September 20, 2024
Yesterday’s rough sea conditions (after getting into the open sea) jolted us into the reality of the passage. Overnight the very bright, nearly full moon was wonderful giving us lots of light. Things improved as the night progressed, however there were still some loud, violent banging on the hulls from waves. Around 2:30am the wind had dropped to less than…
September 19, 2024
The day had arrived! The wind seemed a bit calmer overnight, which was nice since we knew the first hour would be bashing into the wind/waves. After coffee, we fired up the engine and were on our way. It took half an hour to get out of the bay. Once looping over the top it was a bit rough but…
September 18, 2024
Change of plans again, the forecast had stabilized and while we would have low winds for a good chunk of the passage to Australia it was good enough to head out. So today we would check out and provision for the passage. After a longer wait than typical, we flagged down a car. A nice couple drove us about half…
September 17, 2024
The morning forecast gave us disappointing news, there was no longer a reliable forecast that looked good for us to depart. Major bummer after all of the hard work yesterday. It was a cloudy day, so we had to be on limited power use, a great reason to spend the morning reading. After lunch everyone was ready to get some…
September 16, 2024
We have been watching the weather forecast and it was looking like we would leave in two or three days so that made today a big prep day to get the boat ready for a blue water passage. We didn’t kill ourselves but we did spend most of the day working. I also finished up the bottom cleaning, and was…
September 15, 2024
Provisions running a bit low I decided to head to Luganville to pick up a few things to hold us over until full provisioning the day before departure. I got very lucky and five minutes after hitting the road had a ride in the back of a pickup. It was a nice ride, waving to everyone as we bumbled along.…
September 14, 2024
The forecast was spot on with not much wind and mellow seas. After preparing for an all day bash, since we would be going into the prevailing wind/waves, it was a wonderful bit of luck. We were able to make water and relax for the 40-mile motor south, back to Palikulo bay. No real excitement to share. Around 2pm we…
September 13, 2024
More rain overnight and into the morning slowed things down but around 10am there was a break in the rain which I used to sneak off to the island. With no real plan I took my time, stopping in multiple spots to just stare out into the ocean and watch the plentiful hermit crabs scurry around. I poked around the…
September 12, 2024
There was heavy rain off and on throughout the night and we woke to a very humid, damp space. I got to cleaning the windows and solar panels. Carl dried off the inside of the windows and we settled in to wait for hopefully clearing skies. By ten it was looking pretty good, so I grabbed a paddle board and…
September 11, 2024
We had two other monohulls in the anchorage with us. We wanted to say hi but first, off to explore the sandspit on the island we anchored behind. It was a pretty spot that gave us a good view of the ocean on the other side – all of us glad we were not out today in big rolling seas…
September 10, 2024
We heard this town had a store, not really needing anything we decided to check it out anyway. Landing the paddleboards we realized that we were in someone’s backyard so Carl headed to seek permission. Thankfully they were okay with our intrusion and soon enough we walked across their property to the road. Three cute little girls probably five years…
September 9, 2024
We watched the stick in the shore to find high tide (along with help from the tide charts) and just before 8am started our slow march out of Oyster Bay. While not overly concerned there was still some anxiety crossing the pass. Thankfully our route was good and we saw a low of 0.7 meters beneath the keel. Turning north,…