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Exody - Days 122-127: Harry, Vahine and the Suwarrow Yacht Club



The remote atoll of Suwarrow, the southernmost of the Northern Cook Islands, is where New Zealander Tom Neale lived his Robinson Crusoe dream on and off between 1952 and 1977- we all read 'An Island to Oneself' on passage here. In his footsteps, National Park warden-cum customs and immigration officer Harry now spends eight months of the year here with his wife Vahine as sole inhabitants. The boat dropped them last Saturday just before their first great grand child was born and comes back for them the first week of November! Access, supplies and communications are almost every bit as challenging as they were in Tom Neale's day with the exception of satellite telephony! Suwarrow is 200 miles from the nearest permanent inhabitation - Puka Puka and Manihiki to the north and 500 miles from Rarotonga (their home) to the south. We arrived yesterday Saturday 16th May after six days at sea and as sixth of only six World ARC boats we reckon to be taking in this delightful stopover - the rest, we believe, opting after their later departure, three days after us on Wednesday 13th, and also with the impact of a cold front passing through, to route directly to Niue.

The 700 mile six day passage from Raiatea was fairly slow, averaging about 115 miles a day, with light winds to start, then picking up at the end of the fourth day enabling us to conserve half of our fuel supply for the next mile 540 leg to Niue. After rounding atoll Motu One, 'seen' only by radar in the dark, we passed Marara Seamount - one of those underwater features everyone now sees on google earth but whose 3500m high pinnacle was still 1200m below our keel! The last 100 miles brought heavy rain and squalls followed by light winds for the final 40 mile motor in to Suwarrow. Marian lost another lure and tracer after the initial excitement of hearing the line whizz out on Friday. On the domestic front we finally called an amicable truce with Petter on galley duties half way through his five months on board - he does not delight in the challenges of cooking afloat - so Marian and I do that and he does the washing up. This now works well for all of us and to celebrate Norwegian constitution day today 17th May, we have given him a brand new sponge!

Pale yellow black tipped sharks circled the boat in the crystal clear water as we anchored off Anchorage Island, having found a shallow enough patch between the clearly visible coral heads. Two other non ARC boats join us here, one Israeli, one Swedish and both apparently, like us, with psychologists on board - we are yet to meet! Within an hour Harry, with his slightly incongruous high viz customs vest, is in the cockpit and we are completing more forms than you can imagine after he had sprayed inside Exody in the interests of protecting biodiversity. Later all crews met ashore for drinks on the beach and a lime (West Indian for chill out with chat) at the the 'Suwarrow Yacht Club' adorned with multiple momento flags from the 150 yachts a year that pass through. We presented our own, appropriately tattered, World ARC flag signed by all six crews. This 'shelter' is where Harry and Vahine live with Tom Neale's adjacent rickety homestead still serving to accommodate a shelf for book exchange.

While most of the males studied grib files, weather forecasts and the various apps that each have for analysis, most of the females joined Harry to walk across the island for an impromptu shark display - black tipped and grey sharks which respond to Harry's familiar Cook Island Maori cry, conditioned by a routine of feeding. They thrashed around impressively in the shallow water at their feet. Harry finds us a large (he says it is relatively small!) coconut crab with impressively powerful pincers that can husk a coconut- a task that takes a skilled man and a strong iron bar fixed in the ground.

Today Sunday 17th we find ourselves weatherbound with 25 knot winds from the northwest with torrential rain in the squalls, creating quite a chop within the atoll - the dinghy ride ashore would mean a drenching from sea and sky! The immediate forecast is for the wind direction to back west and southwest ie straight 'into our face' for the Niue rhumbline. This is our 'share' of the cold front that has delivered gale force winds to the rest of the fleet at sea further south and east. It is due to abate somewhat tomorrow when we plan to leave - but not before going back ashore both to explore and also to complete the clearance out formalities with Harry. This hopefully includes getting our passports stamped for this, our only Cook Islands stopover.

Peter (Skipper)


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