When I just saw the date of my last narration I was shocked how long ago it was.

I simply was just too busy to write during the day and in the evening I fell into bed like a dead piece of meat.

Although installing Linux Mint is very easy and in the basic installation there is all in, a normal PC user needs, I need a bunch of special applications and I have also some customizations to be done. Linux Mint Cinnamon offers the possibility to highly customize it. This takes time for setting it up but enables me too work later faster and easier.

Fortunately I started years ago a document with all applications I want and the settings I am using. This helps me a lot.

However, why did I need a new PC? The hardware of Lenovo is not as good as the hardware was when the PC were designed and produced by IBM. It’s a pity that IBM sold this business.

To have a more stable internet from WLAN hotspot, I went to the hotel up the hill at the eastern side. Just in time OBM learned that they will pick us at the fuel station close to the dinghy dock and bring us back. Otherwise it’s a walk of close to an hour up the hill. Thus, the three of us went there last Saturday. OBM and Ruslana had a relaxed day and I could work on my PC installation. On Sunday only OBM and I went there; Ruslana wanted to stay on board. Then the PC was almost ready. Still, during the following days I worked on board on fine tuning. Every day a little bit.

Beside this, I had the challenge of getting a new oil pan for my STB engine. I contacted bootsmotoren.de. A good company I used already to get some parts to Panama, which were not available there in a reasonable time.

However, I was lucky to find the needed part in Tahiti. From the mail that they have the part, until now it took almost 2 weeks. Especially the delivery took time. For someone like me, who is used to next day deliveries in Japan and shipment in 2 days when the island of Okinawa, almost 3000 km away from Tokyo, are involved. I begged the staff in Tahiti to please dispatch the part last Friday, it only was dispatched on Monday 1500. So the part arrived only on Thursday at Marquesas Maintenance Service and they didn’t built it in on Friday…

So we can lift the hook only on Tuesday.

Provisioning is done. We only want to get more fruits in Vaitahu where I want to give the hull a good brush because here in the bay I get some growth on it. Starting with a clean hull will make only our about 800 NM non-stop sail shorter by a day.

The route is entered in and is activated in the chart plotter.

Refueling will be completed today. Then all we need is to get the oil pan being fixed and the engine mounted back. Currently the engine hangs in the air of the engine room being opened to the aft cabin, which needed to be emptied completely for that.

I almost forgot to mention the “Big Blue”, my new gennaker, which arrived from NZ. As I pull the gennaker always directly out of its bag inside the PRT bow storage room, I prepared it for this. We also made a training session on how to pull up the gennaker inside its sock and get it down and back in its bag. However, we did not let the gennaker out of his sock. 123 m2 of sail is something I don’t want to catch window while being at anchor. BTW, the new dousing sock, looks pretty good. It should have less friction. The sock control line looks pretty good. Very light but rather thick, which allows to apply the needed force easier. I also got an idea on how to attach a snatch block between the front and middle cleat to run the control line through the block and use the winch on top of the windlass to pull the sock down if it gets to heavy to pull the sock down only with my hands. I’ll see final details when we hoist the Big Blue for the first time.

The watermaker got my attention yesterday.

I changed the oil of the high pressure pump (about 70 bar!) after 300 running hours during which it made me about 35 000 l of water.
This shows pretty good how much we depend on freshwater and that we should be careful and not to waste freshwater.

I also had to change the 5 micron pre-filter. In bays, like the Tahauku Bay of Hiva-Oa, where there are a lot of sediments floating in the water, the 20 micron and 5 micron filters needs to be replaced more often.

Then I started with the preparations of installing Linux Mint 21.3 Cinnamon Edition on my new PC. It is unbelievable how complicated Windows is and how much per-installed trash pops up when opening a new Windows PC for the first time. I’m glad when I’m back on Linux Mint again. PC life on Linux is so much easier.

The evening we spent a few hours with the people whose boat Luc and I rescued the other day. 90 % of the conversations were in French. A BIG challenge for me even now, where I can speak 11 words of French. For OBM it was a bit difficult because she doesn’t speak French, only Japanese, German, and English. Ruslana living in Nice and having attended a French language course it was the easiest. As they are from Flanders in Belgium, Luc and his wife, speak fluent French.
Beside the language challenges, it was a nice evening.

Yesterday I went quickly for a last food shopping ashore. When I came back I saw my OBM and Ruslana standing at the STB corner of the cockpit and was wondering why.

When I could hear her, I got the message that the neighbor boat, an about 12 m catamaran was drifting because the anchor did not hold.

There was already another neighbor with his dinghy at work.

But let me write the story and it’s development from the start, which happened a bit before I joined.

The other side neighbors recognized that the boat was drifting towards the shore. Luc was even up in the mast to repair something up there. Immediately he got down and took his dinghy and started to pull the drifting cat towards deeper water. Partially successful because the rudders of the catamaran did not touch the stones anymore.

That was then the moment I came in. First we tried to push the catamaran with 2 dinghies, each at a stern towards deeper waters. However, then the anchor was holding and thus hampered our actions. We needed to get the anchor up.

As the water is very shallow Luc could pull it up. But then it was needed to move it to deeper waters. I hold the anchor with one hand and hold on Luc’s dinghy with the other while Luc drove his dinghy. But I could not hold the anchor long enough.

Then Luc proposed to go on board of the catamaran to lift the anchor. Going on another boat without permission it’s skipper is the last thing one does. However, we had no other choice.

Luc could start the engines immediately and I went to the bow for working at the anchor. Quickly the anchor was up and Luc drove the boat towards deeper waters where we dropped the anchor again. However, the anchor did not hold. Thus up again. But where to go in a bay, which is very crowded. As one boat was leaving, we waited for a a few moments to use this opening space.

At the end we could drop the anchor and I estimated that I got a bit more than 20 m of chain out. Luc tested the hold of the anchor by pulling backwards and we both gut the feeling the anchor had a good hold.

We went back to our own boats but I invite Luc and his wife for a beer at MaRe at around 1700 hours.

When it was just getting dark, the crew of the rescued cat returned. Luc and I went over to the boat to explain what happened. The faces of the crew were filled with surprise.

Inge disembarked scheduled to fly back home to Switzerland. In some tasks she left her traces on board and I’ll follow ideas she had. We had a good time for the 3 months she stayed on board and we made my final cruise through the Marquesian Islands together. Thanks Inge.

OBM arrived on Wednesday and took over her tasks on board. Ruslana, my crew member to NZ arrived yesterday. Ruslana’s arrival was a bit of a nail-biter as the location of her luggage was unclear and she was issued a faulty boarding pass to Hiva-Oa. However, she and her luggage finally arrived at Hiva-Oa.

Both of them suffer still from a jet lag of 18 and 11 h. I’m glad that sailing doesn’t cause jet lag.

As I saw a small oil leakage at the bottom of the STB engine, I want to make sure that it is closed before we take off for Tahiti.I could convince Vincent the director of Marquesas Maintenance Service to send a technician on Thursday. Unfortunately there are 4 days off now due to the Eastern festivities. Thus, this work will continue only on Tuesday morning.

Yesterday, OBM did some food shopping just for the next days. Unfortunately she couldn’t get eggs. It seems the Easter Egg tradition, which is supposed to be known also here, caused the shortage of eggs

I’ll try again in 2 other shops to see if I can get eggs.

Happy Eastern to all of you!

On Friday I got my new tender. About noon it was unloaded from the Aranui 5 supply ship and brought to Marquesas Maintenance Service (MMS).

There I could unpack and inflate it.

Tino from MMS helped me to pull my old tender on its wheels attached to the transom to the ground of MMS; outboard motor attached.

At MMS I removed the wheel holders and bolted them onto the new tender. For this Tino lent me his private electrical drill because I forgot mine on board and had no way anymore to go back to get it. Thanks Tino for that!

Once I had the wheels attached to the new tender, a fellow sailor helped me to get it into the water.

As soon as tender was in the water, I got a lot of water from above me. Thus, when I arrived at MaRe, I was wet like having swum over to her. It really rained cats and dogs. Fortunately the rain is warm.

Next day, Saturday, I prepared new lines for hoisting it up. Until all was adjusted it took time. But I got it done. Now the tender hangs nicely high up on the davits; higher than the old one.

On Sunday I took the tender back at land again to add pieces of a 3 mm rubber between the wheel holders and the transom. This prevents chafing of the wheel holders and the metal transom.

From the white plastic sheet in which the tender was wrapped in, I made sun protection for the oars. Alex, from Reva Cat, who does some sewing work, turned the wrapping covers into nice bags fitting perfectly. Thanks Alex and see you again on Tauhata? An atoll in the Tuamotus? Or Pape ‘ete?

Now all is ready. The canvas cover will be attached in Pape’ete.

The tender runs nicely through the water and reaches the gliding phase much easier then the old one.

The new tender is a Highfield CA 310. It has a hull made of aluminum with a double floor and a closed compartment at the bow. The closed compartment can hold an external fuel tank. However, mine is too big. Maybe I find a sailor who wants a bigger one and we exchange our tanks. Let’s see.

All in all I’m very happy with my new tender.

Again also thanks to my brother, who helped me with payments because I could not access my back account in Germany.

Normally, I just lay down on my bed without a summer blanket covering my body.

However, recently I woke 2 – 3 times because I felt cold and I had to grab my summer blanket to sleep.

Cold nights in paradise, just 9 deg south of the equator, where we have southern autumn now.

… of my last cruise in the Marquesas.

It was an interesting one and I don’t want to miss any of the bays I anchored in. A bit more is written in the previous narration of this morning and more in all the other narrations of this cruise.

Now I start preparations for the next part of the looong sail from Europe to Japan and back.

Soon my OBM is coming back on board and also Ruslana, my new crew member until NZ, embarks.
With both of them we sail through the Tuamotus atolls to Tahiti. There my OBM unfortunately needs to fly home to Tokyo again. But she will come later again.

The hook is in the ground of Tahauku Bay – again. The bay is extremely crowded today. So I’m considering to change place when a better one becomes available. The anchor is down at 3 – 4 m, MaRe has 20 m of chain and there are still 3 m of water around MaRe at mid tide. Thus, all should be fine.

… of my last and longest cruise through the Marquesas will bring us back to Tahauku Bay, Atuona, Hiva-Oa. It was an interesting time in all the bays of the Marquesas I dropped the anchor. Also the landscapes were very interesting, it was the meeting with people which made is really good. Fortunately my French improved step by step and I’m understanding more. I estimate, I command now 11 words of French.

I wonder now how I’ll think this time here in about a year and more from now.

Back to the departure. We got up shortly after 0400, prepared the boat, and took off.

Wind forecast from yesterday evening was lousy because of later disturbance SW of the Marquesas resulting in a strong weakening of the SE trade winds.
Engines until the end looks very likely. Mr. Wind-ow does a poor job today we only have 2 – 4 KN TWS.

At about 0730 we passed the Cap Tehopeotekeho, the southern cape of Tauhata islands.
Seeing this cape in the early morning light was worth to go around it.

An interesting thing we observed is that there is no vegetation around the cape. Looking at the eastern side of the southern area of Tahuata gives me the impression that different volcanic material doesn’t allow vegetation to grow.

Currently we are running a COG of 048 deg. With cleaned hulls MaRe runs more than 6 KN STW. It’s worth the work I did. Will do it again before starting the longer passage through the Tuamotus to Tahiti.

… , old lava, under the water.

Already yesterday I decided to free dive at the little cape separating the Hanatefau Bay from the Hapatoni Bay. The part of the ancient lava streams above the all light reflecting sea surface, looks graffy and indicates the same under the sea surface.

I swam over to this corner from MaRe. It’s about 100 – 150 m. Until I was already pretty close, may be 20 m to the shore line, the bottom, about 15 m down, was mainly sandy. A few coral and rock dots where to be seen. When I had a closer look, some of the corals appeared to be dead.

Then the steep underwater wall came up from the bottom
Almost vertical. Shoals fish became visible. Some at less then 5 m of water, others further down. There were also the lonesome “riders”. Fish not swimming in shoals but feeding alone on the rocks and corals. Very small ones and also bigger ones. Very colorful ones, and less colorful ones. Kind of normal shaped ones and others with a very long back fin which looks more like a tail than a dorsal fin.
A few appeared to be fighting with each other while others behaved like male and female flirting with each other. They didn’t care much about me while I was drifting at the surface. When I went down, some quickly rushed away as if I’m a predatory fish. Some otherd kept on doing what they did when I started my descent.

What I liked a lot was going down and then looking up the steep ancient lava stream covered with lots of corals.

There were the moments when sunlight ignited their colors. Colors from dark green and brown up to the bright yellow of some corals. It was a bizzare scenario. Thoughts of being on another planet crossed my mind.
The contrast between the colors of the corals combined with the light blue and silver shining water surface above me and the graffy remnants of ancient volcanic lava streams into the sea, was very strong. Very impressive. Now, hours after getting out of the water, I’m still seeing these pictures. Burned in!

I missed to be able to share this experience with my ” special little dragon” who really is good in free diving…

Today I wanted to see the little village Hapatoni, at the southern corner of the Hapatoni Bay.

At 1300 we dinghied over to the tiny harbor, which had surprisingly calm waters. A stern anchor was not really needed, but I through it out to get the dinghy away from the concrete wall.

While we tied up the dinghy, 2 man swam in the beautiful clean water of the tiny harbor. They are in their 60s at least. It was very obvious they cooled down and had a chat in the water.

We followed the main road along the beach. It’s not a concrete or gravel road, the upper layer, and I assume the base as well, is made from big “pebbles” with dirt in between. It works for the needs of the people here.

I got a chance talking to a lady of not identifiable age about the village. Including children, there are 100 people living on Hapatoni. A pretty small community. For shopping they need to drive to Vaitahu or need to take the ferry boat and stay a night in Atuona. As far as I could get a glimpse into the Polynesian customs, there is always a relative living somewhere who takes another relative for a night or so. Relatives seems to have a broader meaning than in the rich country culture.

We kept walking. Along the shore they have many very big and old trees growing. They provide shade along the street and shore because they are very high and very big branches and sometimes even the stems go out towards the water very far. These trees look like a great playground for children. On some of them they just can walk up and sit somewhere on branch and are undisturbed from adults.

I also saw a young couple sitting at comfortable place, just between the stony road and the beach. Knowing how many people are living here, I got the thought that they are currently the only “fallen in love” couple of the village. With a friendly “kaoha”, an additional “bon jour and friendly waving with the hands, we walked by.

There was also a covered bench with a table and great view over the bay up to the horizon. Sitting there was very pleasant. The shade from the roof, the wind , and the view. A really nice place to sit and watch the swell rolling in until it breaks in the surf of the shallow beach.

I’m not a believer, but I like to have a look into churches in small villages. Here they have nicely built walls made from big, 10 – 30 cm diameter, “pebbles”. These pebbles give the wall a very special surface finish and appearance. I enjoy the quite atmosphere in such a building. Back in Japan, I went often into countryside temples to enjoy the same quite and “unplugged” atmosphere.

Inge discovered the workshop of sculptor. He was not there, but all was open so we could see he makes wooden tikis. At one wall several were standing in row. Nice work to me, but I’m not an expert on Polynesian tikis.

We walked along the stony road until its end. There, the mountain dropped too steep into the water to continue building the road without a lot of dynamite and heavy machines.

However, there, we had a great view at MaRe who gently swayed at her anchor.

After about 2 – 3 h we returned back to MaRe who was waiting for me…