Yesterday I got a mail with 2 pictures as attachment thus it went into the big mail folder and will not be downloaded automatically.

However, I made the mistake and didn’t read the size correctly and thought it’s only 500 kB file and pushed the download button. Then nothing can’t be done anymore. Thus, I paid dearly with download time. Now the bottle neck is gone and I will reply to mails on the normal way.

At about noon my sailing friend Shigeo from Japan arrived with the airport shuttle ferry at the tiny harbor of Rikitea. The airport is build on the eastern outer reef. It’s quite a distance across the lagoon.

I had the dinghy ready in the water to jump in and be in 2 min in the harbor. I can see the shuttle ferry far across the lagoon when it returns to Rikitea. So I looked for it, didn’t see it yet, did some more learning French vocabulary, looked for it, didn’t see it, did some more learning French vocabulary, … and missed it for moment and the shuttle ferry arrived before me at the harbor.

Then we went back to MaRe and started as usual talking about plenty of topics but came often back to the long sail from Panama down here to the Gambiers.

He also brought some urgently needed part with him from Japan. At customs there was no special inspection.

First thing I will do, is replacing the control panel in the washing machine because I got a heap of landry to be done.

Later we got hungry and he fixed a salad from the veggies I could get the day before. I had the chance to buy, thus bought all which was offered.

And it was bread baking day again.

This Sunday, I wanted to see a mass in the Cathedral of Rikitea. It is officially a cathedral but it’s the size of smaller country side church in Europe.

The altar decoration is fully dominated with pearl shells nicely polish and arranged. The natural resources from ancient times here.

I arrived about 15 min earlier, but singing was already in full swing. The melody and rythm was Polynesian. People let their bodies move a bit in this rhythm. A lady conducted a small choir, the other people in the church joined the singing they way they wanted. A guitar and a percussion instrument accompanied the voices.

The words of the songs are Mangarevian or Polynesian, but not French.

People came into the church greeting each other with hand shakes or “Bisou”, the French kiss.

At 0900 a bell in one of the two towers rang and then the priest with about 6 altar servers, among them a lady, walked from outside the church through the center aisle forward towards the altar. They all had a white toga like capes; simple, made from cotton or linen. Not like the overloaded ones to be seen in catholic churches in Europe. Later I saw that everyone of the altar servers took them home. One of them was a guy I played a few weeks ago soccer with. We always have a small chat when we meet somewhere.

The people in the church were definitely mainly women and girls. But also single man; one carried his baby on his arms. Also entire families were to be seen. One just in front of me; a family with their 5 kids.

A man walked out in between to come back with a baby bottle for the youngest, nobody cares.

A small boy suddenly run the center aisle forward and came back a few minutes later, nobody cares.

Coming after 20 min in the service or leaving for break outside, nobody cares.

2 girls cuddle with their mom, nobody cares.

A young girl climbed over the benches, nobody cares.

There were only a few spoken prayers, bible readings, etc. The dominant were the songs. They made even me moving my body in the rythm. I could see a lady who made the foot movement of Polynesian dancing; this let’s the body swing very smooth and elegant.

The Holy Communion was received by almost everyone. Even small kids queued up and received it.

At one moment, people raised their hands, pointing their palms upwards and connected with their neighbors hands. At the end parents kissed their kids on their heads. Although many adults kissed others on their heads or gave them their hands for a handshake. The father of the family in front of me turned around and shaked hands with me. The kissing of heads also was done when people left the church.

It was an interesting event for me.

I also noted that some people remember me when I’m somewhere in the village. I feel being welcome in the village but I’m about to prepare to leave again. Sailor’s fate.

About a week ago, Juliet from the gathering point for sailors and a WiFi spot, told me that there’s an event for children in the sports hall at the end of the village.

Don’t imagine a rich countries sports hall. It’s simply a smooth and painted concrete floor. However it functions. (I once played myself on invitation of some youths barefoot soccer with them.)

The event was for kids from about 4 – 12 (estimated) years old.

The younger they are, the more they were dressed in Polynesian dancing dresses. The Polynesian hair wreath were all homemade and looked beautiful. Even some adult ladies wore them.

The kids performed in she groups. The youngest needed the help of their coaches, adult ladies. But the kids gave their very best and it was good watching them.

Among the older groups there were already girls and boys who really performed well. They had a very good feeling for rhythm and their movements where smooth and fitted very well to the music.

It was an event, I’m glad I could see. Thanks Juliet for telling me about the event.

Yesterday, I went to Ta’ina, who sells locally grown not native vegetables to sailors, and she had vegetables for me.

Small green kind of bell peppers, the same as the “piman” I know from Japan, and eggplants (aubergine). Now I had too many fresh vegetables to eat them all myself before the rot.

I just started preparing the eggplants and a part of the “piman”, called here “poivre”, for frying them and put them in olive oil for preservation, when the 2 teenaged girl who came on board on Sunday came again on their old allround windsurf board and their too long paddle. In a plastic bag, they carried a glass of chocolate spread and cookies to say thank you for me treat on Sunday.

As they knew that I baked bread on Sunday, they asked if they can try the bread. I served tea and coffee, which I had still in their cans, bread, butter and marmalade. They liked my bread so much that I immediately understood I have to bake next morning again.

We tried our best to communicate in a mixture of French, English and the help of my German-French off-line dictionary.

Today, we exchanged names. One is called Anuhea and the other Kaua’i. I explained them “Kaua’i” sounds very much like the Japanese “kawaii” which means “cute, lovely, pretty”.

I learned where they live in the village. Kaua’i’s mother passed away already, and Anuhea said she still has her parents but they don’t love each other. Sad stories for both girls. They asked about my parents, who passed away long time ago.

When they left, they asked if they can go again with their board under MaRe’s tunnel and if they can come back next day again and they will bring along an English-French dictionary. Sure I said yes.

After they left, I could fry my eggplants and “poivre” in oil and preserved them in olive oil. Curious how they will last and taste.

It was my lucky day today!

Since I’m here I try to get fresh vegetables beside breadfruits and shaddocks.

When a supply boat comes, they bring onions, potatoes, carrots, this time also cabbage. This all comes from the USA and arrives already pretty old. I once bought carrots but in 3 days I fed the fishes.

Today I got a cabbage, which didn’t look too bad. I took it on board, cut a hole in the stem, filled it with kitchen paper, and made the kitchen paper pretty wet. In this way cabbage can be stored for a long time. An experiment.

But this was not my lucky day.

Local people sell mainly eggs via the local shops or ginger. These things are just placed in the shop so they are easily to be seen from outside. Today a saw something green at a shop and wondered what it is. And this was my lucky day. A got quite a big plastic bag of a green, fresh lettuce. The price was equivalent to 10 EUR. But it was the first very fresh lettuce since the end of March.
It’s locally produced by someone in the village who knows, that many vegetables, not native to the island, can easily be grown here.

From a Filipina friend I got a while ago a recipe green lettuce and shaddock. This was what I made today to go with my fried pasta with eggs and cheese.

What a delicious meal!

Oh what a lucky day!

As I had a nice walk yesterday, I decided to tackle 2 things today.
1 A thorough cleaning of the kitchen, which includes walls and ceiling.
2 Baking of bread.

Both tasks got their checkmark.

I just enjoyed freshly baked bread with cheese, and half a shaddock. Now I’m sitting in the cockpit and let the day pass again.

There was nice surprise today. A part of youth of the village, likes to play around in the community facility because there is a wall of about 1 m to jump into the water. Also the community boats have their attraction. Grown up at river with boats and ships passing by, I fully can understand their way of having fun. Suddenly, two girls maybe 15 years old, came on old allround surf board and paddle close to MaRe and ask if they can come on board. Sure I said yes. Locals are very friendly to me, so I’m friendly to them. But explained that I’m on the middle of clearing.
They came on board, had quick walk through both hulls to get a feeling what’s in such boat. Then another walk around the boat outside. Their curiosity was satisfied.

A while later I heard their voices from under the boat. They enjoyed being in completely different world; being under a boat. They liked to play there using the under tunnel safety lines. Listening to their laughter and giggling they had a good time down there.

Then they came out from the tunnel and asked if I have a shaddock for them. Sure I have. Got only 16 yesterday. They came on board again got a fruit, cutting board, plate, and a good knife. It seemed that they enjoyed this as well.

Then good bye.

So it was a successful day in terms of work accomplished, and nice one with the visits of these 2 curious teenagers.

It’s getting dark now. Now I’ll charge the batteries a bit more, take a shower, go to bed and read a few pages in my current book “Brief Answers to Big Questions” from Stephen Hawking; an extremely interesting book.

After I cleaned all the fruits and bags with seawater to make sure there are no insects sitting on the fruits or in the bag, I stored most of the shaddocks and the lime in the 2 fruit-vegetable nets. A few shaddocks are just placed under the enclosure. For the bananas fixed a new horizontal line under cockpit roof and there I hang the bananas. When they turn yellow I always can pick the ripest ones.

Then I tackled a technical matter. I observed that the weather forecast downloads took too much time. From Keryn of PredictWind support I got the hint that a cable connector might be lose. I couldn’t believe this because the connectors have and outer ring to screw them on to the socket and they are in closed spaces so nobody can touch them. Although I was convinced that the connectors were firmly fixed, the idea that the problem is there, kept nagging my mind. So I started testing in this direction. I disconnected the antenna from the IridiumGO and saw that the signal strength drops where about the same as with the antenna. This means the external antenna doesn’t have the strong effect I had in mind. Then I opened the antenna outside and the outer ring of the connector was indeed loose. To improve the contact to the maximum I applied with a needle a copper paste at the connecting parts, screwed the connector firmly on to the socket and secured the outer ring with a Tesa Textil Tape so vibrations should not be able to loosen this ring again.

Result, I have an improved satellite signal again.

By 1030 I left MaRe to go to the tiny harbor where I wanted to start my walk and do errands.

First I stopped at Magasin Leille to buy some raisins and cookies. The shop assistants, all family members, are very friendly and helpful. If it only would be possible to walk through the shop and look at the products they sell…

Next I went to the place where I got recently bananas, shaddocks, and breadfruit. Wanted to bring them a small present from Japan, which my OBM left on board for such occasions. The man and the son where not there, but his wife and a mother. So I left my little present with the wife. I will come back next week or so. Or I meet him at the shuttle ferry for the airport. It seems he works there.

Then I kept on walking towards the SW end of the village. First I reached the grave of the last king, who got a little chapel like building for himself, the ordinary people just got a normal grave outside. What I observed was two things. First I recognized the people passed away pretty early. Most of them in their 50s or 60s. Second, I saw only 2 graves with people who died in 2022 and nobody in 2023. This with an island population of about 2000.

From lady of the French catamaran ZaiZai I learned that close to the Meteo weather station there is man called Leon and a lady named Moniqua and they have plenty of bananas, shaddocks, etc and happily give away because they do have so many.

I looked if I can see someone at a house nearby, but there was nobody to ask.

So I continued my walk. I wanted to go to the ruins of the former convent of Rouru. Father Cyprien Antoine Liasu, with building and medical skills, started 1836 with the building. 8 years later the convent’s buildings were completed. The Cluny sisters took over the task of teaching
native women and children how to live as good Christians as well as running a kind of medical station. I wonder why it should be better to live as Christians then their own native life?

On the way back, I saw at one house a lady and asked her for Leon and Moniqua. It turned out she was the sister in law of Leon who is currently on Tahiti. While I talked with her in my broken French, her husband Olivier looked for shaddocks and brought me a bag of shaddocks. On board I counted 16.

Then Olivier took me with his car to an area with plenty of fruit trees and looked for bananas. At the end i received about 50 bananas and 20 lime.

At the end he brought me with his car to MaRe’s tender, docked in the tiny harbor.

What a generous person!!!

It’s a pity that I don’t have any small presents anymore on board.

In the early morning hours the wind increased as forecasted. Mainly from SE direction but varying from S to E. For these direction there is no land protection. Wind blows full speed across the lagoon. Gust of up to 30 KN were displayed. However the outer reef gives a wave protection. Thus, waves arriving at MaRe are still lower than 1/2 meter.

MaRe’s anchor holds; 70 m of chain at 15 m of water is solid. Especially with MaRe’s anchor, which is bigger then theoretically needed. It’s my additional safety margin.

My SuperWind wind converter produced quite some electricity despite that the wind was not constant. This was the nice part of the windy night and day.

It was not only windy today but also cold, winds southerly directions are cold because they come from Antarctica there is really cold.

Because of the wind and lower temperatures, I changed my work to an inside one, and cleaned thoroughly the forward cabin on STB. It’s like at home, all rooms need to cleaned regularly even if they are not. Keeping a boat with 4 cabines clean is quite some work.

After that I removed outside a few rust stains, which grew during the long sail.

That filled my day because it’s getting dark here at 1800. We are in the southern winter, which stretches from June – August. Although I mentioned above “cold”, it’s only cold relative to what I’m used. Yesterday was a very warm day. Also on “cold” days I wear shorts and T-shirts and walk barefoot.