White Tern
Travel is like falling in love
new, unconsummated love
crooning love
love like the first glimpse of a Marquesan island
before the anchorage becomes rolly
or the tiny population shares a dose of their chronic strep throat
like a Central American jungle before you try to enter
and find that every tree, bush, wild house plant has thorns
crawls with ants that bite like a son-of-a-bitch
white sand beach love, faintly rosy with crushed coral
a place where you dream of living forever
a place where you might become homicidally bored
a place before
imperfect personalities, awkward intercourse
young hearts, seafarers, learning when to pull up anchor
But I think
love is not just a beating heart
love is often found in thorny jungles
on white sand beaches with sand flies
it is found in patience and acceptance,
love is arriving at the same island over and over
with wonder and a racing heart
Travel should be like that.
~MS
Found this Acanthaster (venomous Crown of Thorns Starfish) while snorkeling in 10′ of water off our boat.
They voraciously eat coral and are considered a scourge
These two were in less than 1′ of water and as I approached, one octopus reached out to ‘hold’ the other
I feel the same way when I get my hands on lettuce – don’t worry buddy, I’m just admiring you!
This small white tern lays its eggs on bare thin branches in a fork or depression without a nest.
A grandmother, mother and daughter
Winter break from school, they spend a month on the Island
away from home in Fakarava
clearing the coconut groves
a hammock by the beach
they don’t have a lot
but they have a tropical island
~MS
Heart of the coconut from recently sprouted coconuts.
This sponge replaces the milk space and is sweet and tasty-ish
Prolific Palms will sprout wherever they fall
In the internet we trust
we believe in our digital sources,
sailors climb in their dinghies with their hard drives
swapping terabytes
open source navigation, the pass current “Guestimator”
it all sounds good, so technologically clever it simply has to work
we’re going where sailors used to dread
watched over by the faint, triangulated signals of satellites
google earth stitched over the old charts
some drawn diligently a hundred years ago by men who were dedicated, but human.
Rand and Ellen of the Catamaran Golden Glow
who bequeathed us so much of this digital treasure one hectic evening in Nuku Hiva
told a story about a family sailing in Polynesia
the daughter at watch, at night,
they hit an uncharted reef going full speed
dismasted, the father ultimately lost his leg
it’s hard not to be haunted by stories like that
on watch at night, sailing between Atolls
we remember the northern Sea of Cortez
only a few hundred miles from Los Angeles, real civilization
charted islands that did not exist or were miles off
once we appeared to anchor in the middle of the sea
An email via satellite from our friends on Starlet
they’ve heard that there is no internet in all of French Polynesia
a cable cut to Hawaii
True it wasn’t working in Kauehi
and I couldn’t post my perfect bonefish picture
so I guess there are still real world connections to the buzzing web
some lonely cable, thousands of fathoms below in the darkness
just couldn’t hold it together anymore
no escaping the real, physical world, after all
~MS
The ‘Tridacna Maxima’ shows up in every imaginable color (This mosaicist is wild about them!)
These abandoned homes get occupied during the copra harvest (coconut for export)
Whitemouthed Moray Eel (feeding on crabs)
THESE are SO AAAAAMMMMAAAAAAAZZZZING!!! Thank you for sharing your voyage with us land lubbers. Hope you have fun with yourselves during the holidaze……peacefully floating around those hidden reefs. Be well!! We send our love, The Weiss Family (SLC, UT)
Hi Bonnie!
Glad you’re tuning in to the blog; makes me feel good about the battles with the meager wifi around these parts. I wish I had one of your pussy hats onboard Allora – could be sailing in solidarity!