Namani at Sea

One of Nicky's projects on the passage to the Marquesas was to write a report on what the had learned about the Galapagos. The result can be found under this link

We put some pictures of our Galapagos-Marquesas passage on Picasa. The new album can be found under this link. Enjoy!

We're back in Hiva Oa now, after a beautiful four days on Fatu Hiva. On Monday (07MAY) we hiked to Omoa, the second village on Fatu Hiva, a bit south of Hanavave on the island's western shore. Over ~17km and five hours the hike took us up (and later down) approx. 900m. After four weeks on passage without much "weight bearing exercise" our legs expressed some surprise at the sudden surge in activity (see picture above...). Nevertheless, it was a beautiful walk across the island, with stunning views and fascinating changes in vegetation.

After having spent four days on Hiva Oa we came down to Fatu Hiva on Friday (04MAY). We left at daybreak and motorsailed most of the 44nm through the rain. It did clear up a bit during the last two hours and with the wind shifting as we got close to Fatu Hiva we got some nice sailing on a close reach at last.

Cliffs at the eastern end of Hiva Oa became visible ahead of us at dawn today (1450Z, 0550 ship's time), only seconds after our last star fix put us within 3 nm of our GPS position. Motane, a little island south of Hiva Oa is visible to port. Will still take us about 3 hrs to actually reach the eastern end of Hiva Oa and another 4 hrs to reach Atuona and the anchorage from there. Were able to sail again and shut the engine off at 0500 ship's time but will probably lose the ENE wind once we get into the lee of Hiva Oa. Stay tuned...

About 40nm away from the eastern end of Hiva Oa / 60nm from the anchorage now (Sunday, 29APR, 2330 local time). Feels almost strange to think that we should see land at sunrise where the moon is about to set on the horizon...

Forgot to mention in yesterday's post: We finally switched Namani's "ship's time" back another hour yesterday afternoon. We're now 9 hours "behind" utc. We checked the Nautical Almanac and it seems the only place we currently share this time zone with are Alaska's Aleutian Islands west of 169°30'W during the current daylight savings time there (the Aleutians east of 169°30'W are apparently in a different time zone, currently only 8 hours behind utc). So: Greetings from us to the Western Aleutians!

As expected two days ago, the wind has stayed rather light and our progress is a little slower than before. We now hope to make landfall in Hiva Oa on Monday (30APR). Despite the lighter wind the past few days have been very enjoyable with relalxed sailing under Parasailor during the day and twin headsails during the night. Seas are down to a meter or less now - taking morning and evening sights/fixes is a breeze now compared to doing it while rolling in 2-3m seas a week or two ago...

.. on Namani today. After two weeks of wind from the SE...ESE with true wind speeds solidly in the 12...15+kn range and good progress at an average boat speed of 5.5kn, someone flipped a switch today and we're now moving at around 3.5...4kn in 8...10kn of true wind. Fortunately, seas have gone down as well, so it's not uncomfortable. Also, even at this slow speed, the bioluminescense in our current patch of ocean is so strong that you can almost read the paper in the glow of Namani's wake - quite a sight.

.. which means we have been at sea for exactly three weeks now. Conditions continue to be good and we're making good progress (by our modest standards). The days pass surprisingly quickly between watches, Nicky's "boat school", navigation and radio scheds, some maintenance - and of course our attempts to hook another fish.

One of Nicky's assignments these past days was to write up our encounter with E Capoe (see post from a few days ago) as a news report. Here it is - hot off the press ;-)