Passage to Maquesas

Well we made it! 23 days and  3,000 nautical miles later we arrived at Taiohae Bay on the island of Nuku Hiva in the Marquesas group. It was very refreshing for our eyes to see lush green vegetation after more than 3 weeks of ocean, ocean and more ocean all around. During our passage we averaged 5.8 knots and 130 nautical miles for each 24 hour period. Not bad at all we think for a small, heavy boat.

Not always blue skies

We both agreed that while the passage was never boring, there was always something to do or fix, it became somewhat monotonous and we quickly slotted into a daily routine. A typical day went something like this: Ivan came off watch at 9am and would make us breakfast. He consistently had muesli while I decided on the day – muesli or fruit and yoghurt and/or toast. If I didn’t need to be on deck all the time while on watch, and heel of the boat permitting, I would then make some bread if we needed it and also start to organise lunch. I figured it was best to do as much foodwise in the galley as possible while conditions were good, because you never knew when it would all change and the galley turn into a gunnel to gunnel rolling nightmare.

We decided early on in the passage to make lunch our main mean of the day. I prepared 90% of the meals and I was finding that the preparation and clean up of a big meal in the evening, before those long night watches, was cutting into the rest time I needed to get ready for the night ahead.

Our night watches weren’t actually any longer than our day watches –3 hours each – they just seemed longer. By the end of 3 hours, in the dark of night, I was well and truly ready to hand over to Ivan. I fairly quickly exhausted my supply of Radio National podcasts I had downloaded in Panama and so I would listen to music or read to keep awake and help pass the time when on watch. My meagre supply of music started to get a bit repetitive though. I was also amazed at how many songs I have that have “ocean”, “sea” and other nautical words as lyrics. One songster even mentions “man overboard” a few times. Hmmm, I’m not too keen to listen to that one anymore!

Our other major activities most days were an afternoon game of Scrabble, reading, watching the fishing line for tell-tale jerks that there was something edible on the end of it, and checking in with a couple of different SSB radio nets. Actually that was Ivan’s pastime more than mine. He calls it his networking time. I call it his social addiction. Flippancy aside, the radio nets have been extremely useful (as well as re-assuring to know there are at least 20-30 other yachts out there like us, making their way across the Pacific Puddle).

Nuku Hiva at last!

We had pretty good weather during the passage – typical south easterly trade winds of 10-15 knots, some squalls and the seas ranged from a ½ metre swell to a 3 metre swell. We had about 5 days in the middle of the passage where the seas were large and confused which made for very uncomfortable sailing and put a lot of strain on the rigging as the boom would bang around even though we had tied a restraining rope to it and the reacher sail would flog. For much of the passage we sailed using the reacher only as that seemed to balance the boat best for using the wind monitor (which meant we didn’t have to hand steer all the time).

Brio coped with it all pretty well. Our major problem was when our outer forestay gave way. Fortunately Brio has two forestays – one of the things Ivan liked about her when he first saw her – which also fortunately meant that when the forestay broke the mast didn’t come crashing down! The forestay gave way during pretty calm weather, but it was probably all of the flogging and banging that caused the breakage. To cut a long story short, we were able to drop the forestay, the aluminium track it is housed within and the sail alongside the deck and lash it all onto the side rail. With some grunting and sweating we removed the sail from the track and threw it down into the cabin and then got back on course with a 10 foot extension now hanging off the rear of our 33 ft. For the rest of the passage we had to use the inner forestay with the smaller genoa sail and we hoisted the main for balance. It meant we were probably travelling a bit slower, but at least we were moving! Now we have arrived at a port where we can use email and telephone, we will set about ordering a replacement furler mechanism that dropped overboard when the forestay came down and a new forestay. Papeete in Tahiti will be our best chance to get the parts and get the work done, so until then we will manage.

Brio on the high (flat) seas

Maintaining a good charge on our batteries has been a challenge. I suspect our fridge thermostat is on the blink and it is draining the batteries, although it could also be a problem with the batteries themselves. The electrics on Brio are a mystery to us. To keep the batteries charged during the passage we were running the engine for 2-3 hours each day and that would only give us enough power to keep the chartplotter and fridge going. We didn’t use our cabin lights or watch dvds so it really felt like a camping experience!

Our fresh food lasted more than 2 weeks and when we arrived here at Taiohae Bay we still had oranges, limes, potatoes, yucca, onions, cabbage, garlic and eggs. Just as well as our fishing skills need improving, having caught only one fish (a mahi mahi) during the entire passage. That’s not counting the little flying fish that would sacrifice themselves on our deck most nights. Ivan collected them to cook up (as I refused to deal with the desiccated little bodies), but never did, so we gave them to someone’s cat the other day.

We didn’t see much else in the way of wildlife while we were out there: a pod of about 100 dolphins one afternoon and the occasional bird looking for a place to land on Brio. The only other boats we saw were the lights of two fishing boats in the distance one night and early in the passage we were passed (within 20 metres!) by a 58ft catamaran called Unama. We talked with them on the VHF radio and each took photos of the other boat under sail exchanging email addresses to send them on. As luck would have it, Unama came into this anchorage yesterday and we handed over our photos. They of course only took a very respectable 15 days to make the passage from Galapagos.

Unama passing us at a great rate of knots

Now we must get on with the business of exploring Nuku Hiva!