Found: One Mojo, slightly used

Breakfast in Baie de Povai, Bora Bora

Well the water on the cabin sole turned out to be fresh, and on further investigation turned out to be leaking out of  the  number one tank into the adjacent aft number two tank which is  not in use because it leaks! In fact the second tank contained 36 litres of water  in bottles which were now sitting in a couple of inches of fresh water. After taking out the bottles and the free water I noticed a pipe from the first tank running along the bottom of the second tank that then entered a  roughly glassed in sort of junction. It certainly looked dodgy and I guessed that was where the leak was. It must surely have been where the water from Tank two had been leaking years ago so I decided I would try and find some sort of hosepipe  and bypass the mess of pipes and that horrible thick old fiberglass junction box. Later in town I  was pleased to find a hardware store that sold clear tubing and I got a metre of it and some hoseclips and  after a very late lunch of raw fish, nice chips and Beer dinghied back to the boat.

The boat by the way was now at the head of Baie de Povai, further south than Vaitape village where I had initially stopped. I moved from there  because I was never happy there – it was too deep for me and all the chain was out,  it was noisy  and there were too many dinghies and launches and other small vessels racing noisily by and creating annoying wakes, and also I was too close to a nice big well equipped american sloop called Reality. It must have been at the extreme in one direction of its swinging about on anchor when I arrived in the gloom, but now was so close I could here his motor running to charge the batteries and keep the watermaker working – as I heard the old guy on board tell his wife who I could see looking at me resentfully – or am I paranoid?- and I could here him chatting loudly on Skype to his mates in the USA and the Carribbean! I felt like an intruder.

Now I don’t have an electric windlass or even a manual one so I have to haul up all that chain and the anchor by hand, and as I mentioned previously they are both a lot heavier than they were last year, so it’s such an effort to do so that I only ever shift reluctantly.  In fact I wondered if that sort of strain might give me a heart attack one day – so far no ill effects and I think its getting easier! But it leaves me pretty wacked for a few minutes!  Anchoring over here is therefore quite tricky for me because I like to anchor in up to about 10 or 12 metres of water, but the bottom here is often more than twice that right up to edge of the reef , without  a gradually shelving bottom that eventually emerges onto a beach as in New Zealand.  So I have to hunt round the bays for a rare spot where its not so deep, and so where I am now, its 14 metres and the holding is good, so I am not going to shift from here for now. It takes about 15 minutes in the dinghy to get from here to Vaitape which is the main town.

Practicing for Races next week

Back on the boat during the night it occurred to me that I needed to make sure the leak wasn’t coming from somewhere else so this morning dried the number two tank completely again and then watched to see where the water would appear from. The leak is very slow but eventually I established it was emerging from under the paint! It must be tracking along from further forward perhaps at the place where the pipe passes from number one to number two – in any case my hose was not going to help! The only way to fix the tank would be a major refit of the whole system, and I am not about to do that. Instead, after wondering how I could sail without a water tank, I decided to just get more bottled water. The leak amounts to a couple of litres per day – and I am not sure if this leak is new or not but the tank was still half full when I got back to the boat last month, so maybe the tank only leaks when its filled right up, and if so, the leak might disappear once the level gets lower. We shall see!

As for the two splits in the sail – Ive stitiched them up and reinforced the repairs with stick-on repair sail cloth on both sides. Again, we shall see.

Tomorrow I am booked to go on a snorkel trip that advertises sharks and manta rays, and the day after I am probably going to be preparing to set sail for Suwarrow Atoll, about 700nm away. The mojo that I found is a used one and slightly the worse  for wear but still functional I think. Again we shall soon see!

Sailing at last

Yesterday the wind was forecast to gradually increase from 4 or 5 knots to about 12 by the evening but at 9am it was already 8 in the Marina and a nearby sloop hoisted sail and disappeared out into the Lagoon.  The change had come early I thought, so decided to follow suit and head for Bora Bora. It was a beautiful hot day and I quickly paid my fees and handed back the key to the showers and toilets, bought some bread and topped up the water and around 11 cast off. Once in the lagoon I raised sail and was soon gliding south past the Sunset Beach Motel and  Raiatea Carenage and then turning west through Pass Rautoanui back into the South Pacific. It was 20 nm to the nearest part of Bora Bora, Pt Te Turi Roa, a marker and light on the  south western edge of the reef, but the pass through the reef was another 3nm up the western side. The wind was 10 to 14 knots on occasion and we were making 5 knots, peaked at 5.5 and the Hydrovane kept us on track.

The Marker at Pte te Turi Roa.

At first I felt nervous. Everything seemed so unfamiliar to me, this being the first sailing I had done for 10 months. After three hours we were half way there and then the Hydrovane started misbehaving. I eventually realized the real problem was the wind which contrary to predictions was  starting to fade, and our speed was dropping. By 3pm we were barely making 2 knots, and much as I hate to motor, I hated even more the prospect of arriving in the dark, so we motorsailed the rest of the way at 5.6 knots and dropped sail inside Pass Teavanui at the very same moment as the sun set.

Theres that Boat again, now also in Bora Bora

I headed for the place where  a number of other yachts were anchored, off the main Village of Vaitape and dropped anchor. While checking to see the anchor would hold  I had a meal of bread and cheese and some yoghurt, and fruit juice that had been chilled in the freezer while the motor was running. I had a couple of problems to think about – a tiny split in the main sail close to the foot, about 5cm long, and a cupful of unexplained water on the cabin sole, so I lay on the cushioned cockpit seat and looked at the incredible night sky and wondered what I should do.  It still wasn’t clear to me.

However I do want to go snorkeling with those manta rays.

Apooiti Marina

Uturoa, the Main Centre on Raiatea

Apparently one of the questions most frequently asked of astronauts – when there were such people - was about how they go to the toilet – and actually that might be in relation to the interests of school children. In any case, probably because I am not an astronaut  I haven’t been asked that question so far but I am going to give you the answers anyway, because it helps to explain why I have ended up in the Marina..

Sapphire does not have a “Holding Tank” so the toilet empties directly into the sea, which is fine when youre at sea but not when you’re anchored in a tiny Bay where people swim and fish. So one relies on Public Conveniences, and as when Backpacking in foreign countries, becomes adept at spotting such places. In this Bay however the only possibilities are to have a meal at the marina restaurant, and use their Facilities, or else check the boat into the Marina. I asked if I could just pay for a key to the Toilets and Showers but this was not an option, so after 4 days on anchor I moved in to the Apooiti Marina for about $25 a night with water, power and showers and toilets. The downside  is loss of privacy and solitude out in the Bay, concerns about security, and 24 hour lighting illuminating the boat. I connected to shore power to fully charge the Batteries but the Solar Panel is working so efficiently it was hardly needed so I’ve disconnected it after checking all the AC outlets on the Boat are all in working order. I’ve also hauled out the dinghy for a better clean up and dry out before putting it away, squirted a bit more Sika around the place, done some washing and yes had a few showers which in this heat have been very refreshing.

The winch was fixed – don’t ask me what was wrong – and yesterday I motored an hour to Uturoa, the main town on Raiatea, had a nice breakfast then bought supplies, petrol for the outboard and topped up the diesel – 22litres used since leaving Marina Taina in Tahiti last year. I met a lovely young German couple on the dock at Uturoa – they have chartered a big Cat for three weeks – and are trying to decide if they could sail together and not wreck their relationship! I told them about a similar Cat that exited Apooiti Marina the other day and was motored straight onto the reef about 50 yards from me, with resulting marital stress in the form of shouting, wild arm waving and gesticulations and bellowed expletives filling the Bay – the French are so Passionate! On Sapphire of course the Crew always do exactly what I want and I never have to shout.

Sapphire and a Cat

Today I would have sailed to Bora Bora except for one thing – theres no wind, and tomorrow its likely to be the same, so I have been doing more cleaning and tidying – I took the canvas Dodger off, washed its window and polished the stainless frame and all thje other stainless on the boat. Tomorrow I will find other such chores to occupy myself but essentially, Ive checked everything and its all OK. I said I would make my final decision once Ive sailed to Bora Bora, and so I shall but I think I will be sailing.

Flashback June 10th 2011

Which reminds me – 0ne year ago today, June 10^th I dropped anchor in Baie d’Avera, Rurutu, 24 days after leaving New Zealand.. I’ll never forget the exhaustion but more especially the tremendous relief at making it.

Testing the System

If I sail, and the computer works, and the Radio works and I can get reception, and the Pactor Modem works then I can send messages to the Blog like this one. I cannot see the Blog or read whats already there, or any Comments, and I cannot send pictures or receive Pictures by this Method which works by Radio not by the Internet or by Satellite or anything else. I can receive email that is text ONLY - no photos, no limks, no attachments - just Text and the address is vjn3327@sailmail.com (this is the corrected, and now correct address - thanks to Webb Chiles who discovered my Typo!)
This message is a Test of the System

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radio email processed by SailMail
for information see: http://www.sailmail.com/

Dear Diary

The Church at the head of the Bay where I'm anchored

On Saturday morning I got a lift with the Motel guy to Uturoa to do some  shopping. I bought Bananas at the market but there were no tomatoes and when I asked why there no eggs, even in the Supermarket, I was told that some months ago because of some sort of disease, all the commercial hens in Tahiti were slaughtered and it would be a few months before egss would be available again. In the end I didn’t buy much at all but had a very useful hour finding out what foods were available that I could stock up on if I head west. There certainly wasn’t the range of tinned meals like Irish Stew, Braised Steak and Onions, and Lamb Curry that I could get back home.

Back at the boat, still tied to the end of the boat launching bay and still floating, it took me about three hours to get the motor all sorted and checked. The biggest issue was the gear change and throttle cable which wouldn’t budge in any direction – I feared rust must have fused the wires together, and if so I would need a new one from Papeete but with CRC and fiddling around with it for  about an hour, it freed up and worked perfectly again. Next, to my great relief, the motor started without difficulty. A large cloud of rust stained water emerged from the exhaust and drifted off behind the boat, and I saw that the generator was working and so was the Eutetic fridge.

Since then, Ive completed the browning of the toe rail and made intermittent forays into the interior of the boat to sort through stuff – some of which I threw out – and to clean and tidy up but it’s a slow process.

On Monday I paid my Bill at Raiatea Carenage and it came to a lot less than what I had budgeted for, mainly because we didn’t end up doing what I budgeted for so I am in front there. I also checked out of the Sunset Beach Motel rather reluctantly and checked into Sapphire Hotel at the Carenage. I filled up my water tank and then cast off, motoring a mile or so back past the motel and into a small bay where there is a marina, but I anchored off it, in about 18 metres, equidistant between a small red yacht called Le Sylphe, about 20 feet long, and an empty mooring. Shortly after it started to pour with rain, a first test of my water-proofing which I am sad to say wasn’t quite as effective as I had hoped, but I have identified a couple more places that will get the Sika Treatment once everythings all dry again.

Leak testing Downpour

The following morning I finally got to “bend” on the sails, and with silicone spray on the sliders and headsail track both sails went on in no time. Then I discovered that the starboard main winch wasn’t working properly – it would only wind in one direction – and yet it had been working perfectly when I last used it. I pulled it apart and got covered in grease – another yachties ritual that Ive been denied the privilege of experiencing till now – but couldn’t find anything wrong with it. All the gears and the little spring loaded parts seemed fine but I could not make it work – I cleaned and scraped away bits of rust and assembled and disassembled and reassembled again and again trying to figure out what the hell was wrong with it – I even disassembled the working one to see if there was an obvious difference but I couldn’t spot one. Finally after 4 hours I decided I would take it back to the Carenage and ask the guys there to have a look at it.. This meant going ashore so I had to unpack the inflatable dinghy, pump it up and check out the Outboard. Well there was discolouring mould on parts of the Dinghy which cleaned up OK, and to my surpise, after some minor tidying and spraying with CRC – the” Workshop in a Can” the Mercury outboard sprang into life almost immediately. I discovered in the process that it has a gear lever!

So I sped back to the Carenage, dropped off the winch and sped back but ran out of petrol! Luckily I had attached the oars to the dinghy and I was almost back when the motor stopped! But I am certainly getting plenty of work outs here, what with cycling, rowing, walking and lifting heavy weights like the rolled up dinghy and the anchor which has put on a lot of weight while Ive been away! . Last year I pulled in the anchor arm over arm but tonight I had to use two arms at a time to pull it up when  the vacant mooring beside me was taken up by an antiseptic white Catamaran from the Charter Company in the Marina. The massive thing dirifts round in all directions and I could have stepped on board at one moment – so I decided to shift.

Earlier in the day I had walked 6km in baking heat to town where I bought a switch to replace the one for the light above the nav Station, and I bought some shorts and a couple of cheap shirts, as well as some veges and fruit and milk. I hitched back to the boat and caught a ride with a midwife from the local hospital! I pointed out Sapphire and said if they get stuck with any difficult obststrics that’s where I’ll be! Now there is something I CAN do!

Evening sail in Raiatea-Tahaa Lagoon, Bora Bora in the background

When the winch is fixed I’ll motor round to the main wharf at Uturoa to get fuel and supplies from the Supermarkets nearby, then head for Bora Bora. I hope that will be in the next few days. Apparently you can go snorkeling with Manta Rays over there!

The New Black

On the Move again

The Electrician promised to come on Thursday morning but didn’t!  I waited till after lunch before getting cranky with the lovely woman in the Office, who then rang him but it went to message bank. There would be no point in putting the boat back in the water if I couldn’t get the motor started, but I decided to continue preparation for launch on Friday afternoon, which basically meant getting the toe rail sealed and painted and hope he would turn up eventually.

Hiro, the young Tahitian guy from the Carenage had already ground back the corroded parts, filled the holes underneath and disguised them once again with a new kind of bog, which , now smoothed and painted over once again leaves the toe rail looking complete. I  erected scaffolding to get access to the outside of the rail and with some expensive new marine grade “Sikaflex” sealed it on both sides. I asked Hiro to get me some black paint and he returned with a litre decanted into a plastic bottle, along with Hardner, which I had never used before, but he explained what to do, and in the morning, I returned before 8 to get it done. It was overcast so ideal for working outside and I managed to paint the outside without my usual catastrophe of spilling the paint or having it run down the side of the hull, or fall off the scaffolding. Just as I was finishing the sun came out and standing back to admire my handiwork I realized with a shock the paint was Brown! Admittedly a very dark brown but brown, not black.

Quelle horreur!  I got getting cranky again with the woman in the office who had ordered it, and she showed me the colour card it had been ordered from and indeed in her gloomy office it did look black – and so did lots of other dark shades of green and blue and one which must have been actual black. If only she had chosen the super dark blue that would have been ok, but brown? But what was the point of getting cranky – it was a subtle difference and in any case Sapphire is not exactly in pristine condition – in fact shes rather tired and scruffy looking ! So later today I am going to paint the inside of the toe rail brown, the new Black. The completed outside of the rail looks pretty good anyway!

So once I had my little tantrum  - it was midday Friday by now - I went back to the boat and who should be inside but Marc, the Marine Electrician and he had brought with him a new fuse board, the one I suspected was a source of trouble last year when I was at Rurutu. I had pointed it out to Marc when he first visited on Wednesday. He re-attached all the wires to the new one and “Voila”  it was working again.

Two hours later, Sapphire was back in the water!

A Much better Look

Crab Antics

Amazing Morning sky

There are coppery brown crabs over here, up to about 6cm across that live in holes they excavate in the soft sandy soil near the water. They busy themselves on the mud a few feet from the entrance but as you approach they scuttle across to it and wait, sliding smoothly in and disappearing if you get too close. There are scores of these burrows along the edges of the road I ride to the boatyard every day and I have been amusing myself by observing their behaviour, which can be quite funny when I approach at speed on the bike, as they  fling themselves into their holes in a mad panic. But they can only do this once they’ve warmed up in the morning, and in places still in shadow and cool early in the morning they barely react as I ride by.

Apart from that theres not much else that’s funny at the moment! But work continues on the boat which is drying out now that the heavy rain has passed and at long last the Electrician has finally turned up, and TODAY is supposed to be coming early to check all that stuff out. Meanwhile various suspect defects have been filled round stanchions and along the toe rail, and once again the Hydrovane mountings have been redone. I had assistance this time but it was still an incredibly tricky task to reach through the inspection port in the transom and tighten the bolts at the stern, a job that I did twice at sea with a wrench taped to the outside. I kept wondering how the hell I had managed it on my own – but we can be surprised by what we manage to do sometimes!

I have also scraped along all the edges of the toe rail, inside and out, and later today will probably reseal it all with sikaflex, though to be honest I will be surprised (but delighted) if that makes much difference. Leaks seem to belong to a universe of their own, and seem to defy most natural laws such as gravity and logic – water can apparently get into the boat at one point and emerge at another completely remote and unrelated part, thus rendering any attempt to work backwards quite futile, unless of course you want to rip out the entire interior of the boat. And Ive thought about it. Ive even dreamed about it.

 

The other thing Ive  done is a yachties ritual that till now Ive managed to avoid altogether but there was no excuse this time – Ive sanded off the hull and put on a fresh coat of Antifouling. 

All Good from this distance - before ANtifouling

With luck Sapphire goes back in the water tomorrow evening, and if the motor works I will anchor off the marina and bend on the sails. I hesitate to use the word “bend” but that’s the strange term yachties use to mean they are putting the sails back on.