Greetings from yacht Ensemble.
Its been a week since our last blog and there is a lot to catch up on.
It was great catching up with the other World ARC boats and crews - and needless to say there were plenty of gatherings and get togethers. The three main venues where 'Alex's' (ex French Foreign Legion who settled here and set up a hotel and bar - with good WiFi), Pearl Lodge (- nice hotel and restaurant overlooking the bay), and the Pizza Place (huge pizzas with lots of creme fresh).
The first couple of days were spent cleaning the boat - and sorting out provisions. Joel was great - and we also had help fron David and Alison off Trumpetta. Both Joel and David went up the mast - Joel fixing the Genakker halyard - and David took the last 1m off the main halyard (more chafing from a roller on the mast head).
Magali and I celebrated our first wedding anniversary at the Pearl Lodge and had a whole day off the boat! Lovely dinner - although Magali had an upset stomach - but she fully recovered.
Zoe, At Last and us went on an island day tour - the highlight of which was the 'Harry Potter' tikis (what a coincidence the 800 year old relics have sun glasses?) It was a wonderful tour - good food at a local cafe, and death defying roads.
We went to a local 'hangi' and tried the local boar. It was a good night - the day that Peat Smoke arrived.
We were planning on leaving on Thursday - then decided to wait for Peat Smoke - and finally only got away today (Sunday). This allowed us to catch up with Gumvor - and we all went out for Pizza after Magali's pancakes.
We suffered a couple of set-backs at the anchorage. On Wednesday the dinghy went missing - only to be found by Joel on the back of a local fishing boat. Then on Friday morning (at 9am - just after we'd gone ashore) - the kedge anchor rope was cut. Normally no problem - but we'd lost the anchor buoy earlier in the week and hadn't had a chance to replace it. Although in only 2.5m of water - despite efforts from Peter on Trompeta and the guys on Southern Cross, Joel and I were not able to find it. I dove for nearly 3 hours doing grid searches - but with visibility less than 0.5m - I finally gave up this morning and we left for Tahuata.
What a contrast! A nice sheltered bay - with 5m visibility! We'll probably spend tomorrow here too - just to finish the clean up and get ready for the next sail!
Tonight it's BBQ - yum!
Cheers
Dave & Magali
1 April 2012 115