After 23 days at sea, we arrived in Hiva Oa Friday morning. What a trip!

The Psychology of a Crossing

In some ways, our recent crossing was one of the more difficult things I’ve done. My daughter Kader reprimanded me because she learned of our arrival via someone else’s social media post and I didn’t respond to her text – I guess that’s exhaustion. It has taken a few lethargic days to write this post.

Herman loves being at sea and should perhaps consider an encore career in yacht delivery. For me, a crossing of this length is comparable to a long flight to get to a destination, although it took 23 days and I like it much more than being on a plane for that long. When I told our team I wanted to share the mental aspect of our trip, they encouraged me to do so.

My daily schedule was:

– 3:40 AM alarm rings for 4 AM watch. 4 AM make Chris and I tea and get on deck. Chris stays on watch until 5 AM then I’m solo until 6 AM when Jean comes on watch. Sometimes we chat, other times we just read our books. If it is going to squall/rain, it usually occurs during the dark and given the clouds, one can barely see.

– 7 AM go to sleep without an alarm after finding a place to hang wet gear if it rained. The gear never really dries because the air is so humid, especially with the cabin sealed against the sea and rain. Usually I sleep until about 9 AM when I get up and offer breakfast to anyone who’s awake.

– 12 – 15:00 watch, with same overlap.

– 15:00 nap

– 17:00 make cocktails and dinner, which is sometimes the only time during the day we’re all awake and in the cockpit together. Meals are served in bowls because everything would slide off a plate.

– 20 – 23:00 watch, with same overlap.

Everyone on the boat has a similar schedule so we were all mostly rested, but also tired. We discussed having watches with less overlap to allow for more rest, and decided we enjoyed the time together. We’re understanding when someone misses an alarm and sometimes encourage each other to leave watch early. We had a minor celebration when we all got to turn off our alarms upon arrival!

Now add to that the incessant motion of the sea that requires constant bracing and balance control. Everything on a boat requires more energy and after boat maintenance, cooking or dishwashing, we’re sweat drenched. Of course, before going on deck for air, we don our moist, hot life jackets.

At 6:00 and 18:00 each day, I’d put a dot on the navigation map and we’d talk about the miles completed in the last twelve and twenty four hours. During the last week, everyone except Herman was counting the days and looking forward to seeing land. Although we knew we had boats around us from the Predict Wind updates we downloaded daily, we went for the last ten days without actually seeing any other boats.

All that said, a crossing like this is a huge accomplishment and we all enjoyed it and each other.

A Poem By Jean

At night while out at sea.
It’s quite a special place to be. In the middle of the open sea. A sea of rolling waves colliding with one another while holding your boat afloat. The wind propelling your rocking ship forward. The breeze rushing past keeping you cool. From bow to stern and port to starboard you are safe. You are surrounded horizon to horizon by stars with the waxing moon still in the sky creating a light that lets you see the water surrounding you, it’s really quite amazing.

Wildlife

Surprisingly we didn’t see much wildlife on the crossing. We saw flying fish daily and marveled at the sight and their persistence. Unfortunately, some of the fish and squid sacrificed themselves on the deck. We had several Boobies alight on the mast so Herman put our boat pole on the bow to provide an attractive alternative. One particularly rainy morning, a flock of small birds followed us for over an hour. Their chattering reminded me of a busload of middle school girls on the way to an event.

The evening before our arrival a dolphin pod swam leisurely across Tieton’s bow. I awoke from my nap to hear Chris applauding and shouting “Show us your belly! Yippee!” As entertaining as Chris was for us, the dolphins seemed to appreciate Chris’s enthusiasm and respond to her.

Garbage

During our 23 days at sea we accumulated one bag of garbage and a half a bag of glass that we took offshore at the marina. We start in by trying to avoid packaging when shopping. When at sea, pure metals (like aluminum) and green waste can be thrown overboard. Lined metals like most canned goods we buy, and metal wrappers contain microplastics and go into the garbage. Facial wipes also contain plastic, so we use washcloths instead. The areas we’ll be visiting are fragile and we’re trying to reduce our visit’s impact as much as possible.

Arrival

As we approached Hiva Oa, we knew our timing would put us in late in the evening or at night, so we slowed down to allow for a daytime arrival. First thing was to head to the gendarmerie (customs & border) to check in before they close. It was uneventful and the gendarmerie kindly reminded us not to drink in public or ride in a pickup bed.

From there, we headed to a Moika & Mango for a burger and a beverage! The first person we ran into was Shane from Outrun. We’d paralleled Outrun for about two weeks and communicated with Shane when he had an issue with the boat. He also volunteered a Surface power adapter when I asked the Pacific Voyagers Facebook group about an adapter because mine disintegrated in the marine air. It is fun to meet people in person after seeing them online.

After lunch we returned to the boat for a nap followed by cocktail hour with more than one cocktail allowed!! We headed to bed early for a glorious night of uninterrupted sleep.

The next day, we went to Hanakee Lodge for the “sailor’s special” than includes lunch, WiFi, marina pickup, and a pool! We all relished a day of complete relaxation at the pool. The next day Herman took Jean & Chris to the dock so that they could catch the plane to Tahiti.

What Next?

Our long stay visas (& original passports) arrived in Poulsbo the day after we left Mexico. Jefferson sent a photo copy and then Kader sent the passports FedEx to Tahiti Crew, our agents in French Polynesia (FP). FP has a new system which requires all documents (boat documents, health and evacuation insurance, passports, visas, etc.) be uploaded prior to arrival. When we checked in, the gendarmerie didn’t seem concerned about our duplicate passports and said to just keep our long stay visa photo with us. Now to track down our original passports that were supposedly delivered…. Just to keep perspective about this long-stay visa stuff: on one of the Facebook groups that are so useful when cruising, some US and Canadian citizens were complaining about the “lengthy” long-stay visa process. Someone (an EU citizen?) posted a summary of the length of time it can take to get a long-stay visa to the US. Once again, looking in the mirror is sometimes a good thing to do.

Now that we know we can stay for a while, we’re going to take a few days to relax and plan our next steps. We haven’t really “crossed” the Pacific yet because we’ve only arrived on the most northeastern landfall. The South Pacific awaits us!

And we’re so grateful to be here!

And some more photos.