Amanu, Tuamotus 30 May 2010 17.8566S 140.8496W
We made it! A couple more 170 mile days for SL, and those at a close haul! She loves them. I’m not so enamoured. Slamming into 2-3 meter seas with 20 tons of steel sends ripples of pleasure through her hull, but each slam sends wake up thoughts into my attempts at dreaming. I can’t say that sailing 30-60 degrees into the wind for 3.5 days is pleasant, but I think it’s worse for many other boats. And thinking back to similar conditions on “Bille en Tete” brings back memories, of wondering if the next slam would shatter the hull. Now, with each slam, I’m more worried about any dolphins riding our bow getting whacked on the head. Upwind slams do not elicit a shudder or a quake in SL, but a bold and determined, “get the hell out of my way, my crew is destined for the Tuamotus!” Still – a bit exhausting for the crew.
What an amazing and surprising arrival though (maybe made extra exquisite by 3 days of beating). It was not at all like the Marqueses where Islands are visible many miles away. We’d been looking eagerly seeing nothing, then we looked up and wondered how we’d missed such a bright green strip of coconut trees earlier. As we sailed into the lee of the atoll, we went from 20 knot winds and 2 meter seas, to 20 knot winds and flat seas – as if we’d sailed out of the ocean and onto a lake. It is amazing to me how quickly a mood can swing from exhaustion to exhileration on a boat. Thinking back to stressful meetings or moments in my land life, I can’t remember ever shaking that stress feeling so quickly – on land stress lingers and gnaws. Here it may be more intense, but it disappears the instant the stressor leaves the scene. So we sailed for 2 beautiful hours in the lee of the atoll at 8-9 knots, miles of long layered strips of blue sea, then white breakers, then yellow sand, then brown trunks, then green coconut treetops. At the south end of Amanu, we saw a church and the narrow entrance, we were lucky, and the rising tide was with us, flushing us into the lagoon, all we had to do was steer away from the edges, and wave at the kids and dogs watching our entry.
We quickly made our way south of the village to a slightly protected anchorage. It’s still very windy, and there’s a huge expanse of water in the lagoon, between us and the opposite side of the atoll. But we’re anchored behind a little hooked reef. It’s enough protection to stop the lagoon fetch from rolling us off our anchor. Still the reef behind us is close if we were to blow off our anchor, we’d risk going bump in the night. Sailing to the other side of the atoll in search of a lee shore, was out of the question given our late afternoon arrival. Navigation inside these lagoons is a daytime adventure, you need the sun high so you can see (and avoid) the random coral heads scattered throughout the lagoon. We will sit tight tonight, although we may not sleep as well as we’d like. Tomorrow we’ll go play bumper boats with the coral heads – a better game for steel than plastic!
My eyes are looking forward to being closed for more than a couple hours at a time!
It’s mother’s day in Europe! Happy mother’s day to my European Moms, Inge and Mijo! And while I’m at it to my American Moms as well. And heck to all my friends and relatives who are mom’s and grand-moms, you probably didn’t get today off, but next year I’ll try to give you an earlier notice so you can – it can’t hurt to have two mother’s days in a year; I know you’ve all earned them!
xoxomo