Lat 16 degrees 32 minutes S
Lon 152 degrees 05 minutes W
Our first night of sailing at the beginning of a 10 day crossing from Bora Bora to Niue Ö nothing really when one thinks about our very first crossing of 6 weeks (35 days) from Victoria, B.C. to Hiva Oa, Marquesas Islands!! We now have Minetta and Nick with us who are eager to share the nightly watches (ahhh such youthful enthusiasmÖ one wonders how long this will last!!?!!).
Oh by the way, we found the ulitimate in laundry facilities in Bora BoraÖ a wonderful little place that had wifi, free coffee and tea served while the owner (a charming French man) took our laundry and did it for us for no more than it cost us to struggle through the one poor washing machine which we last experienced! (I donít think Bill will ever get over that one!). Anyway ñ Bora Bora wins hands down in the laundry facilities categoryÖ YAY!!
We had a lovely afternoon sail although no wind to speak of but it allowed Min to jump in the water and duplicate what I did on our crossing through the Tuamotos. It also allowed me to make quite a nice meal of rice, couscous (with almonds, raisins, prunes, onions, cumin, cinnamon etc. etc.), shrimp and snow peas with onions and garlic to add a little flavourÖ finished off with a nice rose wine et voilaÖ a lovely dinner at sea ñ actually quite relaxing!
Nick and I took first watch (8pm to 12 midnight) and had a special delight of being able to watch the moon rise (What a Wonderful Night for a Moondance ñ thanks Van Morrison) ñ OK no dancing but we sure watched it in awe!! The moon is a lovely companion on these long night watches, although she outshines any stars around her, save for the very brightest, which makes star gazing rather fruitless.
This type of weather ñ no wind to speak of or what wind there is seems to swing around the compassÖ is statistically less than 1% of the time in this area ñ most of the time it is a brisk SE Trade Wind of between 15-20 knots of wind (light airs from the NE)Ö we are hoping that the wind will fill in by morning to about 10-15 knots and we will begin scooting across to Niue. Right now Nick is at the helm and we are doing 0.15 knots in a 0.5 apparent wind (hmmmmÖ if my math holds true that means we really have only approximately 0.3 knots of wind) ñ itís amazing that we are sailing at all!!
I guess we should enjoy the peace while we have it!
Fair Winds
Cath and Bill and the crew of SV Terrwyn
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