. That first dive I didn't quite have it figured out that you can control your buoyancy by letting air out or into your vest so Thomas kind of had to hold my hand with that by deflating me and giving me more weight.
We descended by way of the mooring rope, and I went really slow. Slow enough to probably annoy the other diver with our group but I wasn't taking any chances of hurting my ears. And I was learning how to breath with a regulator. Since Thomas hadn't mentioned anything about either sipping the air, breathing normally or anything else I just tried yoga breathing. Long slow inhales and even longer, slower exhales. Worked pretty well.
Unfortunately the coral is pretty dead around the lemon shark feeding area but there was still plenty to see. A huge cyclone ripped through the area about 5 years ago, which killed a lot of the coral. In some places it's started to make a comeback but not here. I stuck pretty close to Thomas and didn't see too much since I was focused so much on breathing. After what felt like seconds Thomas checked how much air we had left and had to take the Japanese tourist back to the boat. While Ben and I floated under the safety bar (which is at 5 meters under the boat) someone pointed behind me.
Turning around I saw one of the lemon sharks. Holy guacamole that thing was HUGE. Thomas later told us it was about 3 meters but it's body was so much thicker in proportion to the black tips that I've seen. It looked like a pure muscled killing machine. Ok, maybe not that bad but the word predator definitely flashed through my mind when I looked at it. I'm very proud of myself for not freaking out when I saw that sucker. It wasn't close by any means and he (or she) was just minding his (or her) own business, completely ignoring us. I'm ok with being ignored by sharks.
Once we hit 50 bars of air in our tanks Thomas took us up to hang out on the safety bar for 3 minutes before heading to the surface. When we got up there we were surprised to see most everyone in the boat already--Ben and I have good lungs! Our air lasted quite a while :)
Between dives the guides made us coffee and gave us pineapple. An aside: Moorean pineapple is famous and beyond delicious. We boated over to a place on the island where sting rays congregated and jumped in to swim with them. They're really acclimated to people--they'll swim right up onto your shoulder to say hello. You have to be careful about stepping on them or petting their stinger but other than that you can grab their wings and pet them. They're really silky. It's like petting a really cool, flat eel.
The second dive place had a lot more live coral and by that time I was comfortable enough in the water to be able to really see it. Again the Japanese tourist used up his air pretty quick and went back to the boat. Thomas was comfortable enough with us to let us explore the coral under the boat while he took the other guy up, then come find us and take us to see really awesome things.
We swam by an overhang, and then under it to see the lion fish that had stuffed themselves into little depressions and a HUGE moray eel that actually swam out of it's cave and into another one. Ben has a video of it but from my angle it looked bigger. After the eel went into the different cave Thomas stuck his arm in to try and get it out again which kind of freaked me out. Luckily he didn't get bit!! He probably dives here often enough to know what not to do, which I realized later.
We saw urchins and an octopus and sharks (of course). Again, I really regret not having an underwater camera because the only pictures I have are of things Ben noticed. I would have taken hundreds of pictures of all the different types of fishes, the cool tiny spiny urchins tucked away in little places of the coral, the little organisms that looked like cartoon pine trees that would retreat into the coral if you touched them, etc. Some sort of snapper hung out with us for awhile, they would come right up to your mask and give you the eye if you stayed still long enough.
Everyone was teasing me after the dive for looking so incredibly happy. Like I said, I can't stop smiling and was happier than a kid in a candy store. I asked how long we had spent underwater, convinced it was only about 20 minutes but apparently we spent an hour down there! I think the deepest we went was 45 feet, the experienced divers went as far as 90, maybe. Someday that'll be me!
A big big big thanks to Joe and Liz for the amazing weekend and dive and everything. We'll sail back to Tahiti and our poor broken Kyanos on a boat named Dragonsbane with Dale, Jacques, and Adam tomorrow.
Pictures:
Anyways, the actual dive. We had to be ready for the van to pick us up at 7:30 to take us to the dive shop. 7:30 isn't all that early unless you've stayed up late the night before. I grabbed a banana for breakfast and was worried about getting hungry during the dive.
After getting all outfitted with wet suit (next time I'll get a full wet suit, I went with a shorty this time and had to worry about getting cut by coral), fins (they made fun of me since my feet were so small I needed kid's fins), BCD (what? Buoyancy control device or something like that), we headed out to the dive boat and got the safety rundown from our guide, Thomas. He was in charge of me, Ben, and a Japanese tourist who didn't speak English. Part of the safety talk included where we were going: to the lemon sharks.
I've done a bit of swimming with sharks at this point--but mostly just black or white tips that are nice and small. Lemon sharks can grow to be more than 3 meters!! Combine that with not diving before and wondering how I'll do that far underwater...I was getting a bit nervous. But nervousness and stress is probably more dangerous than anything else underwater so I tried to calm down and enjoy the boat ride.
Once you strap yourself into the tanks and BCD and all that jazz it's really hard to maneuver around the boat but once you're in the water (a giant step off the boat, not a jump!) you barely feel any of the gear. That first dive I didn't quite have it figured out that you can control your buoyancy by letting air out or into your vest so Thomas kind of had to hold my hand with that by deflating me and giving me more weight.
We descended by way of the mooring rope, and I went really slow. Slow enough to probably annoy the other diver with our group but I wasn't taking any chances of hurting my ears. And I was learning how to breath with a regulator. Since Thomas hadn't mentioned anything about either sipping the air, breathing normally or anything else I just tried yoga breathing. Long slow inhales and even longer, slower exhales. Worked pretty well.
Unfortunately the coral is pretty dead around the lemon shark feeding area but there was still plenty to see. A huge cyclone ripped through the area about 5 years ago, which killed a lot of the coral. In some places it's started to make a comeback but not here. I stuck pretty close to Thomas and didn't see too much since I was focused so much on breathing. After what felt like seconds Thomas checked how much air we had left and had to take the Japanese tourist back to the boat. While Ben and I floated under the safety bar (which is at 5 meters under the boat) someone pointed behind me.
Turning around I saw one of the lemon sharks. Holy guacamole that thing was HUGE. Thomas later told us it was about 3 meters but it's body was so much thicker in proportion to the black tips that I've seen. It looked like a pure muscled killing machine. Ok, maybe not that bad but the word predator definitely flashed through my mind when I looked at it. I'm very proud of myself for not freaking out when I saw that sucker. It wasn't close by any means and he (or she) was just minding his (or her) own business, completely ignoring us. I'm ok with being ignored by sharks.
Once we hit 50 bars of air in our tanks Thomas took us up to hang out on the safety bar for 3 minutes before heading to the surface. When we got up there we were surprised to see most everyone in the boat already--Ben and I have good lungs! Our air lasted quite a while :)
Between dives the guides made us coffee and gave us pineapple. An aside: Moorean pineapple is famous and beyond delicious. We boated over to a place on the island where sting rays congregated and jumped in to swim with them. They're really acclimated to people--they'll swim right up onto your shoulder to say hello. You have to be careful about stepping on them or petting their stinger but other than that you can grab their wings and pet them. They're really silky. It's like petting a really cool, flat eel.
The second dive place had a lot more live coral and by that time I was comfortable enough in the water to be able to really see it. Again the Japanese tourist used up his air pretty quick and went back to the boat. Thomas was comfortable enough with us to let us explore the coral under the boat while he took the other guy up, then come find us and take us to see really awesome things.
We swam by an overhang, and then under it to see the lion fish that had stuffed themselves into little depressions and a HUGE moray eel that actually swam out of it's cave and into another one. Ben has a video of it but from my angle it looked bigger. After the eel went into the different cave Thomas stuck his arm in to try and get it out again which kind of freaked me out. Luckily he didn't get bit!! He probably dives here often enough to know what not to do, which I realized later.
We saw urchins and an octopus and sharks (of course). Again, I really regret not having an underwater camera because the only pictures I have are of things Ben noticed. I would have taken hundreds of pictures of all the different types of fishes, the cool tiny spiny urchins tucked away in little places of the coral, the little organisms that looked like cartoon pine trees that would retreat into the coral if you touched them, etc. Some sort of snapper hung out with us for awhile, they would come right up to your mask and give you the eye if you stayed still long enough.
Everyone was teasing me after the dive for looking so incredibly happy. Like I said, I can't stop smiling and was happier than a kid in a candy store. I asked how long we had spent underwater, convinced it was only about 20 minutes but apparently we spent an hour down there! I think the deepest we went was 45 feet, the experienced divers went as far as 90, maybe. Someday that'll be me!
A big big big thanks to Joe and Liz for the amazing weekend and dive and everything. We'll sail back to Tahiti and our poor broken Kyanos on a boat named Dragonsbane with Dale, Jacques, and Adam tomorrow.
Pictures:
Fishy! Can't remember the name.
Power boats go so much faster than sailboats. Taylor, this picture is for you: look how flat the Pacific is.
Lion fishes.
Me and sharks.
View from below: sharks.
Friendly snapper.
Coral rebuilding itself.
Saturday, June 29, 2013
Moorea with Set Me Free
Some boats who make the "Big Crossing" (from North/Central America to French Poly) sign up for something called the PuddleJump. I'm not quite sure if it's free or any of the details, but all the boats get to check in every morning of the passage on the SSB (single side band, which we don't have). There's a big meetup in Tahiti, which bleeds over to Moorea for a day or so.
Ben didn't sign up for the PuddleJump so we weren't really interested in any of the goings-on (going-ons?) but we thought it would be entertaining to watch the race from Tahiti to Moorea. The folks on Set Me Free did us one better: they invited us to sail over and stay with them!
Joe and Liz were really thoughtful to offer this. Having folks on your boat can be a huge infringement of privacy so we took camping gear just in case we got the vibe that they wanted some space. That didn't turn out to be an issue though, we had an absolute blast with them and every day were blown away by their generosity. The first day we were there we joined them for the PuddleJump activities: outrigger canoe races, rock lifting competitions, coconut opening contests, etc.
Joe and Liz are divers and they had made friends with some instructors/owners of the company Top Dive so Nicky and Jen also hitched a ride to Moorea. They had never sailed before, so they were excited to see what it was about. Their plan was to take a ferry back to Tahiti that night but missed it...typical for sailing! So they stayed overnight and caught a ferry the next day.
That extra day gave Joe a chance to arrange a last minute dive--which included us! We were a little concerned since Ben and I have never dove, but Nicky assured us that the guides were really helpful and if there was an issue would take us back to the surface. I'm also worried about my ears, since I have issues popping them free diving.
Tomorrow we'll get up nice and early for our first diving experience! Wish us luck!
Rowing team from front to back: Local, Ben, Joe, Nicky, Liz, Local
This was before rowing. I wasn't smiling as much afterwards.
Joe getting a lesson in pareo tying.
Liz fixing dive gear.
Nose flute.
Tuesday, June 25, 2013
Circumnavigate the island by car
Brian and Richard rented a car so we could see more of the island than Papeete, yay! We got an early start and headed south out of the marina. The first stop was a cool Polynesian museum but with an entry fee of $10 a person we ended up skipping that. There's plenty of cool archeological stuff to see just pulling over on the side of the road.
We saw some really cool gardens with little plaques talking about the plants; I finally found out how to spell pamplemousse! At the gardens we hiked up a little ways and got a great view of the lagoon.
After that we stopped by some ancient ruins. It was pretty much some old stone walls--the real attraction was the coconut and breadfruit we picked. I was prepared for Ben to do some dirtbag foraging and had brought baggies just in case; Brian was not excited about the prospect of dirty fruit in his rental car until I pulled out the bags.
Ben's other foraging didn't turn out so tasty: he found a completely green starfruit. They taste almost like a sour patch kids candy. But more sour!
Not much else to write about, enjoy the pictures:
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We saw some really cool gardens with little plaques talking about the plants; I finally found out how to spell pamplemousse! At the gardens we hiked up a little ways and got a great view of the lagoon.
After that we stopped by some ancient ruins. It was pretty much some old stone walls--the real attraction was the coconut and breadfruit we picked. I was prepared for Ben to do some dirtbag foraging and had brought baggies just in case; Brian was not excited about the prospect of dirty fruit in his rental car until I pulled out the bags.
Ben's other foraging didn't turn out so tasty: he found a completely green starfruit. They taste almost like a sour patch kids candy. But more sour!
Not much else to write about, enjoy the pictures:
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Tiny little rental car. Ben tried to pick it up at one point.
Looking at the plants growing on the palm tree. It looked like lichen. I wonder if it only grows on the south side of the trees in this hemisphere.
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