The wind patterns have been tightly associated to the
semi diurnal tides cycles here: "when tide go up,
wind hem com" say the locals. This has been true of
the last four days: easterlies increased to 15 knots
as the tide went up but last night violent squalls
hit, with dark clouds and thunder. So here I am, still
in the same spot, wildy rolling around with the tidal
currents opposing the winds, recovering from a night
up checking anchor at all times, despite having two
watchers onboard to do the night job for me, as at
most times I found none of them awake!!
Getting local crew can be good but needs some management.
It turned out that Philip, our Solomon island crew
picked up in Honiara knew a few of the locals, a fine
diplomatic choice to have brought him to Taumako island
if not a practical one: His seamanship skills had
dropped to very little in the last 20 years since he
worked on the Rainbow Warrior and local ships. Had
to teach him sailing again.
So I was happy to find some other minders for the boat
to help in case I had to escape in the middle of
the night, though being islanders, pidgin is now
the language of choice on board, I am learning fast
but it still causes communication problems when I
want to get something done fast or when a family of
five jumps onboard before I have even got time
to say anything!
One of my helpers, Patrick, has sailed to New Zealand
with Mimi and I am going to take him to Anuta
Island as he seems to know and have the initiative
to sail a yacht out in case the anchor drags.
Such crew swap is a bit of a drastic measure
but no time to muck around.
In the meantime, the KUNA has been the home of
two locals at all time and I feel the difficult
lack of personal space for either parties of
different cultures, let alone having to apply the
local custom dress code on my own boat, like
being embarrassed of wearing short togs to go
and check the anchor !!!
Monday May26th
F:)
