The warmly cool, clear, ringing, perfumed, overflowing, redundant days, were as crystal goblets of Persian sherbet, heaped up – flaked up, with rose-water snow. — Herman Melville
For sailors, these outlying islands are tempting and we’ve had Maupiti in our minds since reading an article about it in a sailing magazine while still in Bozeman. It did not disappoint and it was fun to have some days to explore the little, sleepy island some call Bora Bora’s rival. Maupiti was our last stop before saying ‘au revoir’ to French Polynesia. We would have liked to be able to make it to its’ neighbor Maupiha’a (Mopelia), some 130nm away, but we felt the tug to gain momentum westward …
In May we had the chance to buddy boat with my brother Doug and his family and friends. They flew from Washington and chartered a catamaran big enough to accommodate eleven people on board. We kept a pretty busy schedule touring Raiatea and Bora Bora, hiking, snorkeling, sailing, diving, SUPing and kayaking. A few of us fit in an epic, muddy climb to the top of the peak of Bora Bora. It was great fun to sail alongside my brother, beat him sailing to windward and then watch him blow by us like a ghost ship with the wind behind the beam. He hailed us on the VHF sailing to Bora to tell us that for the comfort of his crew and to keep up with us on the windward leg he was turning on the engine. I said, “That’s awesome (I never expected to be able to beat that catamaran) he said, “Great for you, Marcus…”Evenings onboard Kiwi will probably stick with us the longest. I guess sunsets are like that. After a long day of whatever and wherevering (usually in the water) their ridiculously spacious Bali 46 was a great place to hang out with no particular agenda, sip a little rum or scotch, a glass of wine or a dark and stormy and enjoy the warm tropical breeze and another delicious meal. ~MS
First reliable wifi in over 6 months, so I will be making a series of blog posts trying to get caught up! We last left off in Moorea (Oct.’18), so here are a few last shots of the island which, although somewhat touristy, provided sweet memories and special encounters. Next up, the remote Austral’s …
We waited a while to leave Moorea for the Australs, which was just fine. Plenty of nice diving with our new tanks and gear, bike rides and friends. And whales. In the wind forecasts there always seemed to be a stubborn trough (meaning squalls and confused seas) situated right across the route. No doubt it’s there most of the time in the spring. We finally left, deciding that it wasn’t ever going to really go away, and that anything that looked halfway decent was probably the best we could hope for.
The forecast was for diminishing winds, so after a rough start (including yours truly experiencing a rare though mercifully brief bout of seasickness after going forward to set up the check stays at dusk, we settled in and the wind and seas finally did seem to mellow. Too make sure we made it to Rurutu not too late we also decided to fly the Asym, which we are normally reluctant to do at night. All fine on Diana’s watch, but instead of continuing to decrease the winds built on mine. The plan was to wake her up to furl the sail if the breeze tipped 16 knots. It hit 18, twice and finally I woke her. By the time we started furling it was blowing 22 knots and the bowsprit was nearly bent in half. It was almost impossible to get the sail in. When the wind did die, as forecast, we could no longer fly our Asym.
