276 miles to go! & Arrival

It really can't get much calmer than this...

We are sitting in the cockpit, it's just after dusk, just finished
dinner and we are enjoying a G&T.

Just off the side of the boat the water is as calm as a very
protected anchorage. Basically dead flat, it feels like we're in a
marina. There is a light ripple on the water, this is new!, a few
hours ago the water was like a sheet of glass.

The wind meter says we have 1.2 knots of wind, we don't even think
it's that much. Looking up all we can now see are the stars coming
out. There is no cloud above us, only a little on the horizon
looking forward (west) and a little more behind. Some squalls may
form tonight. Good we can get a boat wash!

Day 18...

Well we didn't get a boat wash and still have no wind. The wind chop
that we had has completely gone. All that is left is a series of
very large swells a long way apart, about 13 seconds (normal I
think is about 7 seconds). It's kinda cool watching these massive
humps moving under us. We have no boat roll, just up and down.

Looking at the weather fax charts from Hawaii, it's likely we will
have very light conditions for the rest of the trip. The great thing
about this boat compared to the last Reverie is it's ability to
move easily in very little wind. Together with the larger rig that
we have it's surprising how well we can sail in a small amount of
wind.

BUT today there is so little wind that the spinnaker won't even stay
filled, it just hangs down from the top of the mast. So the motor
is on.

Still no more fish, very frustrating, now we know we're not the
best of fishermen but we can't sail for more that 3000 miles and
only hook 1 fish!, there has to be something else at play here. We
have noticed that the water temperature is quite warm. Maybe that's
it, we'll make any excuse!

Day 19
Much the same as day 18, not much wind, but it does come in every
so often, mainly at night. We are sailing here and there with help
from the motor in the wind holes.

The lack of wind is getting a little frustrating as we are in the
trade wind belt and we should have something. Some of the boats
further behind have picked up a little, but all in all there seems
to be a big wind hole down here.

Our friends on Lady Sara who are sailing to Hawaii from Costa Rica
have been in a wind hole for over two weeks now and there doesn't
seem to be a break in it for them, so I guess we should stop
complaining.

Exciting news is LAND!!!! earlier today we saw LAND!! the small
atoll called Fakahina, soon after we passed Fangatau. Two names you
could use in anger and sound angry!.

These two atolls are on the far eastern edge of the Tuamotu Atolls
they are both quite small 6 x 5km, we think there is a small village
on both of them.

Later tonight we will pass Raroia Atoll, a much larger atoll still
with only about 50 people living on it. Raroia atoll is a little
famous in sailing circles as it was the atoll that Thor Heyerhahl
crashed "Kon-Tiki" a 45ft Balsa Log raft equipped with a bamboo hut
and square sail while he was trying to prove that the population in
the pacific migrated from South America. Kon-Tiki was wrecked on
April 28, 1947.

After Rarioa we will pass closely to Nihiru and Taenga Atolls. Then
it's Makemo. All the Atolls prior to Makemo except Rarioa don't have
any passes that Reverie would be able to enter. Raroia does, but the
pass and town is on the wrong side of the Atoll and we really want
to get to Makemo.

Day 20 Position 16-27S 142-47W Wind 8 knots NE, SOG 5.9 knots
ONLY 46 miles to go!!!!

STILL NO FISH! Or any bites for that matter - we are changing lures
constantly now, but nothing seems to be working.

Sun is out and it's HOT, the water is the most awesome blue and
shiny like a mirror as still we have very little wind.

Arrival time should be late afternoon. Not the ideal time for going
through the pass, but hopefully with the calm seas the Atoll won't
be to "full" and the current will be manageable.

Either way we will make a run at it!

End of Day 20...

ARRIVAL!!!,

We sighted Makemo on the radar at about 9 miles, it's difficult to
see the atolls any further as all they really are is a sand bank
with a bunch of coconut trees on them.

As we approached the south eastern end of Makemo the wind started to
build. We ended up having a great sail with about 10 knts of wind in
totally flat seas!. We sailed along the south eastern edge for about
7 miles (13kms) it was great to be so close to land. All we had to
do now was get through the pass, get the anchor down and enjoy
beer-o-clock ( arrival right on time - again!). We're not actually
trying to arrive at this time, it just seems to happen this way,
although we're not complaining.

Approaching the pass entrance we notice the eddies and small waves
from the outflow of water. We were arriving about 1 hour after
slack high water, meaning that the atoll will be emptying itself.
It didn't look too bad!. We furled in the Genoa, dropped the
main and off we went.

Even though we went through at the "less than ideal time" it was
very calm. The eddies and small whirl pools were pushing the boat
around a bit but all that was needed was some quite active steering.
We ended up having a 3.5 knot current against us ( not bad
actually).
Once through the half way point the water settled down and it was
nice and calm, current still there but it was flat.

So we are here!!!, Yippee!!!, we sailed 3,250 miles ( just over
6,000kms) It took us 20 days and 22 hours. The second half was very
light on the wind, lets hope the boats still out there get some. We
are lucky that Reverie moves easily with a small amount of wind and
we have a good range under power. We arrived 2 days after we did
this trip
three years ago and are anchored 35m from where we were last time!

So tonight it's pizza, wine and a very LONG sleep.

Cheers!
J&J

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Galapagos to Makemo and 11,000 miles

Day 12....
Just 5 minutes ago we hit 11,000 Nautical miles sailed on Reverie.
( that's 20,372KM!)

It's 6:54 or 7:54 am depending on what time zone we are in - not
sure, 8th May.

Jo is asleep, I am on watch. There is just enough wind to sail, if
we have much less the engine will have to go on ( we have about
12 knots of true wind and about 5 knots apparent wind).

Dire Straits - Alchemy , "telegraph road" is playing on the CD
player ( Ahhh this brings back memories! of way too long ago).

I just put two fishing lines out so hopefully we'll hook some fish,
there is a radio net on shortly and I will check in with our
position and see where other boats are, then we will work on some
breakfast.

We are currently at 11-58S, 124-11W, We are moving at 7 knots SOG
over a course of 225M. 1165 miles to go!

Yesterday was a fantastic day sailing, no speed records but
conditions that would be close to perfect -12 knots of true wind,
and with our sailing angle we were able to bring the wind to about
16 knots of apparent, just forward of the beam. With the wind so
light the seas were very calm. There were no clouds and the air
temperature was in the mid 20's.

Today however is starting a little odd, there is a lot of cloud and
as mentioned above not much wind. Hopefully the cloud will burn off
and we can bag some fish!

Two days later....
Position 13-29S, 129-36W, SOG 6 knots and going down..., COG 240M
Wind 10knots ENE to East

Well the previous day was an odd one. WE LOST OUR WIND!!!!.

Damm, down to sailing in 10 knots of wind coming from the East,
sometimes it has a little North in it as well.

Not what we really wanted. It has been that way for two days now,
bugger!, looks like it will be like this for at least one or two
days more. Now we are getting excited if we see 6 knots on the
speedo!, where before we were hitting 8 and 9's.

Another big drama came up today, the watermaker has died. Well not
sure how dead it is, but it looks like we have a BIG oil leak from
the gearbox in the watermaker, the oil is running into the electric
motor!!, so now I (think) we have a gearbox with no oil - That's
not good, and an electric motor full of oil - that's worse!.

Not sure where the failure is, I guess it's an oil seal between the
motor and the gearbox, after all what else could it be?!

Now the challenge is, the watermaker has a 3 year warranty, we may
need a new motor and gearbox - That woul dbe bad news, as shipping
anything into French Polynesia is costly and time consuming.

We will see how this unfolds over the next few days..

More on the tragic front, we just finished "LOST" series 3,
tragedy!, now we need to find out if there is a series 4 and if it
is on DVD, if it is maybe we can pick it up in Tahiti....

Our lives must come across as very trivial when underway...

Day 14.

Position: 14-00S, 131-18W, SOG 6. knots, COG 240M. 727 miles to
go.

Wind is still light and the forecast looks like it will stay that
way for the next few days at least, so it looks like we have some
slow sailing ahead.

Last two days we managed to complete 128 miles and 132 miles.
Nothing to get excited about but a least it's forward.

We still have yet to hook a fish that we want, yesterday we managed
to hook a small Bonito ( sort of like a small tuna) we chucked it
back. Luckily we have a freezer that's stocked with some Yellow Fin
Tuna that we caught in the Galapagos. But what we really want is a
couple of Wahoo and a few Mahi Mahi, that would give us plenty of
fish for the next few weeks. We will cross our fingers and keep
praying to the fish gods that we get something soon.

Day 15-16

Position 14-53S, 135-46W SOG 6.5 COG 242M
Wind, 10 knots ESE 460 miles to go!

Had a great sail over the last 36 hours. The wind moved south just a
touch and we were able to get the spinnaker up with the main. This
was a massive jump in power. Reverie quickly jumped up to sailing at
around 7-8 knots in very little wind.

On the radio net in the morning one boat had so little wind they
jumped overboard and cleaned the bottom of the boat! The conditions
seem quite variable as some boats have wind and some have none and
some have a little bit - we are in the little bit area.

The seas are very calm, no squalls and fast sailing.

We kept the kite up all day, night and the following day.

At about 9pm on Day 16 , there seemed to be a lot of squalls coming
up on the radar so we thought we would bring the kite in and sail
the night on main and genoa - copped a huge speed penalty but it
made for stress free night sailing. What we really need is a big
code
zero free flying reacher, now that would be cool.

We will get the kite up once the sun comes up and try and get the
speed up. It makes a massive difference in the boat motion having
some more power in the rig. We don't get pushed around by the waves,
the boat is stable, smooth and quiet, can't wait!

Still no fish, had a huge bite yesterday, the line (200lbs) was
incredibly tight, you couldn't pull it in an inch, so whatever we
had it was big. Unfortunately the hook didn't set in it's mouth
enough and it came free, lets hope for another shot at it
tomorrow!

Managed to take the watermaker apart yesterday. There was about
250ml of oil in the electric motor, coming from the oil seal between
the motor and the reduction gearbox. The seal looks ok, but clearly
it's not. Cleaned out the motor and tested it so that's ok, now
it's just what do we do about the seal.

We might try mounting the unit another way so the reduction gearbox
is under the motor, this way we may be able to run the unit with no
leaks - at least until we can get it repaired / replaced - lets see
what they want to do under the warranty.

Looks like we will arrive in on Friday the 16th May. One day behind
the plan. What we now have to think about is the timing to enter the
pass into the Atoll. The Atolls are quite large and usually on the
reef on the southern side the ocean swell dumps a lot of water over
the reef inside the atoll. What this means is that there is quite a
fast
current running out the small pass. Makemo Atoll is approx. 61km
long and 8km wide, it only has two passes where water can leave. So
with the excess water from the ocean swell and the tide coming out
there can be quite a fast current to get through. When this water
meets the water outside the atoll the whole lot looks like a huge
bath tub, it can get very rough and if you don't have a strong
engine you won't make it in. So we need to time our entrance to be
at slack tide or on an incoming tide. Slack tide is at dawn and in
the middle if the day.So depending on when we arrive we may have to
sit outside and wait a little.

Day 17..

Light wind today, Genoa is in and the Kite is back up. Progress is
quite slow though as we only have 9 knots of true wind and about 5
apparent.

Fishing lines out, lets see what the day brings.

Will try and install the watermaker today and see if we have any
success without leaks.

.......

Watermaker re installed and seems to be producing water without any
oil leaks, we will however have to get it fixed at one point.

No fish yet, same old story, but we live in hope.

Wind died right out about mid afternoon, down to about 5 knots
true, that was leaving us with about 2-3 knots. Very calm out, may
even have a BBQ tonight, wahoo for Jo and jamaican jerk chicken for
Jason.

We are down to just over 400 miles to go, lets hope the wind picks
up a little more so we can make some more progress towards Makemo.

Around 5pm, one of the fishing lines went off with a bang, we had a
big Mahi Mahi on the line, unfortunately the hook didn't set and he
was off the line inside of a minute. About one hour later the other
line went off, this time we had a tuna on the line. Hook
managed to set well and he was bought in. It was about 15kg's, which
is a good size fish! After a bit chopping we had him in the fridge.
Looks like the fish drought maybe over, although we need some white
fish meat - Wahoo or Mahi Mahi.

Very flat seas tonight, with a light breeze blowing, we are sailing
at around 6 knots. Just on 353 miles to go!

Cheers

J&J

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Galapagos to French Polynesia Day 4-11

Day 4,

Great day sailing, wind was blowing around 18 knots true just a
little to the post of dead behind us. With our boat speed we were
able to bring it forward a little. So we are having a great sail so
far.

The current that we have had has now faded away, such that our boat
speed over the water and speed over the ground are the same!! Looks
like the current is pulling us a little south, but that's ok with
our destination being the Tuamotu Atolls. Most of the other boats
out here are sailing for the Marquesas and without sailing dead down
wind they are having a hard time staying north with the south
setting current. Lets hope it changes for them.

Good day sailing we managed to hit 180 miles for the day run.

It was a perfect night sailing, lots of stars, wind dropped off a
little but enough to maintain good boat speed. The seas are real
flat so it's super comfortable!

Still no signs of any other boats/ ships, we seem to be closing on
some of the boats out in front but it will be a while before we pass
them as they are 400 odd miles out in front, we seem to be putting
about 30 miles a day on them.

Day 5.

Pos 04-51.6S, 101-48.2W, SOG 8, COG 241, Distance to go to
Makemo Atoll 2553nm

Another great day, excellent boat speed all day.

Even tried fishing!, lots of bites, managed to hook two Mahi Mahi,
but they were both very small, ( 1.5ft long) they looked quite cute.
We let them go as it would feel like you were eating children, we
will wait and see if we can hook something a little bigger.

Had a bit of current today so that is helping us with our speed over
the ground. Oddly, it still seems to be running south. So much for
the West setting current that we should have!

The wind in the whole area is quite light so what we are not seeing
is the really big ocean swells that we had last time, there just
seems to be a small wind "chop/swell" no real formation or pattern
to them. They are quite small so there is little effect on the boat
movement which is very nice.

Talking with another boat on the radio this morning "Copout" they
are about 400 miles in front. They were saying that they had a very
windy and rough night!, something to look forward to! Winds up in
the 30 knots and big seas. Not much we can do about it so we will
see what we get in a few days hopefully it will have blown forward
and we won't have to deal with it.

Watched the movie XMEN 2 today, while being interrupted by the
fishing lines going off, not a bad movie, way better than "heart
break kid"!

As night came on there was the clearest sky ahead, not a cloud
anywhere, looks like it will be a very clear night! Another night
of clear skies and no squalls!!

Later on... still clear skies but the wind is up, it's blowing in
the mid to high 20's sometimes moving past 30. The swell is up and
it's much rougher. Not bad, just rougher than it was. We pulled in a
bit of the Genoa as we were starting to overload a little. We tend
to back off the boat a bit at night and push a bit harder through
the day when you can see what's going on. And for the life of me we
cannot seem to trim the sails very well after dark, I'm sure there
is a method, but for us we just pull them in a bit, and forget them
until the morning.

Current seems to have backed off, still pushing south but we are not
getting any speed effect from it just an influence in our course,
which is a real bugger it would be nice to have a free knot or so to
help us on our way.

Very clear and starry night, it's awesome how many more stars you
can see in the middle of the ocean, looking up is unreal, there are
just so many stars. And the good thing is that as long as we starts
at night that means no squalls.

No moon out either so it's real dark!!, the cool part of this is we
get to see the phosphorescence coming off the boat as we move
through the water. Every where we disturb the water it emits a green
glow. So coming of the back of Reverie we have this long green
"smoke" trail looks awesome!.

Day 6-11.

Day 11 position 10-43S, 119-47W, SOG 7 knots COG 240M 1430 miles to
go, 1860 behind us!

On long passages all the days seem to blend into together. You get
into a rhythm of the days and night watches and it starts getting
hard working out which day of the week it is.

Also for us on this trip the sailing has been quite bouncy so
sitting down writing on a keyboard has been a little difficult.

Either way we have had a good run so far, we have not had the
current that we had a few years ago, if we did our run rates would
have been awesome.

So far our daily miles have been, 156, 153, 157, 180, 191, 167, 185,
186, 174, 170. Today will be a slow one as the wind has really taken
a break.

Day 6 was a cracker, as we were saying there isn't a lot of wind out
here, we were hit with a day and night of 30-35 knots gusting into
the 40's! it was a great fast bumpy ride. 24 hrs later it drifted
off again. We then had a wonderful calm day.

No fish to report, haven't had the lines out alot so that could be
the reason, but we really need to step up the fishing effort as we
need a lot of fish for when we get into the Tuamotu's as we will not
eat any of the reef fish for fear of poison. So the fishing effort
is in full swing.

Yesterday ( Day 10) we were in the middle of a key moment in the TV
series "Lost" when we heard a strange noise coming from outside.
Jo's first thoughts was a bird sliding down the rigging, Jason's was
some kind of rigging failure.

We jumped outside to find the mainsail all the way down!!, Yep the
Main Halyard broke right up the top where the line ties onto the
shackle which attaches to the mainsail. Seems there is a little
design fault in the mast track and sail top headboard. When the
mainsail is out the side for a broad reach, the knot rubs on the
track and it slowly cuts through the line. Then snappo, the whole
lot comes down!

We were able to thread a line back through the mast put a new
halyard in ( it may have a little more resistance to the rubbing),
We also made a small leather cover for the line where the knot is
for more protection. Three hours later we were back in business.

Looking out ahead it looks like we may be in for some rain and
squalls. There is a band of cloud with solid rain areas in it out in
front and we also can pick up a few squalls on the radar. A bit of
rain would be good as on Day 7 we hit a Reverie record and we picked
up 84 flying fish off the deck!!, in some spots they were a few
inches
deep. Looks like a whole school flew into the boat!@ The boat was
and still is covered with flying fish scales, the dinghy, sail
cover, life lines, everywhere! So hoping for a huge rainstorm just
before we make landfall!!!

At the current rate it looks like we will be arriving into Makemo on
the same date we did three years ago!! 15th May!

P.S.

One thing that we forgot to mention in the Panama City log.

Our Advisor "Manuel" was telling us the bars that we should go out
to in Panama. As it was a Tuesday he said we should go to the "Rock
Cafe" now it's not the hard rock cafe just the "rock cafe".

Manuel said that Tuesday night was ladies night- ladies drink for
free!. Apparently this is how it works on a Tuesday night.

First, between 8 and 11pm ONLY ladies are allowed in, they get free
drinks and a floor show. The floor show is a male strip act!.

Then at 11pm the men are allowed to come in, they pay an $11 cover
charge and have to pay for drinks.

But the whole deal is, they get the ladies drunk first and
"interested" in
the men, then they let the men in!.

What a concept, only in a Latin America culture!

Cheers!
J&J