Passage: French Polynesia to Panama week 1 and 2 (10/04/15 - 23/04/15)

18/04/15
Day 8

This first week has been hell. Well, not exactly. I'm sure this experience could be made worse if the boat was full of water and slowly sinking or if we were both sick. But it has not been pleasant.

We left the Gambiers last Friday afternoon, only just making it out through the maze of pearl buoys before it got dark. As always, the forecast was wrong. We bobbed along on a glassy sea all night then awoke the next morning to the same view we'd had the day before with the mountainous backdrop of the Gambier behind us. Not a good start. But at least it was comfortable.


At least there was a beautiful sunset as we were leaving


That didn't last long. For the next two days we weaved our way in between thunderstorms. We would go around in circles for a while with no wind at all before being absolutely blasted by a squall every hour or so. It would rip through quickly, dumping as much rain as possible and lighting up the sky with sheet lightening before taking off and leaving us to drift with the current again as we waited for more wind.


Our track as we head towards Pitcairn Island... we're literally going in circles from the light wind constantly backing the sails and turning us around



The first one of these took us by surprise. We had both the main and our giant Genoa up as the squall approached. I was sleeping downstairs when I heard a little squeak drift down from Garth in the cockpit. His little "Could you come help me for a bit?" seemed so casual. I headed upstairs to find him gripping onto the wheel with the wind whipping his hair into a tangled mess as rain started to drizzle down. Not good. I furled the headsail, using all my strength to slowly pump the winch at the slowest speed. It took forever. Meanwhile the wind picked up and the boat was getting hammered. The low side where Garth was sitting was practically underwater we were so overpowered, with huge waves coming through the cockpit and almost washing him away. After a very long time we got the headsail in then dropped the main, with rain pouring down on top of us and thunder and lightening raging all around. That was the last time I saw the headsail in action. It's still tucked up in bed and the main is still double reefed a whole week later.

Over the next few days the sheet lightening turned into fork lightening. I'd come upstairs to check for boats and we would be completely surrounded by chaos. It was like some kind of terrifying rave, complete with loud noises and constantly flashing lights. I found it hard to watch, because one storm would light up the sky and I'd swivel around to look at it just as the lightening would stop. Then it would start up in the direction I'd just been facing. Watching a lightening show at sea is so different from watching it on land. When I was little I used to wrap myself in a blanket and curl up on a chair on our verandah to watch the lightning that came along with a good Australian summer storm. The whole sky would light up and I would just sit there watching the lightening strike in front of me from the safety of my chair. At sea you can see the whole storm and not just the lightening. The clouds form a big dark patch on the horizon and during the day you can see the grey patch of rain coming down underneath the clouds. So at night time, instead of just seeing a brightly lit sky I knew where all the clouds were and exactly how many storms were raging around me all at once. And we were just a tiny dot in the ocean, completely surrounded.

So that sucked. But then the storms stopped and the real chaos started. We're out of the nice cosy trade winds this far south, which apparently makes everything mental. A front came through with the squalls and the sea started getting a bit crazy. Then it totally lost the plot. The waves were about 4m high on average, which is scary enough on its own. But they were everywhere. Waves were hitting us from all directions, smashing into the cockpit and making their way around the dodger to land on our companionway. Or they'd just crash into each other and we'd get hit by the splashy mess left behind. The whole ocean looked like a spa pool. Everything inside was a bit damp, including me in me bed by the companionway. There's a reason they make dodgers the way they do. Water is supposed to hit the boat from the bow as you head straight into the waves, and that little protective wall of plastic is supposed to stop the spray from pouring into the cockpit. There's no protection from the back, because the waves aren't supposed to hit you from behind. With this in mind, the hatchway wasn't designed to be completely waterproof. It even has an air vent! So if you dump a wall of water on top of our hatch it makes its way through the cracks and comes pouring inside. Not fun (Note: it actually has to be a wall of water to bother us. A splash here or there is fine and will be stopped by security. But when a few bathtubs full of water get dumped on the companionway all at once, its like an entire army storming past one little guard with a guest list and a baton. He gets trampled).

On top of the leaky water situation, the boat was being tossed around like a cork. Every ten minutes or so a giant wave would dump on top of us and we'd be flipped over sideways. You could track the progress of the wave by sound alone, as the roar of breaking water made its way down the boat starting at the bow and ending with a crash in the cockpit. The noise was enough to terrify me, but then it was accompanied by water pouring in and the boat balancing precariously at an unbelievable angle. Everything inside made it onto the floor. We'd filled piles of water bottles with water before we left, so they were floating around everywhere just to torment us further. We were actually lucky it was the beginning of our trip because we start big passages with a huge stew to use whatever meat we have. If we hadn't had a pot of food permenantly ready, cooking would have been impossible.

This went on for four or five days. Every day I woke up and couldn't believe that the sea hadn't calmed down, but it was still a mess. We stayed inside for a whole week, cowering in our bunks and holding onto something so we didn't get flung around. We went past Pitcairn island just as the waves started to calm down. Unfortunately the wind didn't follow suit and was blowing hard from the south for a few days. We didn't think it was worth beating into the wind to try to get to a place where we might not even be able to land, so we had to keep going. Sad, but not surprising.

*
22/04/15
Day 12

The last few days have been amazing. If this is sailing, I'm not sure what we've been doing all this time. The horizon has reappeared from behind the mess of waves. We're downwind. The boat is flat. Life is easy. We even managed to make bread a few times! We're cruising along at 5 knots towards Easter Island and crossing our fingers that the weather will be nice enough to stop there. We left on this passage not expecting to be able to stop anywhere along the way, but it would be pretty awesome to go to some really amazing out of the way places that not many people get to see. Easter is similar to Pitcairn, in that if the weather isn't perfect there's no point trying to stop. I was told that you can only go to shore if you're carrying a handheld VHF radio, so if the weather changes you can be contacted to move the boat to a different anchorage. Despite Garth's efforts our anchor winch is broken again, so we're a little skeptical about going to a place where we might have to move quickly. But we'll just wait and see - we're about five days away now.


Bread!


Before we left French Polynesia we took all our food and divided it into six bags, for the six weeks we're expecting this trip to take. Snacks, cereal, milk, flour - everything got divided up. The tins were left on the shelves but we numbered them for each week. Then Garth drew up a complicated graph to figure out how far we had come and the bags get opened according to distance rather than time, to make sure we won't run out of food if we run out of wind. This was a brilliant idea. We just opened the bag for week two and it was like Christmas. Instead of feeling like we're rationing food it feels like we're getting extra treats. There were nuts in this bag, along with salami and chocolate and a heap of other things. It makes it easier to decide what to eat, and we don't feel bad eating special things like sun-dried tomatoes and crackers, because they've been put there specifically for us to get through this week. Next week there'll be something new! We haven't touched the eight tins of Cassoulet I bought though... Maybe I shouldn't be allowed to buy provisions on my own. At least we know there's always Cassoulet if we manage to run out of food.

After a week of gliding through the night in absolute darkness, the moon is back. I can't believe how grateful I am to see it. I also can't believe how long it dissappears for. Sailing through a moonless night is never much fun.

*

The only thing I've taken photos of is the sunset as we left the Gambiers, so here's some more pics.

French Polynesia, The Gambier Islands (Pearl Farm) 10-04-15

Once we'd said our farewells to Birgit and Christian we headed over a nearby island to visit Rikitea, the only town in the Gambiers. So many islands! The were lots more boats over by the shops and we managed to anchor next to the cheerful yellow boat belonging to Juan, our BBQ buddy from the other night.



We only stayed there for one night, which gave us 1 1/2 days to prepare for our six week passage. That really doesn't seem like much...

It was a cute little town. Birgit and Christian had already told us what time to go and get baguettes, which is the most crucial piece of information for all the small towns in French Polynesia. They usualy only bake bread once a day and it disappears very quickly. So the bakery was our first stop, where we loaded up with the first baguettes we'd had in almost two weeks. Then we spent the rest of the day running around town stocking up for our trip. There were actually lots of stores, but most of them were just little counters that you walked up to and asked for what you wanted. Then they went and fetched it from out the back. This only works if you speak French... I did run round to all of them repeating the phrase 'Avi vouz chocolàt noir?' over and over again. By doing this I ended up with seven blocks of dark chocolate, which will hopefully last me the whole trip. Except that the first one didn't last me the day. Whoops.

We did find two stores that you could walk into though, and we managed to get meat, flour, butter and baked beans. There wasn't really much else to provision with. Our fresh produce consisted of 6 moldy onions, a small bag of wrinkly old potatoes, three carrots and a handful of manderins. I got the sense that the manderins were a special treat, as the shopkeeper was really excited about them and kept trying to make me take some. I assumed they were really expensive (the last bag of oranges I bought ended up costing $2 an orange). But they were surprisingly cheap, so I grabbed a few. And that is all we have to cover us for the next six weeks, aside from a leftover papaya and three more plantains from our garden raid. I also have some breadfruit in the fridge that I've boiled up, ready to bulk out our passage stew.

One thing I noticed about this town is that the people are much friendlier than everywhere else we've been. Everybody in French Polynesia has been nice, but here they were trying really hard to be as helpful as possible. Somebody tried to give me a lift back to the boat when they saw me walking past, but I was nearly there so I politely declined. We could never get a ride anywhere else when we actually tried to get picked up, The shopkeepers corrected my French and kept repeating it until I could say whatever I was trying to say properly. When it comes to French, either you say it perfectly and people understand or you mispronounce something and they stare at you blankly. Mostly they stare at you blankly, even when you're saying it properly. I even managed to have my first conversation in French with a nice man on the street. He asked me how my day was going, and I told him it was very well and I was sorry but my French wasn't very good. Then he said that it was fine and asked if I was on a boat. I said yes, and he told me to have a nice day. Longest conversation ever without throwing in any English! I was pretty happy about that. And slightly annoyed that I'm starting to get better at speaking the language just as we're leaving. Though most of the time I've just been trying to ask for things in shops or ask directions from people, which ends up being just short sentences or questions instead of actual conversation. Nobody else has wanted to stop and talk to me in broken French before. If I can't talk to them properly they mostly don't want to try, even the really friendly people. They just use hand motions to try and show me what they mean.

So the Gambiers are lovely. I'd really like to stay here for a bit longer, but we have to get going. I went to fill up all our water jugs today just before we left, only to discover that the last of the cheap jerry cans I bought in Vanuatu for our passage has now got a hole in it. That was disappointing seeing as I bought them specifically for this passage, but we actually got a lot of use out of them so at least they didn't go to waste. We were slightly worried about water knowing that we had 50L less than we had intended, but Juan came to the rescue by loading us up with water bottles. He must have given us at least 30L more in loose bottles, which was a big relief.

I was the lucky one who got to ferry all the bottles and jerry cans to shore and fill them up from the tap across the road. This took several trips and was a bit of a mission. I had tried to find a pamplemousse for our passage while I was in town, but nobody sold them seeing as everybody had their own tree. One of the times I went over to the tap to fill up with water there were two guys there already, one sitting in the shade and the other filling up mass amounts of water bottles in the back of his truck. I swapped pleasantries with them in French, but one of the men spoke English so we were able to chat for a while. I asked if they knew where I could find a pamplemousse, and the guy in the truck was all like 'oh, here's one,' and retrieved one from the back. Yay! Then he said he had lots of fruit back at his house and offered to go get some for me. Water gathering was the last thing I had to do before we took off, so I had to decline his offer. He didn't understand and insisted he come back later with some fruit. I said we had to leave soon, so he asked which boat was ours. I told him and then he said he'd come by the boat later with the fruit. It took me a while to get them to understand that I was actually about to leave the country and couldn't meet them later to receive their free food. I really can't believe how friendly and generous these people are. Even to offer me anything at all was really sweet, but they were going to go to all the effort of loading it in a boat and then delivering it to me via the water, which is ridiculous. Birgit was right about how nice everybody is and how easy it is to get pamplemousse here! If only we could stay a bit longer.

But we really had to go. I was refusing to leave French Polynesia without some of the black pearls that the country is famous for. Everybody seems to have some and you see all of the cruisers sporting at least one pretty pearl necklace. We hadn't been able to visit any pearl farms yet and I had made an effort not to buy any from Tahiti where they were overpriced and not as nice. We were going to get some from the source. So before we left the country we were going to make a quick stop at the pearl farm on the other side of the Gambiers.

Our plan was slightly ambitious, considering how far away the pearl farm was and that it was close to midday by the time we managed to get away. But I was either going to go back in time to all the opportunities I'd had to buy pearls that I passed up because they were too expensive, or we were going to visit a pearl farm before leaving. It took us a few hours to get across the lagoon. This travelling time was partly due to the mass amounts of pearl buoys we had to avoid on the way. They were scattered absolutely everywhere! Garth went downstairs and left me in charge for about 10 minutes, during which time I nearly had a heart attack. I was standing up in the cockpit in order to see all the little buoys scattered through the water. Then one would creep up on me and appear right in front of us, so I'd run back to change the direction the autopilot was taking us in. Then I'd stand up again and there would be another one right in front of us. So the boat weaved in a jerky, panicky, zigzag pattern as I made my way in between the buoys. Finally I was relieved from the stress when Garth came back and took over again. I don't know how he stays so calm.



Then when we got closer to our destination we had to cross a very shallow patch of water. So we had to slow right down and carefully watch the depth, which was only just deeper than the boat. After we spent ages dodging coral heads and shallow bits, we eventually dropped the anchor into crystal clear water and headed to shore. Phew!



When we got to the beach I was seriously sad about forgetting to bring the camera with me. It was one of the most beautiful anchorages I've ever seen, and without pictures to reflect upon I can't' decide if it was nicer than the pristine water we stayed in overnight in the middle of Fakarava or not. We walked to the pearl farm along the beach but our walk took a lot longer than expected bcause I kept turning to look back at the boat, almost stopped in my tracks by how pretty it was. Garth almost had to drag me.



When we arrived we met Eric, who was the man in charge of the whole operation. He showed us around the farm, encouraging us to stand behind the workers so we could get a proper look at what was going on. Unfortunately they had just harvested all the pearls the day before so we missed seeing them get taken out of the shells. But today they had to put them all back in the water. They were inserting tiny little balls into the shells for the pearls to grow around and grafting a tiny bit of shell on with it, which determines what colour the pearl will end up being.

This was all done by a handful of people, mostly girls with tiny hands. The shells were opened by less than an inch and then held in place by a little clamp. Then the balls and the graft were put in with long pointy tweezers, the clamp was taken away and the oyster was ready to grow another pearl. The pearls in French Polynesia are typically a gorgeous shade of black, but they actually come in lots of colours. In the Gambier especially they manage to produce pearls with a slight golden, red or green tinge to them. Eric had a big sack of shells from the recent harvesting, and he insisted 2 take some as souveniers. You can see the ring of colours around the edge of the shell, like a dark metallic rainbow that changes colour depending on how you look at it.





There was also a room closer to the water where people were tying the oysters up. They put a small hole through the shell which is used to zip tie it onto a kind of plastic mesh that goes back in the water laden with oysters. I'm not sure why, but the oysters have to be pulled up and cleaned regularly or the pearls won't end up quite so pretty. It all seems like a big mission for a tiny little pearl!

After we'd looked around and I'd sufficiently mourned my absent camera, we headed back along to the beach. Eric's house was at the end of the Motu in front of where we'd anchored and that's where he was going to meet us so we could browse through his pearls.

There was another boatload of people hanging out on the beach already. The were from Wigwam, who we met briefly the other day. We chatted for a while as the family got a BBQ going for their dinner. There were kids everywhere, which was lovely to see. They had the most gorgeous accents and the young ones were doing all the translating for us. I really wish I'd bothered to learn French when I was young and impressionable - kids seem to soak up other languages so easily.



Eric eventually arrived and we headed onto his verandah. He had two bags - one was chock full of very pretty, perfect round pearls. The other was what he called an 'unsorted' bag and it was filled with lots of random ones. He laid out a big cloth and upended them all onto it, then invited us to pick through. It was hard to figure out what I wanted. I was hoping for a few nice round ones in different colours and a small bag of cheap reject pearls. He priced the nicer ones of these for us at $2 each, and I got a whole heap of them. They all had defects of some kind, so nobody really wants them. I was really interested in these ones though.



They have perfect lines around them. It looks like they'd been engraved into the pearl, but the oyster does it on its own. Birgit had a necklace made out of them and I love how different they are. I also got quite a few round ones as well as two really pretty pearls shaped kind of like teardrops. My final pearl was a really big guy I'm hoping to turn into a choker, which cost more than double all the little ones at $50. It's huge though, and nice and round. We spent the rest of our French Polynesian money, which was around $200. I also traded two pretty pearls for a small bottle of alcohol, but I left Eric the rest of my Vodka as well. We weren't going to drink it before we got to Panama and alcohol is so cheap there anyway.



The oysters produce a few lots of pearls before being retired, because each time they get re-grafted the pearl will be a slightly lighter shade the next time around. So eventually they lose the gorgeous shade of black and become a much lighter colour which makes them much less valuable. Garth fell in love with the silver one, which has lost all the dark pigment from the oyster being reused too many times. So that one is for him.



We had to go back to the boat to fetch the alcohol, which gave me an opportunity to grab the camera. Unfortunately the sun had moved and was now shining right on the water, so it had lost the pretty turquoise colour. The sun is determined to drive me crazy. It always shines on the water in the afternoon so you can't see where the reefs are from the dinghy and the water loses its colour because of the reflections.



Anyway, now we're off. We've said goodbye to French Polynesia, which has been our home for the last five months. We're heading south towards Pitcairn Island, dodging more pearl buoys and hoping we get clear of them all before the sun goes down. And so begins the longest passage we'll ever have to do.

Xxx Monique

French Polynesia, Gambier Islands, 08-04-15

After yet another week long passage we finally arrived in the Gambier. Unlike the other island groups in French Pol that we've seen, this one is just a few Islands all huddled together. The Tuamotus and the Society Islands are spread out over massive areas, but here the islands are all in one place. You can pick which one you feel like anchoring at each day, just ducking round the corner if the wind changes or you want a change of scenery.


Another sunset under way


Approaching the Gambiers

We pulled up next to the island closest to the pass when we came in. There were two boats already nestled in a little bay between the main island and another tiny island but our charts all said it was too shallow for us to venture in. We were losing the sunshine and didn't want to run aground quite so soon, so we went past them to the other side to look for some sand. We eventually found a patch and as we turned the engine down to drop the anchor we heard our name on the radio. We hadn't heard anything on channel 16 for weeks and didn't even have the cockpit speakers turned on. The mysterious callers were friends with Mark and Liesbet on Irie, who had emailed them so we'd have some friendly faces when we arrived. They'd been calling us since we came through the pass, ready to hand out waypoints that would lead us safely into the bay. Doh! We stayed put seeing as the day was getting on and it was incredibly calm, but Birgit and Christian informed us that there had been breaking waves in our anchorage a few days earlier and that the water was never calm enough to hang around where we were. We lucked out because the water was completely glassy.



We were rewarded for our nautical adventures with a beautiful full moon that night. It was so bright that it felt like it was day time we I was sitting out in the cockpit. I had to change the settings on the camera to take a picture. But I was trying to make it darker instead of lighter like you normally would at night. No matter what I did it still looked like it was day time and the moon still looked like the sun.


11pm and it looks like daytime

Our new neighbours came to visit us the next morning, accompanied by a tray of fresh fruit. Fruit! They were both so lovely and welcoming, which was amazing after the month we'd had getting there from Tahiti. After we spent some time tidying up they led us in a convoy to the outer reef so we could go snorkelling. It was ridiculously calm. Christian and Birgit told us that over the whole cyclone season it had only been calm enough for them to get out there once before.





It was so much fun swimming in amongst real coral again! We've had a great time swimming in the crystal clear waters of French Polynesia, but the coral has all been the same. It's mostly scattered coral heads littered with reeds. There was a solid reef here though, littered with gorgonian fans and other interesting corals. There wasn't an abundance of aquatic life, but we did find lots and lots of brightly coloured parrot fish. They don't usually let you examine them up close for very long as a general rule but these ones were fat and friendly, ignoring us completely as they munched away on the coral.




Pretty little parrot fish

We also came across two white-tipped reef sharks and neither of them seemed too bothered by us. The second one showed up as everybody was climbing back into the dinghy and I was the only one with my head in the water. The others were above the surface discussing our previous sharky friend and so didn't really catch on that we were being circled by another one when I yelled out 'Shark!' This meant that by the time they figured it out and replaced their masks he was already gone. I hate being alone in the water with sharks and I'm glad he wasn't too interested in us.


They always want to play with Garth

So we had a lovely swim. In the end we didn't get to take in any of the other beautiful snorkeling spots the Gambiers are famous for, so I was really grateful for the escort out there. We would have had no idea where to go. After we got both boats organised, Christian and Birgit led us to another anchorage on the other side of the island we'd been behind the night before. It was a little bit rolly but we were so happy not to be enroute to somewhere that we thoroughly enjoyed throwing the anchor down and chilling out. They had us over for dinner that night, as well as every single night over the last week. It took us so long to organise the boat after all our passages that by the time we had it tidy and ready to receive guests, it was time to go again. Unfortunately Birgit wasn't feeling well on our last night anchored away from the town and we didn't get to repay their hospitality. But we felt thoroughly spoiled the entire time we were there.



The next day we did some boat work before following Christian and Birgit out to the next bay over. There were quite a few boats there already but everybody was so friendly. Birgit said there were only a few boats in the Gambier for the entire cyclone season (I think she said eight), so they've got a nice little cruising community here. Everybody knows everybody.

That evening the fun continued with a BBQ on the beach. We were joined by a nice German guy on a catamaran and a young guy called Jan, who has sailed his tiny boat across the Pacific all on his own. He's the first person we've met on a smaller boat than ours. Its really tiny for a liveaboard, 28 feet I think. His boat is also the first we've encountered that was designed by Bianca as well, just like ours. It has a similiar racey feel to it but is much smaller. It rocks back and forth like a dinghy if you move from one side to the other, which means he gets absolutely slammed by waves as well as from the wake as other boats zip past.




It was a lot of fun to just head over to the beach and light a fire. We sat around until quite late in the evening, drinking and being social. Birgit even made stick bread to put over the fire. I've never encountered anything like it before but Garth was quite familiar with the concept. We each got a stick and wrapped our bit of dough around the end of it in a spiral pattern. Then the stick went over the fire as if there were a marshmallow on the end. It quickly went crispy and golden on the outside and was an amazing addition to our dinner. I wish we could cook more things on sticks over fires.


Stick bread!

The only thing I didn't love about the beach were the centipedes. We rocked up bare-footed like we always do, to the surprise of everybody there. Apparantly there's centipedes everywhere in the bushes. I had a brief brush with one when we were building our dinghy on the dock in Bora Bora, but it was quickly destroyed and forgotten about. I did not love the idea that the mat we were sitting on could at any time be overrun by dangerous bitey things with lots of tiny legs. Luckily Birgit has a keen eye for the little buggers and she both spotted then removed a few babies from our circle before they bothered anybody.



We were also shocked to find out that it was Easter. How on earth did that happen? We had absolutely no idea. Our new German friend passed around chocolate to celebrate the holiday, which was more than welcome. He also supplied us with some fresh pamplemousse juice which was absolutely amazing. I'd only just tried my first Pamplemousse in Hao when our French neighbours on the dock next to us handed one over as a parting gift. The're giant, sweet grapefruit and they're as big as a small melon. In France i'm sure a pamplemousse is just a regular grapefruit, but here in French Polynesia they're giant and awesome. I hadn't even thought to juice it before and now I'm really disappointed that I've missed out on them the whole time we've been here. Every single house has a tree laden with the fruit. Both Juan and Birgit said that to get free pamplemousse in French Polynesia all you have to do is compliment somebody on their beautiful tree. The people here are so nice that they then force you to take some of the fruit. If only my French was better I could try this out.

We moved to another anchorage the next day. You really don't have to go far here to be surrounded by completely different scenery. There's so many bays and they're all gorgeous. This next anchorage was around the corner from where we spent our first night. There was a shallow channel in between two islands where the wind was funneling through, which was nice for our wind generator. It would have been a lovely spot to go kiting but the wind died by the time we wanted to give it a go.



There was a nice house with a concrete dock to tie up to nearby. Christian and Birgit know the owners, who were on holiday for a while. So we were able to go ashore to try and find a path up the mountain for a nice view. The Gambier used to be heavily populated, with thousands of people living on the island we were trekking over. I think Birgit said there's only something like four people living there now. All the houses are long gone but some of the tracks remained. They led us through the forest over an invisible path - there was no way in hell we would have been able to find the way on our own. All the mountains here are populated with pine trees, which is really bizarre. It was like stepping into another world. One minute we were climbing through soggy dirt in amongst the tangled roots of old trees and stepping over rotting coconuts, and the next we were engulfed by the unmistakble scent of pine trees as we made our way over all the needles scattered on the ground.

We headed up and up, clinging onto trees as we tried not to slip over on the nasty combination of soft dirt and loose pine needles. We eventually made it to a ridge where we had a nice view of the Gambier islands and the water down below. But the sun had run away so it wasn't exactly picture perfect. Birgit suggested we wait for the sun to come back, but the boys disappeared into the woods like a couple of mountain goats. Garth found some animal tracks leading up the mountain, so up we went. The reeds we were walking through were deadly, slicing through your hand if you slipped and grabbed for them. They whipped at our arms and legs as well, leaving me covered in tiny cuts. We had been warned about them though so at least I wasn't surprised. Birgit and Christian had obviously done this before. They came prepared with a machette to hack the path and a lemon to squeeze onto Garth's hand when he got bitten by a paper wasp. Four months surrounded by the cheeky little buggers and that was our first attack. I think we got off pretty lightly... probably because I'm not the one who got bitten.



The goat tracks through the reeds were annoying. Because the wild goats are goat height, their paths were little tunnels through the reeds instead of sensible human sized paths. We got down on all fours to crawl through them, which made life a lot easier. Eventually the path disappeared completely and we were left with some tricky steep bits of soft dirt to clamber up and some big rocks to scale. I would have ended up at the bottom of the mountain a few times if Christian hadn't caught me.




But we finally made it to the top, and the view was well worth the hike. It's been ages since we've made it up a mountain! The last one was probably in Moorea, but we didn't really hike up it. The view is always more rewarding if the walk is a bit of a mission. We all hung out taking pictures of the pretty islands for a while before trekking back down, tired but triumphiant.




I stole this one of all of us from Birgit 

When we got to the bottom again we spent some time raiding the garden that belonged to the house. Because the owners were on holiday and Christian and Birgit knew them we weren't bothering anybody. Their garden was huge. There were several big lemon trees all heavily laden with fruit and we each gathered bags of lemons from off the ground to make lemonade with. Christian found a big pole to knock some green papayas down and I stood at the bottom with Birgit trying to catch them. They also cut down some green plantains to share with us and we all got into the green coconuts. I even managed to score the only ripe breadfruit, which i acquired by sitting on Garth's shoulders.


Our anchorage from the top of the mountain. You can just make out the house next to the water

I was interesting to see how these two seasoned cruisers did things. They've been living aboard for a long time and have systems in place to make life as easy as possible. They do washing every morning in the water from their shower the night before (everybody out here washes in the ocean and rinses the salt water off with fresh, so it's essentially fresh water that would otherwise go to waste). They bake fresh bread every morning. And they collect coconuts by taking a machete, a spoon and a heap of jars to shore and getting stuck in. The water gets poured into a jar to drink later. The jelly gets scooped out and saved to cook with in leu of coconut milk. And the bits of husk and shell get left on shore while Birgit and Christian escape back to the boat with nothing but a few jars. All this time I've been dragging coconuts back to the boat and making a slow mess in the cockpit, for fear of cutting the boat. It obviously makes more sense to deal with all the mess away from the boat!

We've been seeing things like plantains and breadfruit all the way across the South Pacific, but had never tried to cook with them. I hate bananas and no matter how many people tell me that they're not the same as plantains it's hard to believe when they look so banana-y. Neither of us is too fond of papaya either, so we've avoided those as well. But Birgit and Christian had us over for dinner yet again that night and made a curry from the green papaya, plantains and the coconut jelly. And it was delicious! They explained that whilst green, both can be used as generic vegetables in pretty much anything. Birgit fried up some plantain chips as well, which were also amazing. So now we're a lot less scared to cook papaya and plantains at least. I even had a go at cooking breadfruit for the first time after they told me how to figure out if it was ripe. I cut up and boiled the whole thing like Mark and Liesbet had told me to and now we're putting it in pretty much everything. So that was exciting, both because we learned a lot and because we had fresh food again for the first time in a long time.

They told us that we could go round to the village where we anchored the first night to get vegetables. For $10 the lady there sells mixed bags of whatever fruit and veges she has to cruisers. I absolutely loved the idea of just being handed a bag of unknown produce and putting it to use. But unfortunately we didn't have time. After two days in that beautiful spot the weather started looking promising for us to leave, so we had to say our goodbyes to our new friends and head over to the town to stock up for our big passage. Eep!

Xxx Monique

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French Polynesia, Tuamotus, Hao to the Gambiers - 01/04/15

It took us six days, but we eventually made it the 270 miles to Hao. We gave in and motored the last 17 miles, because it only took 3 1/2 hours. If we'd kept "sailing" it would have taken 12 to 20 hours to go that last little bit, and we'd had enough.

The pass was exciting. Despite there being no wind we could see standing waves in the middle of the channel. Not good. Again we had no idea what the tide was doing or when the best time to go through was, so we just went for it. Usually when we're approaching a pass that Garth's not sure about he says things like "Don't worry, it's not dangerous," "Look, there's plenty of room," and "We'll be fine." This time he was saying things like "Shut all the hatches," "Put in the washboards," "Be prepared to get really wet," and finally "Hold on tight." This was not promising. Usually as we head in he assures me that everything is under control. This time as we were pulled into the swirling mess of waves he said "I don't think we're going to make it through."

We got swept up in the waves and I turned around to see that we were completely surrounded by walls of water. We were being pushed through the pass by the waves behind us but our progress was being hampered by the swirling mess of currents in front of us. I'm glad Garth knew what he was doing, because I saw no way for us to safely turn around. He again assured me that if it all went wrong it would still be safe, just not dry. My job was to focus on a point on the shore in order to confirm that we were still moving forward. We slowly made our way through at under 1 knot, until we were through the worst of it and the land slowly started moving past at a normal speed. Phew!





The atoll of Hao used to be a big navy base, so there's a lot of disused navy things everywhere. Which is fabulous, because there was a big concrete dock just lying around not being used, waiting for us to tie up to for free. There was already another boat there with an adorable little kid and a lovely couple onboard. They helped us tie up then had us over for appetizers, which became our dinner. After such an unexpectedly long passage there was no way we were cooking. Amilee and Dejay were visiting from Raiatea for a few months so Amilee could fill in as a teacher on Hao. They were wonderful company, filling us with wine and food. They even sent us home with a giant pamplmouse from their garden in Raiatea, which was delicious. Neither of us ever feels like socialising immediately after a passage, but we had such a nice time with these friendly people. We don't meet people very often and it's always nice to be in good company.





Dejay filled us in on his own run through the pass, which was similar to ours. He strapped himself in and wrapped up in a life jacket as he got close to the reef and expected the worst. He had more trouble than we did, as he was afraid of the engine overheating from running it so hard for so long to get through the current. I'm so grateful that ours is new and tough. Their boat made me ridiculously jealous though - it's the same length as ours except it's 1m wider, which made it feel twice as roomy as our racey little thing.





Because we had a dock right next to us, we took out the bikes for some on-land exploration. Boy do they make life easier! It was wonderful being on the dock and we could ride along the sea wall straight off the boat, eventually connecting with a road. The concrete roads are all flat and empty which was perfect for bike riding. In fact we didn't see many cars in town at all, just pushbikes. When we were riding along we saw a little boy playing with his tricycle outside his house. He left the bike on its side in the middle of the road to go inside and play with his dog before returning a few minutes later. Nobody cared. The streets were busy, but everybody just went around. There's not many places where you can leave a bike in the middle of the road on its own knowing it will be okay.





It was a bit strange biking along the Motu. It's the narrowest one we've been on, with a beach on one side of us and houses along the waterfront on the other. It's crazy to think that you could cross a whole island just by crossing the road.



We left early to get fresh baguettes at the recommendation of our neighbours. We went past countless people heading back the way we'd come from, all carrying fresh bread. So we knew we were going the right way. We went to the wrong shop at first, where my broken French was useless (which is frustrating because I know the word for bread!) We were eventually pointed towards another shop which had people lined up out the door. That was the one! We had to wait in line for ages for more bread to come over in a big bin, straight from the oven. It was distributed quickly amongst the waiting crowd and we all walked out with more than we could carry, leaving the bin empty again. This was the best bread we've found in all of French Polynesia. It was soft and fluffy inside, light and crisp on the outside. I wished I'd taken more than 4 after we devoured a whole one on the way home.


The centre of town, taken from outside the post office




Sunset from Hao

We planned on staying in Hao for a few days, resting up and then taking off again to the Gambier. We stayed one day. This obviously made me unhappy. But Garth was adamant that we wouldn't have a good weather window for another week, so away we went. We made good speed for about half a day before the wind died off and we were left bobbing along at 1 - 2 knots. So much for our weather window. We had even gone to shore to get internet, downloaded grib files on the tablet which we transferred onto the laptop, which we needed to run the engine to charge in order to get the most accurate forecast possible. We should know by now that the weather forecasts for French Polynesia are never going to be right.





So we're taking another week to go another 300 miles. We've spent the past three weeks sailing almost nonstop. While incredibly boring it's at least slightly promising that we haven't gone crazy, because if we'd gone at a normal speed and in the right direction we'd be a lot closer to Panama than French Pol by now. At least we've been eating like kings on this passage. We're hardly moving and the seas are calm, so over the last few days we've made focaccia, chocolate pudding and a cold noodle salad (salads are usually the hardest because chopping up little bits and pieces is impossible when the boat is all over the place). So the food situation is good, even though the sailing situation is not going well.


More sunsets on the way to the Gambiers



Xxx Monique

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