Get Lost On Purpose

Author: Drew

  • Cruising and the Internet

    As I sat here today checking the progress of the Puddle Jumpers on their way across the pond this year, I realized how nuts it is to high speed internet access here on the boat.  When I graduated high school, wifi was barely a blip on the radar.  Now, twelve years later, I’m sitting at anchor in one of the most beautiful places in the world sending text messages to Margie in Georgia and updating my Twitter page.  Many cruisers will argue I’m not really experiencing “the life” if I’m plugged into what’s going on at home but welcome to the future people.  As we get closer to a “viable” satellite broadband solution for smaller yachts I think cruising will shift to a younger, still career-minded crowd.  I put viable in quotes because they do have systems on the market but the data transfer amounts are still small for how much money they want.  How many jobs these days require nothing more than a desk, a computer, and the internet.  Hell, I was up at 3:30 this morning to monitor the opening of the stock market.  With the right technology, those jobs can be done from any where in the world, even the middle of the ocean.  No reason we shouldn’t have graphic designers, active traders, and other web based business people out here then.  That’s why I check blogs like Panbo’s Marine Electronics continuously waiting for the next big announcement.  It shan’t be long till I check the site one day to hear Ben Ellison raving about a $100/month all-you-can-eat satellite broadband provider.  I’d be happy to shell out several thousand on equipment if someone could come up with that.

    Speaking of communications.  I looked over today and realized I haven’t once turned on my SSB radio since I’ve been in the Pacific Ocean.  I spent all that money and time installing it and I only used it a few months in the Caribbean to pick up Chris Parker’s weather net.  I only use the Iridium for email these days.  It’s so easy.  And maybe I’m a little anti-social when it comes to radio nets.  So what.  Doesn’t make me a bad cruiser.  So I made a note and tomorrow I shall be up at 5am to monitor the nets and see how the Puddle Jumpers are doing.  Let’s see if I can get some use out of the thing this year.

    ssb

  • Sailed to Moorea

    It seems I am safe over here in Moorea from the worsening Dengue Fever outbreak in French Polynesia.  It’s not like I can be concerned with it anyways since apparently I’m only one of 2.5 billion people living in “at risk” areas.  It’s epidemic in over 100 countries.  I pulled out my old WHO International Certificate of Verification to see what I’d actually been vaccinated against a few years ago when I had the shots.  Hmmm…let’s see Tetanus, Diphtheria, Polio, Typhoid, and Hepatitis B.   Well, I’ve managed not to stab myself with any metal objects while traveling so that’s good.  No need for the Tetanus.  I’ve hopefully avoided food and water laced with Typhoid infected feces (although I certainly ate some questionable things at Carnival in Salvador, Brazil) so no such need for the Typhoid shot.  As for Hepatitis B,  I’ve managed to steer clear of whores on my journey, short of one who wasn’t even foreign, so I think I could have done without that one as well.   It seems Dengue is the only disease I’ve come close to out here and there isn’t even a vaccine for it!   Next time, I’ll skip the shots.  After all, you could compare them to insurance and I’m out here without a lick of that (health, boat, or otherwise), so why be concerned with it?

    In my opinion, Moorea is the most beautiful of all the Society Islands and so far, this anchorage at the mouth of Opunohu Bay is the best.  I’m anchored in 12′ of water so clear it looks like you can reach out and touch the bottom from the bow.  The reef is to my left and a small public beach is to my right.

    Opunohu Bay Anchorage moorea-anchor-chain

    I spent the first night in Cook’s Bay.  It’s gorgeous in there and I would have loved to spend a couple more nights but alas, the real world calls and I needed the internet to get some work done.

    cooks-bay-dosia

    I planned to come to Moorea first thing on Saturday morning but at 6:30am a massive Va’a race flew past the mooring field at Maeva Beach in Tahiti.  Va’a, outrigger canoe racing, is every bit as important to the people of Polynesia as Georgia football is to Athens, Ga.  I’d estimate that between 6:30 and 8 o’clock, fifty race boats and 300+ support and cheering boats passed by on their way out the pass to Moorea.  The “follower” boats were loaded down with spectators flying the flag of the team they support and cheering them on.  I assume they start racing that early in hopes of finishing before the tradewinds kick in sometime between 10am and noon.  I left the mooring around nine to cross the Sea of Moons to Moorea, about a ten-mile trip, and by eleven all the boats were passing me on the way back to Tahiti.  Those guys are nuts.

  • Greatest logo in the world

    HinanoHinano, the beer of Tahiti must have the greatest logo design in the world.  I love it on signs, tshirts, and even right here on this can I’m drinking.    Google supposedly has the most popular logo in the world but does it inspire tropical fantasies in your head?  No.  From the Hinano logo, you are inundated with South Pacific images.  The polynesian girl with the Ei of flowers on her head, the wind-swept palms on the motu in the background, and the calm waters of a lagoon; all this on your can or bottle.  Hinano Logo hinano4 They have an entire clothing line with their own models and they sponsor sports teams, surfing competitions, and outrigger canoe races.  They seem to have a hand in 80% of advertising that goes on in these islands.  I thought the brand is unheard of where I’m from but according to their clothing line website, it’s sold at a bunch of stores on the North Carolina coast!  I’ll still load up on t-shirts while I’m here though.

    By the way, the ring of flowers on her head is, I believe, called an Ei here in Tahiti and it looks like it is made of Tiare flowers, the national flower of French Polynesia (a form of Gardenia).  For anyone coming to Tahiti, when you get off the plane someone will most likely offer you one of these flowers.  It you are taken, that is to say, if you are in love, you put the flower behind your left ear.  If you are single, your right ear.  It’s hilarious how many women I see running around here with their husbands in tow and a Tiare behind their right ear.  The locals probably ignore it by now but I figured I’d point it out anyways.

  • Back to Tahiti

    The sail over to Tahiti from Bora Bora took twice as long as I thought but I guess you can say that’s typical of sailing.  I forgot about that westerly current that  pushed me backwards a knot in the direction from whence I came.  I was finally able to grab a wind shift and sail at an angle that made much more sense for my intended destination.  It’s been such a long time since I sailed upwind I forgot about the excitement that goes into it.   The rail spent most of the morning in the water yesterday.  To you non-sailors, the boat was heeled over so far the deck was awash.  That means I was going fast, not thinking of safety, and seeing if I could break anything.  After miles of easy downwind sailing, it was fun to push Dosia to her limits again and remember why I put so much hard work into making her seaworthy.  So there it is, my first overnight solo passage and I gotta say, I don’t like it.  I don’t understand solo sailors and how they do it or why they even want to.  I guess many don’t have a choice cause if they did, I assume they’d sail with a beautiful woman like I do (no offense Aaron…you were a good mate last year man).  In the end though, I guess it’s not who you are voyaging with as much as the fact you are actually out there doing it, living life the way you demand it be lived.

    And that brings me to my not-so-official quote of the week.  I was reminded of this quote reading a fellow Pearson 365 owner’s blog.  I used to have a copy of Sterling Hayden’s book, The Wanderer.  I have no idea what happened to it but I remember reading it 10 years or more ago and falling in love with the concept.  A hollywood actor in the 50’s, distraught with the industry, accused of being a communist, and pissed about his recent divorce, takes the kids and runs off on his sailboat to Tahiti. You may recognize him at the cop Michael Corleone kills in The Godfather but probably not as it was years after this photo was taken.  A famous quote from his book describes exactly what I’m doing out here and why I’m doing it at this point in my life.  Sterling Hayden died from prostate cancer at age 70.

    Sterling Hayden“To be truly challenging, a voyage, like a life, must rest on a firm foundation of financial unrest. Otherwise, you are doomed to a routine traverse, the kind known to yachtsmen who play with their boats at sea… cruising, it is called. Voyaging belongs to seamen, and to the wanderers of the world who cannot, or will not, fit in. If you are contemplating a voyage and you have the means, abandon the venture until your fortunes change. Only then will you know what the sea is all about. “I’ve always wanted to sail to the south seas, but I can’t afford it.” What these men can’t afford is not to go. They are enmeshed in the cancerous discipline of security. And in the worship of security we fling our lives beneath the wheels of routine – and before we know it our lives are gone. What does a man need – really need? A few pounds of food each day, heat and shelter, six feet to lie down in – and some form of working activity that will yield a sense of accomplishment. That’s all – in the material sense, and we know it. But we are brainwashed by our economic system until we end up in a tomb beneath a pyramid of time payments, mortgages, preposterous gadgetry, playthings that divert our attention for the sheer idiocy of the charade. The years thunder by, the dreams of youth grow dim where they lie caked in dust on the shelves of patience. Before we know it, the tomb is sealed. Where, then, lies the answer? In choice. Which shall it be: bankruptcy of purse or bankruptcy of life?”