Well, I suppose I ought to say that it’s been a long time since I rocked and rolled and bucked and bashed to windward like this. We’ve simply gotten out of practice of going to weather – we’re cushy cruising sailors, right? However, if you took those opening stanzas of music from the classic Zeppelin tune, cranked it up plenty loud, and synched it in a certain way with video of Walk On bashing east in these waves towards the Marquesas, and I bet you could make some pretty cool music video out of it all. Other songs come to mind, all in similar veins: “Thunderstruck” and “For those about to Rock”, both by AC/DC, “Crash” by DMB, “Jungleland” by Bruce, “Wild Night” by Van Morrison, “Fisherman’s Blues” by The Waterboys, and so many others – some for the music, some for the lyrics, some for simply the title. I’m just trying to put a creative spin on the situation – hell, it’s one a.m., the boat is heeled and bucking, I’m sitting on the floor in the dark, Danny’s snoozin’ on the saloon sofa/bed, Lara’s snoozin’ in the aft cabin, and I can’t hang out in the cockpit because it’s blowing 25 knots on the nose, and the 2.5 meters seas we’re plunging through and crashing up against are leaving a good amount of spray and flying saltwater to soak anyone or anything foolish enough to be hanging around in the cockpit. And I’ve got three more hours on watch. Might as well write for the blog, right?
The reality of it all is that we’re something like 75 miles away from Ua Po – from a waypoint off Ua Po that we’ve got on the plotter. But we need to be making progress towards that waypoint at something like 65 degrees from where we are at the moment (west and a tad south of the goal). Pity that even close-hauled, the best progress we can make is something like 20 degrees – the trades are pumping (blowing hard) and the current across the bow at a perpendicular angle is somewhere in the neighborhood of 2 knots. Talk about having it stacked up against you! This means that while we need mostly to go east, we’re mostly going north, actually. Eventually, like sometime tomorrow late morning, we’ll have to tack and head back SSE… Inching our way east if you will. And so it goes.
And to think, we’ve been lucky! After that cat snuck away from Rangiroa last week and had us looking closely at the weather, we knew we were being given a chance, a fortunate if short break in the weather. I don’t even remember now, as the days have smudged a bit together on this bumpy passage, but for something like 36 to 48 hours, we were able to really make serious easting when the weather disrupted the usual flow of the trades and resulting west-setting current. Had we not been so lucky with a weather window, we might not have 75 miles to go, but more like 250 or 300 to go. I’m not surprised now about the accounts I’ve read of boats leaving the Tuamotus for the Marquesas on this very same stretch, only to turn back after making scant progress in 5 days of beating to weather.
‘Nuff complaining. What you really should see are the waves. Wow. Big rollers some more than 3 meters easy, maybe 4. Most of the time our blue lady lifts up and over with little effort, her sails helping not only to make way but also to balance her and give us a decent ride. But there are other moments, when time, place and direction all seem to be out of whack just enough in that split second that we really crash into one. A tremendous ‘boom’ shakes the whole boat, and we take some heavy duty splash action head on, as well as many many gallons of seawater on deck. I can tell you where all the leaks are now… Especially the ones that don’t show up with rain. Funny though how waves look somehow better by moonlight, and there is a nice moon going on tonight, wouldn’t you say?
And the fishing, you ask? Hmmmm, a mixed bag. This morning we pulled in a fish on the handline. It was a tuna – good size, probably 25 pounds, maybe 35. Not sure weather it was a yellowfin or a bigeye. I wanted it to be a yellowfin as I’ve never caught one and I know they are super yummy. However, the little ID Chart that we have and flashes of the fish in my mind’s eye tell me it was likely a bigeye. We’ll never really know, as he spit the hook right in our faces, exactly at the moment we were pulling him up, by the leader wire, into the scoop of the aft ‘swim platform’. It’s an awkward maneuver at best, with the dinghy there and all, but in rolling seas and with a flopping fish it can be downright difficult. This time, he won and we got our lure back. I know, I know, they make things like gaff hooks and even nets for these kinds of situations… Later in the day, another fish… This time a beauty, though I don’t know whether it was from the marlin family or the sailfish family. It was long and thin, probably between 4 and 5 feet, and it was very pretty indeed. I dare say it even looked elegant. Wish my Uncle Paul was here to see these things – he would certainly know what it was we had on the line. It was similar to the one we caught the other day, just longer and heftier. Not sure if it was good eating or not, but as I was in doubt, I preferred to catch & release. We are into keeping what we can definitely eat, especially if we know it’s yummy – and I’m not into keeping something just for a picture or a personal size record, especially if I don’t know whether we’ll eat him afterwards or not. Oh well, that’s the way it went today. Perhaps tomorrow, closer to the islands, we’ll have some good luck and pick up a mahi mahi or wahoo.
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Thanks to family and friends for the email. We look forward to the correspondence and are having a good time with it – whether it’s anchorage suggestions in Fatu Hiva, or descriptions of present-wrapping and travel plans for the Holiday season – we love hearing from you. (That goes for Danny too!). – – – – –
“Some easting, some easting, my kingdom from some (70 nautical miles of) easting!”
More soon. Time to make some more joe & check out the stars. M
S/Y Walk On 