On Sunday 22nd April, after saying our goodbyes to friends we may never see again we upped anchor around midday and left Isabella Island in the Galapagos to start the 3,000 nautical mile sail to the Marquesas. We’d been listening to weather forecasts on our Single Sideband radio out of New Zealand and felt this was as good a time as ever to head on out. With such a long distance to go there’s no way of predicting what the weather will be like in a week let alone three so we just have to cross our fingers and hope for the best. We only carry enough fuel to motor slowly for about one week so if the wind dies off we have to sit and wait for as long as it takes to come back and if we get heavy winds for long periods of time it may get very uncomfortable as the seas will build quickly in such a large ocean.
Two other boats, Purrfection and Scholarship also left around the same time as us so we plan to keep close radio contact with them twice a day. We also joined the Pacific Cross radio net which included nearly all of the boats making the crossing, every morning we would join the role call of over thirty boats to give our position, speed, course and weather to everyone listening. This gave us some piece of mind and a feeling of being less alone; especially knowing that if anything happened to us then someone could send help. Leaving the first day on Thursday 17th May we had very little wind and had to motor away from the island, we’d heard from boats up ahead that they weren’t able to sail until the third day and so we slowly left the comforting sight of land behind reluctantly using our precious fuel supply. That night we caught two Dorado fish on our lines and felt a little more confident that we’ll at least get a varied diet! We heard on the radio that night that between the latitudes of 3-8 degrees south the weather is rough and unpredictable and as we’re currently at 1 degree south and our landfall in the Marquesas is at 10 degrees then we would be sailing directly through it!
Our weather forecaster advised us to head directly south to 9 degrees and then turn west and sail beneath it which would just give us a couple of rough days as we pass through. This sounded like a great idea and so we changed our course and headed almost due south. The prediction was right and the next couple of days were very uncomfortable, here are some extracts from our daily log kept on board to give you an idea of what it was like:
Wed 25th April- Position: S 03*11 W 93*50 – Day 4
Very choppy confused seas hitting us from the side, not nice at all but we are able to sail with winds coming out of the South East. Caroline is seasick and the wind vane is refusing to cooperate so we are hand steering, we hope we can push south of this but looks like it may take a couple of days. We’ve spoken to Scholarship and Purrfection and they’re experiencing the same conditions although with much bigger boats their not getting quite as wet as we are!
Friday 27th April- Position: S 07*18’73 W 99*11’28 – Day 6
At 16:20 we’re on a course of 240 degrees sailing with a nice steady breeze of 10 knots from the East and it seems that the bad weather is over with. We’ve started to head more west which means we’re now on a more direct course towards land. All is good on board and our spirits are a little higher. The saltwater tap has stopped working which means the dishes are starting to pile up! We have 2487 miles to go and there’s nothing on the horizon as far as the eye can see. We’re still hand steering for three hours at a time as the wind vane is refusing to work. Today it was warm enough for us to bath with buckets of refreshing sea water over our heads on deck and dry off in the warm breeze. Our fresh water has to be saved for drinking and cooking and a very quick rinse now and again!!
Monday 30th April- Position: S 08*29’5 W 105*01’36 – Day 9
At 08:45 the seas are coming from both south and east pushing us around a lot making it very rolly and even more impossible for the wind vane to work. We’ve tried every sail configuration that Bluemoon has to offer and it doesn’t seem to like any of them. Jimmy has more luck than me and so he gets short periods without having to touch the helm but I find it too frustrating and would rather just hand steer. I’d do anything for a big Auto helm right now as just needing to go to the bathroom means we have to wake the each other up as we can’t leave the helm for a minute!
We’ve just passed over the 2000 miles to go mark, Hurray! Which means that were over a third of the way there on our eighth day out. This morning Jimmy caught two big Dorado’s at the same time on the fishing lines which should last us a few days. We’re having a fishing contest with Scholarship anPurrfection andnd I think we’re now in the lead. Our meals have become the big excitement of the day and take a lot of planning and discussion to prepare.
Friday 4th May- Position S 09*19’02 W 111*45’21 – Day 13
We’re now heading dead down wind with the sails Goose Winged, the head sail poled out on one side and our main on the other. We’re rolling around a lot as the seas are pretty big around 6 ft from our stern but we’re moving at around 6 knots so making good time. Of course we’re still hand steering and getting really sick of it although it does make the time pass quicker as we are always busy. We passed over the half way mark today without a soul in sight. We are the furthest away from land you can probably get anywhere in the world with over a thousand miles of open ocean in every direction…..very strange feeling but also extremely peaceful.
This morning we heard on the Pacific Cross net that a Norwegian boat behind us and about a week out of Galapagos had to abandon their boat and be rescued by a Container Ship. They received some serious damage to their yacht during a storm and we’re taking on water faster than they could pump it out. It’s very scary to think that it could have been any of us and has made us realize how fragile we are out here.
Sunday 13th May- Position S 10*18’50 W 132*56’89 – Day 22
We’re on a course of 270 degrees with the wind from the east at fewer than 10 knots. We have the Head sail poled out and the Mizzen sail up but moving very slowly. This isn’t too bad however as it means the seas have calmed right down and we’re able to watch movies in the cockpit at night while we’re on watch. Today we were passed by another sail boat which this morning we could barely see coming up behind us and by sunset they were just a spec on the horizon in front of us! We took pictures of each other as they passed and shouted messages of good luck. They have a water shortage problem as salt water entered one of their drinking water tanks contaminating it and with five people on board they were rationing to the bare minimum. They are pushing the boat to its limits to get to land as soon as possible to replenish their stores and at the speed they’re moving they shouldn’t have a problem. It did make us feel very slow however as they left us for dust and by night fall we couldn’t see them at all. To lift our spirits we were given one of the most spectacular sunsets I’ve ever seen and we sat in silence watching one of nature’s greatest shows.
Thursday 17th May - Making landfall at Fatu hiva, Marquesas – Day 25
After slowing down last night to make landfall in the light we have our first glimpse of land at daybreak after twenty five days at sea! The island of Fatu Hiva is the most beautiful sight towering thousands of feet into the air it looks like something out of a King Kong movie with huge pinnacle rocks jutting into the clouds covered in lush green vegetation. We can barely contain our excitement as we motor around the island and head towards our first anchorage in French Polynesia. As we got closer we could make out the anchorage and so many of our friends already there, a very welcoming sight! We were joined by two other yachts also arriving at the same time and finally dropped our anchor in 90 ft of water in the most spectacular anchorage we’d ever seen.
After 25 days of hand steering we were completely exhausted but driven by so much adrenalin from our arrival we dived over board for a fantastic swim in the cool clear water and to scrub away the thick layer of scum that had developed on the hull of Bluemoon over such a long passage! This evening everyone came over to celebrate the end of the longest passage we will ever have to undertake and Norwegian Independence day. We swapped stories of our trip and discussed broken parts and even a few broken limbs received underway…… We made it!!!
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