Almost There

February 11, 2011, 7:45 pm

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This piece first appeared in the August 2010 issue of BluePrintReview. It was written on Day 43 of our 44-day passage from Mexico to the Marquesas, and it's part of a longer manuscript which might just see the light of day one day.

In January, Michelle was nominated for a Pushcart Prize for Almost There.

 *    *    *

Almost There 
by Michelle Elvy

We are closing in on the Marquesas. It's been over a month of nothing but blue under our keel and the steady arc of the sun and stars as they exchange places overhead in a repeated pattern of light and dark.

Tomorrow my daughters will see Fatu Hiva's lush green hills and pronounce it a perfect day, but then again, they think today's perfect, too: children live in the moment like no one else.

Which is a good lesson for us all, especially when crossing an ocean. Because out here you are alone with the rhythm of your thoughts and the ghosts of your past.

*

We scattered my brothers' ashes several years after their Cessna fell out of the sky. We met for Thanksgiving at our mother's house, my brother, sister, and I. A family out of balance, trying to find normalcy in a shattered world. The turkey was baked to perfection; the dinnertime conversation was alternately hilarious, edgy, and bitter. But we united around one thing, that two lost sons should live out eternity somewhere other than in an upstairs closet. And so we said our final farewells as we sifted their vaporized bones through our fingers into Spa Creek, around the corner from our mother's house.

I never pictured my brothers settling on a quiet street in Annapolis, and I had mixed feelings about them taking up residence there. We agreed that they should be scattered, but we had never reached a consensus about where to do it. The sea was where they spent most of their leisure time, where they had chased tuna and wahoo and marlin and sailfish. For me, anywhere in the Atlantic would do: off the Florida coast where they kept their fishing boat; off their home waters of the Narragansett; at the mouth of the Chesapeake closer to childhood memories. But schedules got in the way and years slipped by until we finally settled on something that was logistically easy for our busy lives.

An anti-climactic end, I thought.

But I've come to think it was right, after all. Ashes to ashes, returned to Nature in the waters at their mother's doorstep. I watched our mother cupping dusty dry bits of her boys in her small hands on that Thanksgiving Day and my heart broke all over again. I think of her now — passing this spot on a quick errand, glancing down the street where she kissed her palms and whispered goodbye, remembering her sons as she strolls through her neighborhood on a summer's evening — and I like knowing my brothers are there.

*

But in death, as in life, they are adventurous men and I see them wandering, too. Like me, perhaps: restless souls, or maybe just curious. I see them float out Spa Creek into the Chesapeake, past the haunts of our childhood, north up under the Bay Bridge, where they stop in Baltimore just long enough to see what became of me.

North? says Kirk, and Marc nods, Yep.

They stop in Manhattan to check in on their other little sister, a woman buried in grad school assignments and married to a boy they never knew who has brought peace into her life that makes them smile. Then they are Boston-bound, looking up girlfriends now married with kids and friends who still tell stories of two brothers as different as a mathematician and a poet could be but inseparable in life and death. They laugh at the ceaseless Big Dig, dip their toes in the chilly Narragansett and head south — down the Chesapeake again, where they putter in the Sassafrass for a day, because if you had all the time in the world, wouldn't you?

They pass Annapolis once more (Hello, Mom! calls one; Goodbye, Mom! calls the other) and then dash up the Potomac where they look in on their baby brother, who, at thirty-three, has now outlived them both (An accomplishment! says Kirk, and Marc flashes his pointy-toothed grin) and lives a musician's life that one brother won't ever understand (What the hell is post-punk? mutters Marc) and the other admires (Never mind, you old fart, teases Kirk).

They chuckle their way back down the Potomac, bantering about baroque and modern and postmodern Art, Marc still tickled at pushing buttons despite his invisible form, and Kirk giving it back because someone has to, even if they are both dust and smoke.

And then they are at the mouth of the Chesapeake, and they are making tracks now to the tropics. Kirk tips his Duke cap toward Durham when they're off the Carolina coast, and Marc shouts Yo! to the West Palm Beach fishing fleet. No time for the Gulf Stream now; they're heading to Panama, through the Canal and into the mighty Pacific — new territory.

They cheer when they cross the equator: Almost there, whispers Marc. They're gaining speed, traveling more west than south, and finally they spy in the distance a small white speck on the heaving sea.

And now here they come, to me — not blurry memories but vivid and strong. It's March 16 today, and for once I don't see my brothers in the burning wreckage of a plane, as I have done every anniversary since that spring day when metal hit mountain. On this morning I see them everywhere: from Spa Creek to the Pacific Ocean. With friends and fathers and siblings and mother. They trickle down streams and float on oceans. They drift through air and dart across time. Connected to us all, connecting us all.

It's March 16, and I'm seventy miles out of the Marquesas.

I've come three thousand miles to get here.

It's taken me fourteen years.

Today I see that all this time my brothers have been here too, right beneath my keel, willing me forward.

---

Passage Making: On the Importance of Being Ready for Nothing at all

May 26, 2011, 9:43 pm

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Dolphin at the bow

-- a version of this article appeared in Latitudes & Attitudes, December 2010 --

Our passage from Mexico to the Marquesas took forty-four days.  That’s longer than the gestation period of a kangaroo and almost twice that of rabbits.  One reason our passage lasted so long was that we took the scenic route.  We snuck a peak at SocorroIsland, but weren’t allowed to get off the boat.  From there we sailed to Clipperton, where conditions were such that the wrecks on the island, which had initially been objects of curiosity, took on a more ominous significance.  So we didn’t get off the boat there either.  These diversions added an extra 800 miles to our voyage.  But we also spent two weeks or so exploring the patch of water around 01 deg. North and 125 deg. West, inching forward by day on the slightest zephyrs and being set backward at night by a current that frequently ran more than two knots.  All told, we sailed some 3250 miles in 44 days –  that’s an average of about 3 kts.

I’m not complaining about this passage.  We didn’t have any major difficulties, and our sojourn in the doldrums was not forced upon us but was more of an aesthetic choice – we could have fired up the Perkins at any time, or at the very least offered some kind of sacrifice to the gods of wind and weather to get us moving again.  Indeed, we quite enjoyed our six weeks at sea.  And although we were thrilled eventually to see the lush, steep slopes of Fatu Hiva rising from the ocean, we weren’t desperate to get off the boat.  Once at anchor, our daughters jumped at the chance to swing from the halyards again, while their parents reacquainted themselves with the taste of beer.  The dinghy had to wait another day for its resuscitation.

Albatross

When I compare this voyage to our first few oceanic jaunts, what strikes me is how much our attitude toward passage-making has changed.  We’re less skittish than we used to be, much more content at sea and less anxious to bring our voyages to an end.  It helps, of course, that we’ve learned a thing or two since we first started sailing; we’ve grown comfortable with the boat and have stuffed her nooks and crannies with enough useful junk to improvise solutions to most problems.  Much more important, however, is that we’ve learned to appreciate the irony that one’s voyage at sea is quite different from everything one prepares for.

A Mahi-Mahi near the equator advises us not to swim off the boat.

A blue-water passage leaves no room for complacency.  Cruisers spend a lot of time imagining one nasty ‘what-if’ scenario after another, trying to prepare for every contingency.  And so they should – they’re putting a lot on the line.  But all of this anxiety about safety creates the impression that the passage itself is an undertaking of immense risk, which prudence suggests ending as quickly as possible.  It is as if disasters were creatures of malevolent intent, lying just beyond the range of Coast Guard helicopters, poised to strike at both the boat (the snapped back-stay, the shredded main, the seized engine) and the flesh (the abscessed tooth, the broken arm, the embolism in the brain).  Never mind that boat is in good shape and the crew a paragon of health.  Passage-making is often treated as a kind of race to reach one’s destination before disaster strikes.

Sunset in the Doldrums

But while dutiful sailors typically prepare themselves for the worst, they should also be getting themselves ready for nothing much at all.  The truth is that most passage-making is profoundly uneventful.  Although the stakes are high, the overwhelming odds are that nothing bad will happen.  While one has diligently prepared for the worst, crossing an ocean poses less risk than crossing the country in a car.  It just takes longer, has far fewer changes of scenery and no roadside attractions.  Moreover, even if one is possessed by the urge to complete the passage quickly, when that destination is more than a thousand miles away and your vessel lumbers along at a pace not much faster than a brisk walk, the notion of “quickly” becomes absurd.  As a result, the experience of an ocean voyage is often anti-climactic – a curious juxtaposition of dread and boredom.  Indeed, the number of cruisers who actually enjoy passage-making is less than one might expect.  When a friend, for instance, informed us of his impending departure from New Zealand to Fiji, I suggested that he must be quite excited and looking forward to the trip; he figured I was being sarcastic –  he hadn’t left yet, but already he wanted the voyage to be over.  Somebody else we know looked forward to an invigorating sail from Mexico to Hawaii, but then endured a passage so tedious that in Honolulu he sold the boat.

Scooping up sea critters

Perhaps at this point you’re expecting me to insist that the key to meaningful passage-making is to understand that the journey is the goal – that one needs to immerse oneself in the voyage itself and not focus on the destination.  But I don’t possess the spiritual depth to make that wisdom resonate.  Our approach to passage-making is quite the opposite.  For us, the voyage is something that happens while we’re doing other things – making fishing lures and baking bread; organizing boxes of stainless fasteners and picking weevils from the rice. Our kids love the baking, but not so much the weevils.   When it’s calm, they’ll set up their wooden train on the cabin sole, or put on their dress-up clothes and arrange a tea-party for their stuffed animals.  And when the boat romps through a building sea, they invent new ways to swing from the handholds or lie on the salon table, waiting for a wave to tip them into the settee.

Traveling by sailboat is certainly slow, but it is so unlike other forms of travel that the speed and length of the voyage doesn’t matter nearly as much.  It doesn’t require the same intense concentration as driving a car; it doesn’t subject you to the same mind-numbing, blood-clot producing boredom as an 11-hour flight.  And I would much rather embark on a two-week passage than suffer the experience of LAX. When all is said and done and the self-steering gear is set, the boat pretty much sails itself, leaving us free for other things.   Sure, the interests of safety demand some kind of routine and diligence – checking the bilge, looking for signs of chafe, watching for traffic.  For added measure, we impose a moratorium on all recreational swimming (for fear of contributing to the food chain) and alcohol consumption (livers are people too).  Now and then we’re called upon to put in a reef or two (or three), or to shake them out again, or to change a sail, balance the boat or adjust our course; but after that we can focus our attention elsewhere.

Swell off Fatu Hiva

We’re admittedly less sanguine when we’re caught in the teeth of a gale.  The sound of waves slamming into the hull and sweeping the cabin top still sparks an adrenal flash, even though we know that the boat can take on far worse conditions than we’re ever likely to encounter.  But what do we actually do in those conditions?  Well, we reef down and keep a close eye on things, making sure nothing breaks and that we don’t get run down.  If necessary we’ll heave-to.  Apart from that, we jam ourselves into the corners of the boat and sleep.  We figure it’s better to rest just in case something nasty happens than to exhaust ourselves worrying about said nastiness.  And then we wait for the weather to pass.

Of course, it is nice to be moving and I won’t deny the frustration in the doldrums of plotting our daily progress on the negative side of the number line for four days in a row.  But turning on the motor would have been worse.  The sound of the engine would have filled the cabin and left little room for meaningful pursuits; the expensive diesel draining from our tanks would have focused our attention on the “progress” of the voyage itself, the boat’s painfully slow pace and the immense distance still before us.  Much better to wait.  And, in fact, our days in the doldrums were some of the most memorable I’ve spent at sea.  Contrary to expectations, the temperatures were remarkably cool, requiring us to cover up at night.  We were haunted by a languid cross swell, from the northeast and southeast, long and undulating but barely enough to rock the boat.  In the mornings we were often enveloped by a thick and drenching fog that encouraged nudity in the cockpit to spare our clothes. One night in particular, looking out to the horizon under a brilliant canopy of stars reflected in the water, I had the impression that we were at the center of snow globe.  Usually, when the sea is broken by swell and chop and the skies patterned with cloud, it feels like we can see forever; but on this night the horizon seemed close enough to swim to.

One of our strangest (and still unexplained) experiences occurred at night at N 00 deg. 44’; W 124 deg. 42’ (or, if you prefer, in the absolute middle of nowhere).  As I went up to check our course, I was greeted by a vigorous mammalian breathing and snorting – a kind that I have only heard from sea lions – and it seemed to be coming from right beside the boat.  But we saw nothing, neither the tell-tale glimmer of phosphorescence nor anything with the flash light.  Two nights later at N 00 deg. 41’; W 124 deg. 14.4’ (in other words, about thirty miles east of the first position) we heard the sound again.  It must have been the same creature; maybe we were drifting east together.  I doubt very much that it was a whale, and cannot believe that any self-respecting sea lion would wander so far from shore, so I have no idea what kind of creature we heard.

Priorities -- swinging from the halyards in Fatu Hiva

While we weren’t moving very much, we still had plenty to do.  We read aloud from the Philip Pullman’s His Dark Materials trilogy under a makeshift canopy in the cockpit, a work that has as much to say to parents as it does to children.  We examined peculiar critters scooped up from the sea, and witnessed the triumphs and tribulations of President Bartlett in The West Wing.  Michelle monitored our consumption of powdered milk and I spent three days replacing worn plugs in our teak decks.  It is often said that cruising is about fixing your boat in exotic places; we also fix ours at sea.  Eventually the wind filled in again, sending us across the equator at a blistering 2 knots, after which it never faltered.  Ten days later we were swept into the lee of Fatu Hiva by gale force winds accompanied by torrential downpours.

Considered only as journey from one place to the next, the passage was indeed quite long.  But passages are not simply voyages and they’re not only about sailing; they are, in fact, extended moments when one’s whole life modulates into a different key, where distractions fall away and nothing stands between you and your imagination.  So when you’re ready to go – you’ve checked the rigging and changed the oil; and you’ve sewn together the carcass of a chicken to feel what it’s like to stitch a wound – give some thought to what you’re actually going to do out there.  Remember the promises you made to yourself in college to read the unabridged works of Tolstoy and to memorize the night’s sky?  There will never be a better time.

The (Road)way of the Orca

October 19, 2011, 12:05 am

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We recently spent a day following orcas here in the Bay of Islands. When we were with them they were enjoying sting rays as appetizers. When we left, they were heading for a different bay, presumably for a main course of dolphins. Later in the day, they joined us in our anchorage in Urupukapuka Bay for an after-dinner treat: more sting rays, a favorite for the New Zealand orca.

An orca slides beneath Momo's transom.

We were first notified of their presence as we were drinking our morning coffee by Jochen Zaeschmar, who came to New Zealand some twelve years back because of the marine life here, which marks both his passion and profession. We upped anchor and Momo followed the orca around all morning, along with Jochen in his boat and Ingrid Vissar, a New Zealand native who has devoted her life to understanding the NZ orca.

Ingrid the Orca Researcher collected the kids so that they could have a better view.

Jochen and Ingrid interact with these animals the way most people would with their dogs. They call to them, talk to them, laugh and splash with them. They have even gone into the water with them. Ingrid has categorized and named a great many of the local NZ orca. There's Nibbles, Funky Monkey, Miracle, Yin, and even Moby --  named after Jochen's dog who has his own relationship with the orca as well. There are only 200 - 250 in all of NZ waters, and Ingrid knows many of them personally.

Orcas swim between Momo and Ingrid's boat.

Talk about crossing boundaries and borders -- Ingrid drives the length and breadth of this country to track the orca and know them more. Meanwhile the orca seem to swim up and down both coasts, from North Island to South Island and back again, in patterns that researchers are only beginning to understand. You're as likely to find them in Auckland harbor as in Bay of Islands, or even further south. They alternately head off on their own (particularly the males) and then return to the group/family, sometimes regrouping hundreds of miles away. Small  groups hunt together, teach the young, and court and play.

Our encounter with orca makes us think about our own travels in a world without highways. There are no roads out here -- just a whole lot of blue. We equip ourselves with charts and GPS and radar and depth sounders; the orca have all that built in and follow their own waterways.

Jochen's close enough to reach out and touch them.

...and now they're coming our way.

We never know where they're going, but they sure do.

Easy Bake Recipe for Stove Burner Repair

October 31, 2011, 6:37 pm

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Repairing a Faulty Two-Part Burner of a Typical Marine Stove

Tools: scissors; knock-out punch and mallet; vise grip clamp; duct tape.

Materials: top of a tin can; Marine-Tex epoxy putty

Time (including baking, but not including looking for tools): 20 minutes

Directions:

1. Trim lid with scissors to fit the bottom of the burner cap

2. Create an appropriate hole in the center of the lid with a few blows of the rubber mallet on the knock-out punch (I can’t imagine life without a knockout punch)

3. Fit the lid into the burner cap

4. Apply Marine-Tex epoxy putty to the bottom of the lid

5. Fit the bottom of the burner into the burner cap and onto the lid

6. Seal the edges of the bottom of the burner with epoxy putty

7. Clamp together with a vise grip clamp (apply duct tape on those points of the clamp that touch any epoxy so that the clamp doesn't stick)

8. Bake at low heat for ten minutes.

Disassembled burner & the tin can lid with an appropriate hole that lines up with the hole in the bottom part of the burner.

Momo is equipped with a fairly typical three-burner propane stove/ oven that has been on the boat ever since the vessel was built in 1982. It’s nothing flash, but it’s functional. At the time the stove was marketed under the “Seaward Princess” label (at least as far as I can recall, since the label on our stove pealed off years ago); now, judging by appearances, this same stove is being distributed by Tasco. Even though it’s thirty years old, we’re not about to replace it because marine stoves are expensive (especially in New Zealand) and we’re not convinced we would be replacing it with anything better. The principle of “better the devil you know” is especially appropriate when fitting out a boat like Momo because most of the “marine quality” equipment for such vessels is designed for a small, recreational market, which means that the stuff is often disproportionately expensive and qualitatively challenged compared to similar goods produced for the mass consumer market.

The tin can lid fitted into the burner cap; next, the lid is smeared with epoxy putty and the bottom part of the burner is fitted into the cap on top of the lid.

Our biggest problem with the stove has been its burners, which began giving us difficulties about a year or so after we moved onto the boat. In case anyone feels that we are expecting too much from our stove -- after all, by then it was over twenty years old --it’s worth pointing out that it wasn’t until we bought the boat that the stove was put to rigorous use.

The burners are made of two parts. The cap looks like it is made of aluminum. The bottom is made of thin mild steel. This steel rusts along outside edges where it meets with the aluminum cap, producing little holes in the bottom of the burner that then emit small flames.

Our first “temporary” repair involved simply smearing Marine-Tex epoxy putty along the edges where the burner bottom fits together with the burner cap. But since this repair worked remarkably well and lasted a long time, it soon became standard operating procedure. The repair itself takes no longer than making a cup of coffee, and if you pop the burner into the oven at low-heat the epoxy is sufficiently cured in about ten or fifteen minutes.

Clamp together, bake at low heat for 10 minutes,  and we're set to go.

I should also add that, based on our experience, the burner is perfectly safe. The propane needs oxygen to burn, which it gets at the top of the burner cap; and even when exposed to flame, as far as I can tell the cured epoxy resin doesn’t really burn but rather gradually turns into ash. Eventually, however, small holes reappear -- both because the epoxy slowly deteriorates and, as Neil Young puts it, rust never sleeps – and we have to repair the burners again. But that’s just part of routine maintenance.

Recently, however, we have tried something new. It has been about six years since that first repair, and the rust has devoured so much of the edges of the burner bottoms that our simple epoxy repairs don’t last more than three months. I thought perhaps we might have to admit defeat in the struggle against planned obsolescence and purchase new burners or fashion new bottoms from stainless. But then I spotted the lid of tin can on the counter which fit the bottom of the burner cap almost perfectly….

Shit Work

March 14, 2012, 3:30 pm

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The head discharge line runs up to the cabin top in the "shower," across to the opposite bulkhead, and straight down towards the thru-hull.

A couple of days ago our toilet plumbing signaled that it was time for the annual dismantling and cleaning of the system by springing a leak and spewing filth all over my foul weather jacket. Foul indeed. About once a year, not quite as predictable as the tides but just as inevitable, the plumbing succumbs to its own peculiar form of atherosclerosis, constricted by calcium deposits produced by the reaction between urine and seawater that I’ve seen reduce the diameter of flow to the size of a pencil. On the occasion of having completed this annual ritual, I thought I might say a few words about some of the less conventional features of our toilet plumbing, which may not be very romantic but could perhaps be useful.

1. No anti-siphon loop. Now, fitting the system with an anti-siphon or vented loop is generally considered critical (“it is absolutely essential,” says Nigel Calder, “to fit some form of a siphon break on both suction and discharge lines.”) But given how quickly calcium deposits form, I can’t imagine that they remain operable for very long. Therefore they only provide a false sense of security. Our response to the risk that the system might siphon water back into the boat has been to run the discharge line all the way to the cabin top and then down to the discharge thru-hull.

The PVC connects with hose above the waterline. The "shower" hasn't been used as such for years, and functions much more like a garage. Of sorts.

2. PVC pipe. Our discharge line consists almost entirely of PVC pipe, which is cheap, strong, easy to work with, and – most important – entirely odor-proof. The last time I did major re-plumbing, I used some of the nice sanitation hose purchased at great expense from the local chandlery, but right from the outset the stench permeating the hose was enough to drive me off the boat (this problem was made worse in our case because we run the line quite long in order to create a high loop). We were told that the only way to deal with the odor would be to invest in the even more expensive hose, which needed to be imported from the USA and even before it left the States would run us something like $85 a meter (in our case we were looking at $500 worth of hose – even more by the time we got our hands on it in New Zealand). But the fact is that standard household PVC pipe does the trick exceptionally well for a fraction of the price. The limiting factor is that the pipe is rigid and exposed to the (very minimal) risk of cracking. I suppose it’s possible to smash it by throwing an anchor on it, but there’s not much room for a wind up. Nonetheless, we use a short length of hose between the toilet and the piping and another length of hose that connects with the pipe just above the waterline and goes to the discharge thru-hull.

3. DOW 795. I love the stuff. It’s pretty much the only sealant I use. It’s a non-acetic silicone (doesn’t have the typical vinegar smell of most silicones) designed for glazing high rise buildings, for example. It is very elastic, adheres well to plastics (i.e., plexiglass and PVC), quite forgiving (in terms of application procedures), cleans up easily with mineral spirits (even years later), and keeps almost indefinitely in the tube after it’s been opened. Here I used it on all of the joints and to assemble the PVC piping. Now, it’s not much of an adhesive, which means that the PVC piping can come apart. Indeed, the reason the pipe sprung a leak was that the pressure due to the clogged system forced one of the joints apart. But while that is messy, it’s a better alternative than breaking something in the toilet. Also, unless you can take the PVC apart, there is basically no way to clean it out. This might not matter very much if there’s a building supply store down the road, but it could pose quite a problem if you’re anchored at Minerva reef. Since the PVC connections aren’t permanent, however, this makes the length of hose between the discharge thru-hull and the PVC connection above the waterline all the more important. While there is the risk of a mess, there’s no risk of sinking the boat.

New Zealand to Fiji (May to September, 2013)

November 22, 2013, 6:29 pm

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It’s certainly been a while since we posted anything. Now we’re more or less on the move again. We left New Zealand for Fiji in mid-May (2013), a passage to windward that featured, among other things, plenty of vomiting on my (Bernie’s) part. The offset companion way on the Mason 43 is nicely situated so that those afflicted by mal de mer can make their offering to Neptune directly on the side deck, which he washes away immediately (which admittedly works best when on a port tack). Other highlights included a mollusk-encrusted dinghy that wafted the smell of death through the dorades into our enclosed and humid cabin, and a pre-cooked chicken that fell behind the stove during rough weather and putrefied for days before being discovered.

In late June, our friends from Canada visited us in the Yasawas. We made them work. Yvette hurt her shoulder climbing into the dinghy; James buggered his knee climbing onto the boat. We think they're still friends, but we haven't heard from them in a long time.

In the category of boat repairs: our nine-year-old anchor light/tricolor gave up the ghost immediately after we left NZ. The damn things are expensive. So this time we cobbled together an assembly of much cheaper and more ubiquitous LED running lights for less than the half the price, which has the additional advantage (in my eyes) of being repairable. Admittedly, it's not very pretty, but it lives at the top of the mast, so who cares.

Momo anchored off the village of Somo Somo, Naviti Island in the Yasawas.

Somo Somo landing party.

Somo Somo kids.

Somo Somo

Somo Somo -- outdoor cooking

Jana's pic of a large spider.

James leads from behind on our trek to the other side of Naviti island to snorkel the WWII wreck of a P-39 aircraft. According to the elderly woman who lives near the site and remembers the event, the plane clipped the trees and crashed into the lagoon; the pilot, armed with a handgun, emerged shortly thereafter and enjoyed tea with her aunt before being rescued.

Naviti

Manta

Momo spins at anchor.

In the "reinventing the wheel" category, Yvette and Jana destroy my mallet trying to figure out how to get into a coconut.

This fellow was destined for the smoker.

Exploring a sandy reef at low tide, Musket Cove, Mamanucas.

We actually spent an inordinate amount of time working while anchored at Musket Cove. But we had a nice view from the office.

A windy day at anchor.

More from the boat repair categories: the dissected corpse of our inverter/ charger. We replaced it with two 60-amp Sterling Power ProChargeUltra chargers (they can be hooked up in parallel) and a separate TruePower 1000 watt inverter. We figured it was a good idea to have to have two separate chargers for redundancy. The chargers also work on both 110 and 220 volts. The complexity of an integrated inverter/charger isn't necessary and such units also have a notoriously high failure rate. At this point, all of our AC comes from the batteries; the Honda generator only powers the chargers. We bought the units from Bay Marine Supply in the US, who shipped them priority mail to Fiji.

A last look at Lautoka ...

Jana and Michelle get in the way of a photo of Lola reading her Kindle while leaving Fiji.

Goodbye Fiji.

Vanuatu (September / October 2013)

January 4, 2014, 8:41 pm

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Our time in Vanuatu was far too brief. For us, it was largely a stopping point along the way to Indonesia. By the time we left Fiji, it was already late in the season and we needed to cover a lot of mileage to get out of the tropical cyclone zone. Hence, we were psychologically already gone -- heading west. Our stops in Tanna Island and Port Vila allowed for just enough of a glimpse to tell us we'll have to head back for a longer stay. Some day... For now, here are a few photos from our few weeks there, late September to mid-October.

Arrival from Fiji – 1 October 2013. Momo at anchor in Port Resolution -- named thus by Captain James Cook (after his ship), the first European to come to Tanna (the volcano beckoned) in 1774.

Port Resolution Yacht Club, Tanna Island. You can see the various yacht and country flags hanging in the club. The locals are very welcoming, and make it easy to stop here.

Jana looking out over the anchorage in Port Resolution.

Tiara and coconut palms – signs of the South Pacific.

The signs and smells of the South Pacific.

Dinghy ride around the entrance to the Port Resolution anchorage – cliffs and caves.

Carvings along the road, Tanna Island. Lola and Michelle drove one day with Johnson, Rossi, and Andrew to the village with a bank (we needed Vatu for our trip up the volcano – 5000 per person, equal to about $50; exchanged our remaining Fijian dollars). Along the way, like a taxi service, they stopped to pick up various people – some paid, some did not. Everyone knows everyone, and a car is a valuable commodity. We listened to some Vanuatu music along the way, with a reggae beat, and became acquainted with Johnson’s cousin, who writes his music from prison in Port Vila. Johnson tells us that he’s there because of stealing: the very poor must resort to stealing and it’s not even viewed as a bad thing, just sad that he got caught by the government -- but even that is not so bad, because he got a special cultural grant to support his music in prison, so he sits there with his recording equipment and produces CDs. We liked the music and even looked for some in Port Vila. We also went by the prison in Port Vila but didn’t hear any music that day.

Tanna (like many islands in Vanuatu, we gather) has a very strong sense of its own identity. The islanders are fiercely independent and proud of being their own people. They have resisted the effects of 'Europeanization' fairly well and even led a separatist movement in the 1970s. Maintaining their own customs and cultures, they are proud that many of their people remain in Tanna, not succumbing to the lure of the big city of Port Vila. Even in the early days of colonization, they resisted Christianity more successfully than other places. Their identity, interestingly, includes a staunch commitment to the John Frum Cargo Cult -- a faith that from a certain perspective is more firmly rooted in reality than the traditional religions of West.

Kids in Tanna. We spent an afternoon strolling through the village at Port Resolution and talking to people. Among other things, they are building some new public buildings and a school. I spoke with the Australian woman in charge of the school project (nearly complete) who was there just then to oversee the final steps. Sue, Andrew and Phil had all participated in this project on their own free time, with Sue spearheading it and raising Aus $200,000 over the last few years. She had first sailed here with her husband on their boat some years back, and she fell in love with Tanna Island, found some magic here and set about finding a way to give something of her time and energy to this village.

Our host Johnson rings the village bell. We were told to look for Stanley, but we never found Stanley. Johnson is Stanley’s brother, we discovered – and apparently the current “go-to guy” in Tanna Village. On our trip across the island, Johnson stopped along the way back, and he and his friend went inside a house and returned with bowls of cassava and coconut milk with bread for Lola and me. They sat on the side of the road and ate their lunch then, which included, for dessert, white buns drizzled with sweetened condensed milk. Lola and I enjoyed the cassava and coconut milk – delicious, as always.

The village makes good money off the volcano. They have figured out how to make the most of their natural resource and have it very well organized for the visiting yachts and other tourists. They drive you there (30 min) and escort you up to the top. We left around 5pm so we could get there in time to see it in the light and then at dark, too.

Another of the volcano.

Leaving Tanna – sailing to Port Villa and waving goodbye to the volcano, which we found just as impressive from this view as from the close-up range. It spews constantly, and you can see it for miles. No wonder Cook stopped here.

Our introduction to the urban language of Port Vila (called Bislama) came mostly from signs around town. Always fun to decipher. Here, a private home with a warning sign against trespassing. TABU: Yu no kam insaed = You no come inside.

Calcium for strong teeth and bones + iron for making you strong. You get the idea. Vanuatu Ministry of Health is watching out for its people.

Number one water.

Some views strolling around Port Vila and its environs.

Even in town the papaya grows in almost every garden.

Beautiful gardens in Port Vila. 

Lola and the iguana. One of the things we grew tired of in Port Vila was how everyone wants to sell you something. Even this nice fellow walking by wanted to share more than just his cool pet. He stopped and let the kids hold it, showed them a few tricks with him, and smiled as we snapped photos. Then he asked for money for the photos we took. That is: he asked for money since he and his pet were the subject of our photos. We tipped him and smiled but grumbled, just a little. 

One of the best things in Port Vila was the French baked goods.Quiche, pastries, pain au chocolat, glace…  all delicious. We also purchased bread and croissants, but they did not last long enough to count as provisioning for the next leg of our journey.

Port Vila’s market was fun. Vegetables, fruits, flowers, fish. A big space with a lot of variety. We enjoyed shopping here but did not find it especially cheap. Still, we stocked up on certain supplies for our trip to Indonesia, purchasing as much large grapefruit as we could carry (each of us had a heavy bag or two), and other staples. In the shopping centers, we bought coffee, beer, bread, butter and pate. 

Walking back down to the harbor after a stroll up around town and through the suburbs. The main street of Port Vila runs along the waterfront, and then various roads lead up and away to the government buildings, the museum, and other commercial sites – car rentals, grocery stores, laundry, etc.

Port Vila harbor view -- Momo among anchored boats.

Cooling off.  Some days in Vila were hot – and we anchored outside the main mooring field so the kids could jump off the boat and cool down. 

Lola up the mast. Lola and Jana have been swinging on the bosun’s chair for as long as we can remember. Now that they are getting bigger, they are venturing further up the mast. You can’t really swing from the top, but it offers a great view of the harbor.  Next time we’ll send her with a bag of tools and have her fix something up there.

Our checklist in Vila included sorting our Internet so we could do a few last things online before disappearing for a month, fixing our nav station light, getting a new back-up handheld GPS (one of our backups had died), printing Indonesia paperwork so we’d be prepared upon arrival, locating some of the weather and sailing nets for the next crossing, checking the rig, shackles, reefing lines, chain plate bolts (stern) and Jerome’s bearings (self-steering gear), and of course stocking up on water.

Saying goodbye to the family on Pacific Bliss. We met in them Port Vila only briefly but we expect we’ll see them again, as they’re now settled in Nelson, NZ. One of our last stops in Port Vila was to have a beautiful steak luncheon at a restaurant outside of town, recommended by Colin and Liz. Lovely view, nice French waiter, good food and wine. And, at $10 a plate, it was a bargain in this town.

Pulling up anchor and putting Vanuatu behind us… but first, we must dislodge a large hunk of rock stuck on our anchor. Bernie had to climb on top and stomp quite a bit, but even that did not help. He finally secured a line around it so we could ‘tip’ it and change the balance. It had settled into a perfectly balanced state on our anchor and was not going anywhere without a lot of encouragement. I worried that Bernie might go with it, but he managed to stay dry.

Goodbye Port Vila....Next top, Torres Strait.

On the balance of risk, freedom and choice: a response to the Rebel Heart controversy

April 9, 2014, 12:04 pm

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Such a fascinating media flurry around the Rebel Heart story -- a  family rescued some 900 miles offshore from Mexico. In the last 36 hours we've read hundreds of blog comments attacking the Kaufmans for being irresponsible sailors and parents. I don't know how well prepared they were for this voyage -- I do not know this family, and I have not followed their journey. But I do know they've been sailing for a year to prepare for the first offshore leg of their circumnavigation, and I give them credit for at least leaving the dock in the first place.  

I keep wondering why people feel the need to judge this family for doing something they believe is the right path for them, for creating a life that is exceptional and full of love and life, for teaching their children about the world in a hands-on way. All the things I value. 

All I can come up with is that there is something else going on here. This is not about the rights and wrongs of sailing with small children or the decisions we make as parents -- it's about larger fears that permeate our society.

So when I was approached to write about this storm, I felt a strong urge to respond. I am not dogmatic or particularly preachy about 'our' way of life. But it rankles that others are about their own set of values, and this issue seems about much more than sailors or offshore adventuring. I think it's important to look at the way we balance our lives between risk and perceived notions of safety. 

This link will take you to a blog post I wrote for the parenting journal, What To Expect. 

-Michelle Elvy, in Bali, Indonesia

---

Tual and Debut, Kai Island, Indonesia (November 2013)

April 24, 2014, 2:12 am

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Arrival in Indonesia...

Arriving in Debut, Indonesia and exploring the anchorage and the surrounding town and countryside of Kai Island was our first introduction to Indonesia. We found ourselves enjoying it immensely, despite major communications barriers. The people are gentle and patient, and we managed to get by pretty well. One of the things that made our stay so good in this anchorage was the hospitality shown by Mr. Koro, who drove us back and forth to shore (nowhere to land the dinghy -- very shallow landing area and then concrete steps, with nowhere to tie up), and Mr Addy, who was our taxi driver around Tual and the surrounding area. Wonderful people -- and service with a genuine smile.

A tour around the Debut anchorage with Mr. Koro in his long boat.

Debut, Indonesia, on Kai Island. Largely a Muslim fishing village.

Mr. Koro and his outboard. 

A tour around the anchorage took us under the bridge that we heard day and night as mopeds and pedestrians crossed it. Clatter-clatter-clatter. 

Lola and Jana in the bow of Mr Koro's boat.

Kids on the bridge. We found the children in our first stop extremely curious and friendly. Even with no English, they managed to express themselves quite well. And we never had the feeling they really wanted anything, other than to be friendly. A nice welcoming feeling.

Kids on the foundations of the bridge, at the island where they are building a new dam in Debut.

Common structure for houses along the waterfront in Debut, Kai Island. 

Driving around Tual...

In the big city of Tual -- the market. Fruits and veggies for the first time since Vanuatu. The large grapefruit were a disappointment, but the cucumbers and papaya did not disappoint.

And bananas -- lots and lots of bananas. 

A typical market stall in the Tual market. 

Jana gets squeezed. For the first of many times. We discovered that Indonesians adore Jana. Her blond hair and fair skin prove irresistible and their natural response is to grab her and pinch her cheeks or arms – hard. She grins and bears it and carries the burden for the family well. 

Lola and Jana make friends in the Ministry of Tourism,Tual. These women insisted on having a photo taken with Jana and Lola – a practice we would soon become well acquainted with. This is where our check-in happens. In Tual, there is a whole office dedicated to tourism, but we’re not sure what they do exactly because there is a lot of sitting around and smiling – and so many officials for a place that sees very little tourism. Perhaps they are trying to promote tourism more? Perhaps it’s part of a programme to bring more people to their region? We could not tell. But we did meet Mr. Budhi, who was our ‘agent’ and helped us check in and clear our boat into Indonesian waters.

Mr Budhi and Michelle. Mr Budhi was our official agent and he helped with check-in, which consists of checking in with Quarantine (they first came to our boat on our first day, along with Mr. Budhi), then Immigration, then Port Captain, then Customs. The added bonus for Michelle was that Mr Budhi drove her around town on his bike all afternoon, from one office to the next. And then drove her all the way back to the boat – a nice long evening ride across the countryside of Kai Island. City and country smells from the back of a moped – a great introduction to Indonesia. (Thanks for the photos, Arthur on S/V Morning Glory!)

Meeting some people in places around town...





Queuing for benzin. Mopeds are the common form of transportation, and the lines for gasoline are long.

Visit to a beach resort area where on weekends this area is packed with Tual City residents who come to relax and eat large family meals. 

School visits...

Visit to a local village and their school. These kids performed songs and played games with Lola and Jana and the teachers gave us a tour of the school. We met one teacher named Bean (who says to pronounce it “Ben”) who met us the next day and took us around the island on another tour.  Ben’s English was pretty good so we could ask questions and understand most of his answers.

Mr Bean and his school -- with Lola and Jana in the mix. The kids played games with Lola and Jana and we were wined and dined by the school teachers in the evening. Our introduction to home-made banana fritters and potatoes. Yum.

Visit to Mr Budhi’s school, where the students learn home economics and language to prepare themselves for the tourism trade. They learn hospitality (hotel management), food services (cooking) and  textiles (sewing) -- and they have special classes in English . On this day, they were dedicating a new building so we were invited to the ceremony where the building was blessed and the students then sang songs. We then went on a tour of the school which included some treats – fresh papaya/ mango juice,among other things – and also a request that we sit with a senior class and talk to them about who we are and where we come from. We had a fun hour or so with them – answering their questions and also asking some things about their school. A couple of them demonstrated impressive language skills, and they were a friendly group of kids and teachers. 

The students gather to sing for the ceremony at the Tual City School for Tourism.


Teachers sitting in the shade (with the guests, too!).


One of the things that struck us about the architecture in Tual was how colorful it is. It's bright and cheery. You can see they did not go for subdued colors on this new building. And in the costumes below, made by the students at the school.
 


More photos from the School for Tourism: Students and their Singer, and the showroom with some of the things they make, including clothing and crafts, such as the entire wedding outfits made for the wedding of one of the teachers. The school made the bridal gown, the groom's suit and a very large wedding settee -- featured here with the head of the school and Jana sitting on it.

A visit to a nearby village...

We took a day-trip around the island of Kai and visited another small village on a nearby island, off the northwest coast. The locals were keen to show us their 'museum' and other sites, so we were excited to see what this was all about. We were treated to a wonderful visit, and this village, more than anything else on Kai, reminded us of some of the Polynesian villages in the South Pacific. Village life and rhythms are much the same, though this particular village is preparing itself for what it thinks is the inevitable onslaught of tourism in the near future. In fact, they are gearing up for it and hoping it brings more visitors. We were among the few visitors this year.

 Seaweed drying in the village. The sell it to local restaurants and eat it at home, too.



 Root of the cassava plant, poisonous to eat in its pre-dried state but then formed into waffle-shaped dried snacks which you find in stands on every street corner in towns across Indonesia.

Village kids singing to us and serving coconut water.

The village washing station.

The heart of the tourism attraction in the village. This is the "museum" -- a remnant of Japanese artillery from the second world war. 

Village canoes.

Terima Kasih! And Sempai Jumpa!

  Mr Addy, our taxi driver in Tual/ Debut, and his father. Mr Addy drove us for the 3-4 days we were in Kai Island. He drove us back and forth between  our anchorage in Debut and Tual City (8 km away), and all around the island. Each day we paid him $15 or $20 for his services. He was a wonderful guide and a great help while we were there. And he took a real shine to Jana – as demonstrated by this gift on our last day with him. He stopped in his house on our way home and emerged with this enormous shell – a beautiful gift for the delighted and genuinely surprised Jana. We're still trying to figure out how to fit in on board.

Saying goodbye to Mr Addy and Mr Koro – our two guides in Debut. They came for coffee on our last morning, and despite profound language gaps, we managed to share a few stories and enjoy one last visit before leaving for new stops in Indonesia. 

Making Charts from Google Earth

May 8, 2014, 8:00 pm

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We don’t have a chart plotter per se on Momo. Instead, back in 2006 we installed a low-power PC with a decently sized monitor in the nav station space that once housed the electrical panel. Basically, we use a fell-off-the-back-of-a-truck version of MaxSea, which has served us well. Anyway, last year we came across some software that enables you to make charts that are compatible with MaxSea or the open-source navigation software OpenCPN (at this point, we should probably be using OpenCPN, but we suffer from the old-dog-new-tricks syndrome).

Like OpenCPN, the chart-making software is freely available and easy to use – its developer Paul Higgins has indeed provided the cruising community with an invaluable service.

The Googe Earth charts are especially useful in poorly charted reef-riddled areas like Fiji and Indonesia. You can find many Google Earth charts posted on the internet. But since they can be screwed up in a number of different ways, we prefer to make charts of potential anchorages ourselves as we go along.

I don’t really want to discuss at length the virtues and limitations of these charts – they can be made and used in a number of ways and a healthy dose of common sense comes in handy. Instead, I just wanted to post a few images that more or less speak for themselves.

The first set of images features the anchorage at Musket Cove in Fiji. Evidently we came and went, came and went ...

Standard C-Map chart of Musket Cove, Fiji

Google Earth chart of Musket Cove, Fiji

The second set features our anchorage on the island of Rinca in Komodo National Park in Indonesia, where we celebrated Festivus 2013.

Standard C-Map chart of Rinca Island, Indonesia

Googe Earth chart of Rinca Island, Indonesia

And the third image shows our path into an anchorage on the north side of Komodo Island, Indonesia. One of the limitations of the Google Earth charts is that they don’t indicate depths (of course, our “real” charts provide soundings, but in a place like Indonesia you sometimes wonder whether they make it all up). The water here is very deep right up to the shore line. In this case, we were looking for a suitable spot to drop the hook, with me on the bow and Michelle at the wheel. As we slowly inched along, the reef suddenly appeared just a few meters below the surface while Michelle, at the back of the boat, couldn't see the bottom at all. The track on Google Earth chart pinpoints this spot with amazing precision (especially if you zoom in on the chart, which we can't do here).

Standard C-Map chart of anchorage on north side of Komodo Island, Indonesia

Google Earth chart of anchorage on north side of Komodo Island, Indonesia

Vanuatu to Indonesia (October - November 2013)

May 9, 2014, 7:29 pm

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We bid farewell to Port Vila, Vanuatu on the evening of 13 October, but Port Vila did not want to let us go. We sailed off the anchor only to discover that the CQR was balancing a hefty chunk of rock and coral on its tip. There was no way to knock it off, so we had to tuck behind an island and climb out onto the anchor to attach a line to the anchor crown. We then dropped the anchor again so that it hung from the crown, which released the anchor from the rock. This sort of thing doesn't happen very often, so we felt the need to take a picture.

The conditions for the passage to the Torres Strait were quite good; we sailed most of the way with the wind from behind, the mainsail reefed, and the jib and staysail lying on the foredeck. However, four or five days into the passage, Jerome started to complain ever more loudly. Jerome is the name of our windvane self-steering gear; we started calling him Jerome soon after his installation. I named him after the patron saint of travelers, St. Jerome -- who, it turns out, is not the patron saint of travelers at all but rather a grumpy old man most famous for going off on heretics. My mistake.

Jerome's main bearing -- consisting essentially of a fiberglass tube -- had deteriorated; this was not a new problem but one I thought I had fixed. So one morning at the crack of dawn when conditions were good we hove to and hauled him into the cockpit for surgery, which lasted the better part of the day. This sort of thing doesn't happen very often, so we felt the need to take a picture (it should also be said that filing and sanding epoxy/fiberglass while dressed only in underwear is not the wisest maneuver).

In point of fact, there aren't that many things to photograph when you're on a passage -- parts of the boat, other parts of the boat. So we took a whole series of pictures of our laundry hanging out to dry on the mainsheet. We seldom experience conditions so predictable that laundry can be dried in this manner, thus the taking of these photos in particular was overdetermined.

We arrived at the top of the Torres Strait on the morning of 25 October, our twelfth day out. Spotting the tower on East Cay some five miles away reassured me that the GPS still worked, because I sometimes entertain the thought that where we are in our small virtual electronic world may not bear any relation to our place in the larger scheme of things. Jerome was once again giving us problems, but this time we were able to anchor in the lee of one of the islands and take our time. It took a little more effort to get him into the cockpit this time (I didn't have to go over the side when we were at sea).



Over the course of two days we took him apart, made an entirely new bearing, and put him back together again. It's a learning experience and looking back more than 1000 miles later it appears as if we have the problem under control. This sort of thing doesn't happen twice on a passage very often, so we felt the need to take a picture (it should also be said that filing and sanding epoxy/fiberglass while dressed only in a pair of shorts is not the wisest maneuver).

The fact that the Torres Strait is a shallow stretch of water strewn with islands and shoals through which two immense bodies of water exchange their fluids filled me with a certain degree of trepidation. But our conditions turned out to be wonderful -- incredibly blue water, strong winds, and sheltered seas. On our way south we anchored overnight for a second time. And as we passed Friday Island heading into the Gulf of Carpentaria, we saw a huge bag of trash transmogrify into mating turtles. This sort of thing doesn't happen very often, but we were too slow with the camera.

Naturally, we celebrated our transit of the Torres Strait with a double batch of brownies and french onion soup. But the rituals in preparing this holy feast were not properly followed -- i.e., do not use bad eggs; do not eat raw batter. And thus the priestess was struck down with great vengeance. Michelle disappeared into our bunk with salmonella poisoning for most of what remained of our passage (some 800 miles). Salvation came in the form of Cipro, which gave her hallucinatory dreams and eventually brought her back to us. This too doesn't happen very often, but I didn't have the heart to take a picture of Michelle lying on the floor next to the toilet cradling the stainless steel vomit/ popcorn bowl. We do, however, have a photo of Lola and Jana on Halloween, which was celebrated in the morning for about ninety minutes without any trick-or-treating.

The sailing itself was gentle and smooth, the shallow waters of the Gulf of Carpentaria giving way to those of the Arafura Sea, which were also quite shallow but incredibly black. At dusk the sea would suddenly become an obstacle course dotted by the peculiar red-blue-green flickering LED "navigation" lights of small Indonesia fishing boats and drifting fishing lines (or nets -- I couldn't tell). At one point as I watched from the companionway, the boat -- moving slowly yet inexorably -- crossed a line shimmering green with phosphorescence stretching on either side to distant flickering buoys. I held my breath, but the line was undisturbed and thus must have been at least two meters below the surface.

We finally arrived in Debut Indonesia on 3 November, twenty-one days after leaving Vanuatu. Just outside the entrance we took in tow a family in a small boat with a failed motor. Arriving in an entirely new place after spending time at sea -- in this case a place dotted with mosques, teeming with friendly people we could barely understand, and crisscrossed by long narrow boats powered by percussive lawnmower engines with long propeller shafts hung over the side -- is  always electrifying. After we dropped anchor and engaged in a lengthy but incomprehensible exchange of sounds with the stranded family, we lent them our dinghy oars. And they promptly brought them back, which nicely set the tone for our sojourn in Indonesia.

DIY Siphon

June 29, 2014, 9:27 pm

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A few months ago while watching an Indonesian fuel broker cup his hands around the top of diesel container and blow into the container to get a siphon going, I came up with this nifty little siphoning device.

It's made from a piece of scrap plywood and couple of hoses (in this case with outside diameters of 1/2" and 3/4"). Two holes are drilled through the wood such that the hoses fit tightly. They need to be close enough together so that both hoses fit into the opening of the containing vessel. The larger hose transfers the liquid -- one end reaches to the bottom of the containing vessel and the other end reaches into the lower receiving vessel. The smaller hose reaches only slightly into the opening of the containing vessel. You hold the wood firmly flat against the opening of the containing vessel and blow into the smaller hose to create the pressure to get the siphon going.

Of course, the device isn't completely airtight, but neither does it need to be. You don't need to blow very hard to get the siphon going and the method still works even if there are just a couple of centimeters of liquid at the bottom of the container. It's all pretty obvious and I wish I had thought of it sooner. Check out the action-packed video below!

Passage from Serangan Indonesia to Puteri Harbour Malaysia, July 2014

July 16, 2014, 2:14 am

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We had a pleasant and uneventful passage from Bali to Malaysia, sailing almost dead down wind most of the way. We motored for only a few hours just north of Bali and then again when we arrived in the Strait of Singapore. Click here for a closer look.

Podcast interview: sailing? adventure? or merely a way of life?

July 24, 2014, 11:29 pm

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Mehari

Erik Hemingway is a father of six and a firm believer in adventure. In 2009 he sold all his possessions and moved onto a sailboat with his wife and small children. That’s right: five. And they had another baby along the way, in Israel. They turned off the autopilot of their everyday (and mostly easy) land-based lifestyle and took a harder route, sailing for three years. Now they are back in North Carolina, and they are so committed to encouraging families to step away from routine that they run a website and podcast series in which Erik interviews traveling families.

His goals are clearly stated in his opening paragraph on his site:

If you have a dream to travel, but feel like you can’t live adventurously until the kids are safely tucked away in college, think again! The goal of this website is to get you traveling & we think it’s the best thing you can do for your family! We want to give you the tools and advice to help you make decisions, and to dream BIG and GO! We think life is short and we all want to live with no regrets. 

You'll find sailors in the interview series, including our friends on Totem and others we don't know such as  father-daughter team who bonded as they crossed oceans together.

But on the site you’ll also discover stories you’d never expect: a family travelingthe US by bus, a single mom and her son in Central and South America, a family doing slow, deliberate travel (and Jason is also an expert in how to jump properly), a single mum with a 9-year-old son, a single dad who understands the need to stop and breathe, afather and daughter connectingthrough travel – without iPods and other modern conveniences – and afamily on bikes, traveling 17,000 miles, from Alaska to Argentina.

 These are serious adventurers. And you can find them and their websites and blogs here.

Momo in Fiji

In our interview, we focus on why and how we set sail with babies, the practicalities of getting underway, how we earn a living in order to carry on, the lifelong learning curve of living this way, the need for a sound vessel, the timing of departures, and the inevitable fears that influence the decisions people may or may not make to step out of the routine. And how we’re really just a couple of homebodies.

This felt more like a conversation than a formal interview. And Erik has an excellent radio voice (better than either of us; he must be trained professional).

 You can hear it here. 

 Thanks to Erik Hemingway for getting in touch. Onward!

Paper Dance: from the Mexican Cha-cha to the Springtime Shuffle

August 3, 2014, 4:10 am

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Office of Tourism in Tual, Indonesia

Buenas Dias.
Bonjour.
Fakaalofa atu.
Kia ora.
Ni sa bula.
Selamat pagi.

Sailing from country to country, you become well acquainted with officialdom in its various forms. You learn how to greet officials with a friendly hello -- and with a stack of photocopies: passports, crew lists, boat documentation, exit papers from your previous port. For each port you enter, there is a dance you must learn, stepping gently from one office to the next. There are appropriate moves you adopt, always beginning with the greeting (often quite formal: a bow, perhaps). Each place has its own style, and quirks. A smile goes a long way in any language -- but you have to know how to dance by local rhythms.

Momo in Ensenada, 2004

In Mexico, for example, we learned that the Port Captain was the most important official -- and the one who led the dance -- in each town. Having a baby in Ensenada was enough to teach us about pacing when it came to the Mexican cha-cha and its various movements. Sometimes you pick up the beat and meet deadlines -- Cha-cha-chá! -- but mostly you have to turn in all the proper forms, with multiple copies going to multiple offices, and, well... wait.

In French Polynesia, we tangoed back and forth between Immigration, Customs and even the bank, as the bond (a deposit required upon arrival and returned upon departure) was a key stipulation for entry. The Cook Islands and Nuie were easy enough -- requiring patience and a knack for slowing down the pace, a quiet waltz through dusty concrete offices with friendly fragipani'ed agents.

I don't recall Tonga, to be honest, but by the time you reach there, you've gone through the drill enough times to bring multiple copies of all your papers and to be prepared to take your time.

Fiji  I do recall, because we went there twice, checking in one year in Savu Savu and another year in Lautoka. Fiji is an easy arrival, because the officials speak English for the most part and exhibit a characteristically quiet patience about them: sit here, please, let me get my pen -- no, this one does not work, another one perhaps -- let's see, oh my colleague has gone for the day, come back tomorrow... 

New Zealand is perhaps the most efficient place we've ever sailed to, despite the metaphorical slap and note in our official entry file for dropping our anchor for a few hours just outside the harbor entrance to await daylight, opting not to arrive in an unfamiliar harbor at an unfamiliar Customs Dock in the dark.

Momo in Town Basin, Whangarei, 2009

In New Zealand, administration runs like clockwork, and even getting our residency, while a lengthy process -- a very slow dance, you might say (with two offshore trips, one to Fiji for a season and one to the 12-mile-limit off the coast in order import the boat as residents, once all the papers had been properly filed and accepted) -- was straightforward enough. Even the tax department is easy to work with (and, in the IRD offices on Bank St in Whangarei, they smile).

Indonesia was another matter altogether. Prior to sailing there, we sorted our visas with a trip to Suva, and, via an online contact in Jakarta, I secured an 'agent' who became our 'sponsor' and helped get our Cruising Permit -- the infamous CAIT. To say the paperwork in Indonesia is cumbersome is an understatement. The check-in and check-out processes made all the paperwork required for giving birth in Mexico look like child's play, and the ease with which we obtained our visas in Suva was no indication of what was to come.

The offices in Indonesia share some characteristics with those in Mexico, and remind me faintly of encounters some decades ago in East Germany: they are dimly lit with fluorescent bulbs; they are smoky and poorly ventilated; they usually have one fan whirring away in the corner, with little or no effect; and there are always a bevvy of officials with impressive uniforms -- not exactly bustling, but doing a kind of indecipherable shuffle, as they open drawers, examine files, sigh and eventually sign and stamp an approval.

Mr Budhi and Michelle, photo by Arthur Hoag

We were helped with our check-in by Mr Budhi from the Tourism Ministry, who ushered me on his moped from Tual's Port Captain to Immigration to Customs. Half the time I had no idea what was being said, of course, so I settled into a relaxed position (in a somewhat dozed state after having been sick at sea for a week with salmonella) to observe just how they get the job done. Not many boats arrive in the eastern parts of Indonesia, and few boats had checked into Kai Island before our arrival.  Lucky for us, one boat had preceded us by a week -- S/V Morning Glory -- and apparently the easiest way for Customs to deal with our arrival was to copy their information onto our forms.

I watched over the shoulder of the official entering data on his screen.

Flag: US

Length: 13m

Tonnage: 15

Wait... In my dozy state, I thought: Morning Glory is a catamaran. Same flag, same length, but displacement? Not sure about that. 

Then:

Owner: Arthur Hoag

Stop. My turn to step in and lead. Gently, gently, I pointed out that they would have to change the owner's name, and a few other details. Oh ya, ya, ma'am.  

I leaned over the keyboard and peered at the screen while the Customs official typed in the next set of papers -- and had to do the same again: Change name here, and here. No, not Mr. Hoag. Me. And here. Not Morning Glory. Change to Momo. Here, here and... here. Hoag, no. Elvy, yes.

So far, so good. 

And now, your stamp. Boat stamp, ma'am. 

Momo's boat stamp

We had met Morning Glory on anchor in Debut the day before -- they were the previous boat to arrive in these parts, remember. They had greeted us with cold beer and snacks and advice about checking in. This included prepping us about the Boat Stamp: an official stamp with boat name, flag, registration number, captain's name, and signature line. We did not have such a stamp. But, armed with the advice from Arthur and Amy on S/V Morning Glory, I managed.

When it came time to stamp my papers, one photocopied paper after another, I pulled out the stamp we had dug up  in haste late on the previous night, in a cupboard of toys and games. It did not say S/V Momo; it did not have the boat registration number or the captain's name; it did not have a signature line. But it worked. I stamped over and over and over, with aplomb: Spring is here! 

And signed my name right above the wavy grass. And smiled and bowed and thanked them for the dance. 

---

Beyond first impressions: Ambon, Indonesia (Dec. 2013)

September 6, 2014, 8:44 pm

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Had we let our first impressions guide us, we'd never have stayed nearly three weeks in Ambon City. Nestled a good ten nautical miles up the inlet that runs into the center of Ambon Island, Ambon City is the capital of the Maluku province of Indonesia and historically served as the regional center of the Dutch colonial administration. It's a relatively large city in eastern Indonesia, with a gubernatorial office, bustling streets, varied and imposing architecture, a university, military parade grounds and a large shopping mall (where we discovered, among other things, Indonesian donuts that rival Krispy Kremes).

The first thing we knew about Ambon, however -- even before we arrived -- was that it was the center of Christian-Muslim violence as recently as just over a decade ago. We learned of this first-hand from a Muslim English teacher in Banda (our last port of call before Ambon), Mr. Cinta, who told us he'd fled to Banda when the violence got really intense. Mr. Cinta met us on a Banda street one day, stopping his moped and smiling a hello. We struck up a conversation and the next thing we knew, he was inviting us to 'tour' Banda Neira with his school group. His students, he told us, would enjoy the English practice -- and they'd show us around the historical sites. They took us from the central museum to the canoe sheds, where carvers were hard at work preparing their crafts for the upcoming annual island races, to the wide waterfront streets where Dutch plantation owners built large homes with sprawling verandas, now overgrown and unoccupied (their plantations occupying the nearby, and larger, Lontar island).

Mr. Cinta and his students, with Lola and Jana

We learned many things that day in Banda, but Mr. Cinta's brief account of his abrupt departure from his home town of Ambon impacted us as much as anything else. He summed up the circumstances of his departure from Ambon succinctly: "If I stayed, I would be killed. So I left." Cause for caution, we thought, though Ambon has enjoyed relative peace in recent years.

The second impression came when left the Banda Sea, turning into  Ambon Bay between the two main peninsulas that comprise Ambon Island and seeking the protected port of Ambon City.

Trash along the shore of Ambon City -- with plenty floating in the river, too, posing navigational hazards

Instantly we were surrounded by trash, forcing us to carefully navigate in and out of garbage; never before had we seen so many bits of wood crates, plastic, netting, styrofoam, ramen wrappers, yoghurt containers, soda bottles. Some pieces of trash floated as isolated bits, while others were caught by eddies and currents and strung together over time: swirling masses of putrid waste. We crept up the inlet ever closer to Ambon City, wondering: What have we got ourselves into?

Ambon River

But we dropped our anchor in the midst of this filthy harbor and made ready for shore -- where we were confronted with more garbage: along the inner harbor, by waterfront homes, up riverbanks. We soon discovered that discarding our own trash ashore simply meant finding a pile (any old pile) and heaving our plastic onto it. Not something we ever became comfortable with -- but, with no other option, something we did. We sought out large rubbish containers, only to discover later that they were dumped on the side of the road (right next to the bins) by city-dwellers searching for useful items -- only to be refilled again. What use the receptacles were, we never did figure out.

Rubbish is an inescapable rudeness and affront in Indonesia -- and Ambon was, well, ugly.

*

Thus, stories of religious strife and the vast amount of trash we encountered first-hand shaped our early impressions of this city.

But we stayed long enough to look closer and soon discovered many things to enjoy in this crowded city of nearly 400,000 souls. The food was spectacular. The wireless worked. And the people were remarkably friendly -- despite our youngest having to endure far too many women pinching her soft white cheeks.

We dinghied ashore the first day and walked through a gritty, dark and downright stinky alleyway to arrive on a streetcorner bustling with more noise and traffic and smells than any place we'd been in a long, long while. Mango carts, bicycle guides (becaks), motorbikes, mopoed taxis (ojek), automobiles, pedestrians, taxis, bicyclists... all crowding together, many of them bucking the trend of the local (and sometimes, to us, indiscernible) traffic patterns.

Even now, after nearly a year since we arrived in SE Asia, I'm mesmerized by mopeds and other vehicles crowding the streets in this part of the world. Tual and Ambon introduced me to the frenzied driving (by the time we arrived in Bali, we were brave enough to enter the fray ourselves) -- and I still  stop on the sidewalk just to watch the traffic, a striking shift in scenery, compared to sailing in a ten-knot breeze.

*

Ambon streetside care

Our first mission upon arrival in Ambon was sorting our Internet connection. We were sent to the Telkom offices but arrived around 4pm to discover them closed. Sullen and hot, we started down the street, only to hear a man chasing after us: Internet? Come! I show you Internet. Bernie was skeptical and did not want to follow him, sure that we were being led to an Internet cafe -- which was not what we needed. But we really had no choice except to follow this enthusiastic individual, so we did.

He led us only a little way down the street to a red van. Two women emerged with their Telkom-mobile shop. I marvelled at the efficiency of this small troupe, watching as the Seussian thingamabob unfolded before our eyes: front doors and side doors opened, then out popped a display counter, and next came the folding table and chairs: - voila! --  Thing One and Thing Two had set up an Internet street-side access provider, just for us. Within twenty minutes we were up and running. And smiling.

*

Coast Guard vessels, right, in the evening light

When we went ashore the second day, we passed a Coast Guard ship with men waving vigorously -- and motioning for us to come. We hesitated, wanting to avoid an official scolding for any potential offense or violation of an unnamed rule that we had no way of knowing in this part of the world. We even tried to ignore them. But they kept hollering and waving -- and so we reluctantly motored closer and slowed near their boat. With very little English, they indicated we should come aboard. We hesitated again. But after a few more words in our very limited Bahasa and their very limited English -- and a lot of gesticulating -- it was established that we should come aboard and tie up our dinghy there, alongside their boat -- because it's safer. That part was easy to understand: they wanted to be sure we felt secure, and insisted we use their boat as our floating dock while in Ambon. We felt quite safe in this city so far, and we had no fears of leaving our dinghy at the nearby fishing dock, but we followed their friendly suggestion nonetheless.

On our first day aboard the Akelamo, Captain Djufri and his crew also insisted they help bring our washing to the laundromat, and soon they had lined up four mopeds streetside, inviting us to hop on. In the end, Jana declined the offer to board the back of a motorcycle and race through an unfamiliar city with a man she'd only just met (despite her parents' urging: go on, it'll be fun! -- sometimes it's good to have one sane person among the four of us), and instead she and I got a becak, the local cycle rickshaw, while Bernie and Lola happily sped off on motorbikes en route to the landromat.

View to Ambon houses from the Commonwealth War Cemetery

From that day forward, we went ashore many times, and we always tied up to the Coast Guard -- there were actually two vessels tied side-by-side, the Akelamo alongside a larger ship which we traversed each time. And we were always greeted by crew members who helped us carry our laundry, rubbish and groceries across their decks, and who courteously raised and lowered a long boarding ladder each time they saw us coming. We grew comfortable with the smiles and limited dialogue with Kiki, Dudi, Enjiel and Huong (who had the greatest smile of all).

During our stay, the Coasties also insisted on filling our water tanks, even urging us repeatedly to tie Momo alongside Akelamo for convenience, but we declined the generous offer because the angular curve of their considerable steel hull would damage our rigging (something we finally communicated via a pencil-on-napkin drawing).

Captain Djufri and his crew helped us with fuel as well -- taking us to a waterfront alleyway in Ambon lined with vendors whose shops are stocked with large barrels of diesel and petrol, and filling our jerry cans at Kiki's shop in an unusual hands-on funnel fashion. The shops were filled with containers -- full ones lined up on the ground, empty ones hanging from the ceilings --  plus small counters of candies on the side and family members emerging from various doors and hallways to say hello and check us out.

We have now come to realize that we're as much a curiosity to the locals as they are to us -- and we've grown accustomed to having our photo taken quite often by locals capturing the family in the dinghy, or the family walking down the street, or the family visiting the Islamic Theme Park (more on that forthcoming -- in the Malaysia tales).

But back in November 2013, having only arrived in Indonesia, we were still taking it all in and found ourselves marvelling at thecoordinated family operation for delivering fuel into our jerry cans, which involved a woman we assumed was Kiki's wife sharing the workload, squatting in her sarong and controlling the transfer of fuel from their large vats into our small cans. Meanwhile, there was a child relaxing on the counter, a parrot overseeing the whole process, other family members popping in and out to check on the curious strangers and smile at our children, various other small transactions happening in the corners of the shops, chickens wandering the alleyway, goats in nearby pens. And, of all things, a codger smoking cigarettes.

We had several exchanges over tea and biscuits, too -- some more successful than others. And near the end of our stay in Ambon, our new benefactors came to Momo for a visit, too, marveling, we think, at our cramped quarters and what my children decided was our underappreciated tea. Both Lola and Jana observed how our guests gingerly sipped small quantities and feigned that their thirst had been quenched, while Captain Djufri kept encouraging the one reluctant drinker to finish his cuppa -- which he promptly did, though all of them adamantly refused seconds.

*

Happy fruit vendor

We ate well in Ambon. We went back to the same two restaurants several times. We ate at Dedes because it's where we arrived on our first night out. When we asked our becak drivers (two passengers per vehicle) for a good restaurant, emphasizing we'd like to eat local ayam goreng (fried chicken), they drove us through a long stretch of the city outskirts and finally stopped at the palatial three-storied Kentucky Fried Chicken -- and, realizing our mistake, exclaimed, "No, no, we would like local food! Indonesian! Tidak American!" We were grateful when our drivers finally dropped us on the doorstep of Dedes, where we discovered delightful fish curry, squid barbecue and, yes, local fried chicken. The second restaurant became a favorite because they had the best nasi ayam goreng (essentially chicken fried rice) that we'd ever had. Lola always ordered two portions there, and when we told them it was our last visit after two weeks of frequenting their shop, they gave her a free watch from the counter at the entrance. Everywhere we went, we were greeted with smiles and generosity. And people who wanted to have their photos taken.

*

Jana pets an eel

Other highlights in Ambon included the day drive up the coast with the family on S/V Morning Glory, who also anchored in the harbor with us for a few days. On that excursion, we stopped at the Tulehu hot springs (we didn't swim) and the sacred eel pools at Waai (Jana got up close and personal with them, along with the kids from Morning Glory -- but she jumped back quite a bit when one became a little too friendly). We also stretched our legs at the very tidy Commonwealth War Cemetery, its manicured lawns and pruned gardens immaculately clean and in stark contrast to the rest of Ambon City.

Also, we'll not soon forget the jam-packed and bistering hot waterfront market, fireworks every night off our stern and the pre-dawn call to prayer, which, in the spirit of the Christmas season, was always answered, loud and garbled, by a nearby church. I've grown accustomed to the call to prayer. But I never expected to travel this far from home and be accosted by canned Christmas music.

4:30 AM in Ambon.

*

Other photos from our visit to Ambon below.

Ambon waterfront market

Locals gather at dusk at the city waterfront

Fuel shop in Ambon alley -- and the fuel was even clean! (photo by Lola Elvy)

Part diesel depot, part kiddie daycare -- fueling up in Ambon (photo by Lola Elvy)

Fuel alley, Ambon (photo by Lola Elvy)

Family fuel operations /vendors (photo by Lola Elvy)

Parrot overseeing the fuel op (photo by Lola Elvy)

All smiles in Ambon alley (photo by Lola Elvy)

Wild Phosphorescence (Ko Phaluai, Thailand)

September 29, 2014, 8:01 pm

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Pinnacle Beach, Ko Phaluai

While anchored in four meters of water in a bay on the north of a small Thai island (Ko Phaluai -- lat: 9.550345; long: 99.69351) the other night (28/29 Sept., 2014), I woke up around 1:00 AM to find the boat rocking a little bit, so I went out to check the direction of the wind. Well, there wasn’t any wind to speak of -- the boat was just moving a little, perhaps due to refracted swell (although it worth noting that we had not noticed any swell the previous day and conditions had been calm, so perhaps the movement was due to other reasons). But when I stuck my head out the hatch, I saw long lines of phosphorescence pulsing into the bay. This was definitely something we all had to see, so I woke up Michelle and the kids and we were soon on the foredeck watching a most amazing and mysterious light show.

The pulsing lines or waves were hundreds of meters long (as far as we could see), widely spaced, and maybe 8 meters wide, moving rapidly at a rate of about 3 pulses per second. These slightly curved waves of light were moderately bright and  "clean" -- that is, without disruptions or anomalies, all the same width, evenly spaced, all with the same uniform, undifferentiated, moderate level of phosphorescent glow. The entire effect was incredibly geometrical. Within the waves (and around them) we could also see an abundance of more “conventional” phosphorescence -- intense isolated flashes of green from individual organisms caused by agitation through wavelets and darting fish.

Phosphorescent pulses were emanating from a couple of points within the bay as well, not far from the boat.  They seemed to spin out like scythes from these points -- not points, really, but central areas that were perhaps 4 meters across.  Whenever pulses from different sources met, they flashed together and the train of pulses stopped. That is to say, the pulsing patterns never overlapped or extended beyond the line of contact with other pulsing patterns. It was as if their energies cancelled each other out. Meanwhile, the whole arrangement of pulsing light was slowly moving and shifting the entire time.

Then, around 2:00 AM -- we had been watching for approximately one hour -- the display abruptly ceased; the bay went dark first, while beyond the bay an indistinct glow persisted for a few minutes longer.

It is worth pointing out that we had noticed earlier that the water was very phosphorescently charged, so to speak.

Many years ago we saw something similar while sailing near Hawaii. In that case, we didn’t see waves or pulses of light but rather large (many meters across) sharply delineated angular patches of flashing phosphorescent that lit up the ocean surface.

These large patterned displays of phosphorescence seem almost other worldly. They are impossible for me to comprehend and very difficult describe.

Update:check out the following article"Phosphorescent Wheels: Fact or Fiction" by Peter Herring and Paul Horsman, which examines other accounts of such phenomena (thanks Nancy).

Cross-legged: A reflection on the bonding nature of cultural difference

October 20, 2014, 11:12 pm

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(a version of this essay was published in Takahe 82, August 2014)

Chief Watsoni of Makongai, with lunch

Fiji, 2009. I am sitting cross-legged on a mat woven from voivoi leaves with Watsoni, the village chief of Makogai Island in eastern Fiji, eating a Sunday lunch of crab, cassava and coconut cream. The cream is so good that it's not enough to dip my crab legs and cassava into it. I want more. So I reach for a spoon in the middle of the mat — halfway between the chief's daughter and me — dip it into my bowl and bring the rich white cream to my lips. As soon as I do it, I feel eyes on me. The daughter throws an inquisitive look across the mat.  “I love the coconut cream,” I offer, but it's not an adequate explanation for my breech of luncheon etiquette.  Her eyes grow brighter, and her mouth forms a wide grin, as if to say: “You silly kaivalagi! Why are you using a spoon when it's easier to drink right from your bowl?”

We have lived on our boat for nearly a decade. We’ve been exploring the Pacific for several years, making our way first to Mexico (where our second daughter was born), then to Hawaii, British Columbia, Alaska and finally back down to Mexico again and across the Pacific to New Zealand. This year, we set sail for Fiji, arriving in early June and expecting to spend the whole season exploring this island country. It’s now halfway through the season, and we've spent the last three months in the eastern part of the country. Makogai is the fifth Fijian village we've become acquainted with, and our simple but sumptuous meal with Chief Watsoni is at least my twentieth meal sitting cross-legged on a voivoi mat. By now, I feel somewhat acclimated to life in Fiji. I've become enchanted with the friendly people of these islands. I know how to wrap my sulu modestly around me before entering the village boundaries. I have learned how to grate coconut and make lolo. I am a connoisseur of kava. Even my children have come to crave the taro-leaf-coconut-cream standard meal in these parts. But no matter how much we embrace the culture, I am acutely aware in the moment I bring that spoon to my lips that there's still no getting around the basic fact that we are different.

Kalesi and Louise preparing a meal

I've sat with women on the floors of houses all across the South Pacific and prepared meals. The typical tool is a dull but strong knife which they employ as can opener, carver and shucker. A machete is more common than a butter knife, and more essential. Silverware is non-essential, as I've seen demonstrated time and again. A few weeks ago when three women from Koro Island's Nabuna Village spent a day on our boat fishing, they insisted at lunchtime that they prepare the meal. They had carefully packed taro root and cassava from home, already cooked and ready to eat. The only thing they required for the meal was a large pot, in which they boiled the fish whole with chili pepper and lime. When the meal was ready, I reached for bowls for individual servings, but they shook their heads: No,we don't need those. They fished out the largest specimens from their catch of the day, a dozen or so small reef fish averaging about five inches, placed them carefully into four bowls for us and poured the chili-lime broth over top. I gingerly picked at the paltry specimen looking up at me from my bowl, trying to pull the miniscule bits of meat from the fragile skeleton (with a fork).Meanwhile, my husband and daughters took their cue from our Fijian friends, who settled themselves comfortably into our cockpit and proceeded to devour their share with their hands from one large bowl, sucking and slurping at the bodies, heads, fins, tails and bones till there was nothing left but the juicy broth. This they consumed by passing the bowl around and sipping loudly, each in turn. Clean-up was simple that afternoon.

The Chief visits Momo

On another occasion, a group from Nabuna Village came to our boat to spend an evening. We drank grog and rum and told stories long into the night. They insisted on providing the entertainment, too, in the form of Fijian Music. We were looking forward to this: I had visions of ukuleles and drums and rhythmic handclapping. Instead, one of them produced a CD from a stained, sandy bag and asked me to put it into our player. I could barely tell which side was up, so mutilated was the once shiny disc. In no time, however, our new friends were swaying and beating their hands to the reggae-like music, wholly unaware of the scratches, pauses and skips in the line-up. Our new friends were happily humming along to “their” music — which ranged from UB40 to a local band who had recorded their music in Koro Island's recording studio — and they were proud to be sharing with us.

This led me to reflect on the pragmatism of these islanders. Everything they do is supremely practical. The make grog bowls out of old mooring balls and recycle large squares of wrapping paper for interior wall decorations. They have no use for shoes — Chief Watsoni of Makogai told us that he moved back to his island from the city of Levuka (a town of about 3000 residents) because, among other things, he was tired of wearing shoes (he tossed aside his watch, too). They even reuse old DVDs and CDs, making them into shiny adornments on their trees. Furniture is deemed unnecessary; all major activities happen on the mat, either inside or outside, as evidenced by the permanently bruised, swollen, and calloused talus: a tell-tale sign of a lifetime of sitting cross-legged, and a clear indication that we are from a different world.

Indeed, everything about the way these islanders move sets us apart. They seem deliberately slow in speech and contemplative to a degree that tries even the most patient of souls, but can climb a coconut palm before you can even utter the short syllables, “yes, please.”  We notice that even our children, who have grown up on a boat and are fairly adept at swinging, swimming and scaling vertical things, look ponderous and awkward in the presence of Fijian children.

But I do not mean to paint a single-sided, romantic picture of the “simple island life”, and our typical First World-Third World dichotomy would be misleading. Fijians have whatever 21st century technology they can get their hands on: cell phones, radios, televisions. They eagerly accept any movies we pass along. They rely on diesel-powered generators until 9 o'clock at night, after which the cell phone becomes even more important because of its accessory flashlight. Yet even though we come from a technologically advanced place, it is not our technology that draws them to us. What interests them about us is that we are culturally and socially different. And they welcome us into their lives precisely because of that difference.

I find myself reflecting on Robert Dean Frisbie's letters to his friend James Norman Hall, written in the early 1940s.[1]  Frisbie lived during the 1920s as the only white man on the island of Puka-Puka in the Cook Islands for many years, having married an islander and raised a family there. He spoke the native language, swam on the backs of turtles and understood the strange and complicated ceremonies constructed around island beliefs. He was immersed in island culture. And yet he understood that he was not one of them, and that he should not try to be, for the special nature of his relationship to Puka Pukans was defined by his very difference. “A white man in these islands must not go native”, wrote Frisbie:

It is a pleasant thought to dally with in civilization, a disastrous one to put into practice. When a white man goes native, the people brand him as being no better than themselves. Now, probably, he is no better; but if he goes native he will not be as good, and he will soon find that the natives look down on him. Why shouldn't they? He cannot compete with them in their own culture. He cannot catch fish as well as they, climb coconut palms, plant taro, catch a great turtle in the open sea — he can perform none of their tasks as well as they do. If he tries to do these things he makes himself ridiculous. Plainly, he is inferior to the natives.

Kalesi and her fish, about to become lunch

I can relate to that. When it comes to reef fishing, tree climbing or even just hiking around the island, we get sorely beaten every time (even with our rubberized protective footwear). We are not bendy like they are. We have a great big spear gun, but they catch more fish. We feel ridiculous quite often, even in the most modest challenges. We haven't even attempted to ride a great turtle.

 But even as we might feel awkward or ridiculous on their turf, we also sense a mutual respect, something Frisbie observed, too:

Natives want to be proud of “their” white man, as they call an epicurean like myself. They are disappointed if their white man does not live up to expectations. They want to admire him, brag about him, serve him in the grand manner.

Mele at the helm

Now this doesn't mean that we have to flaunt our “western” ways — they are revealed even without us trying. But it's true that islanders are just as curious about our ways as we are about theirs. We “brag” about our encounters to our friends back home, and they do the same. We noticed the gleam in the eye when, one after another, our new friends took turns at the helm when we sailed to a nearby anchorage together. Later during our visit, Mele confided that they usually do not board the visiting yachts in their bay, that we are the first people who stayed long enough to get to know them and invite them to our home. I can understand why this was special for them; just as we like visiting their homes and seeing their lives up close and personal, they were given the chance to peer into ours, too. We opened our home to them, which broke down one barrier between us. But at the same time, I'm sure we nevertheless “lived up to expectations” in our kaivalagi ways.  I liked the reciprocity here, and our extended visits with each other allowed them and us to view the “otherness” of our lives first-hand.

Frisbie chronicled the colourful differences between his own heritage and the native culture he adopted as his own. But he also wrote about the meaning in the exchanges across cultures. He pointed out that islanders' pride in “their” white man is a reflection on their own self-worth:

…it is of the utmost importance that a white man never ridicule the natives; never sneer at them or in any way humiliate them. If he does this, he is lost. He must remember that, in the last analysis, they are not glorifying him but glorifying in themselves.

Jana's new woven sunhat, on another visit to Fiji in 2013

I feel an immense sense of wellbeing from our encounters in South Pacific villages, and I wonder if it's because I sense on a rather basic level that we are each seeing the other culture, extending our respect, while also recognising the good in our own.  Our time in Fiji has been a cultural exchange in the best sense of the word. We are all a little richer from these interactions. Our close proximity to each other has laid open a path to appreciating another culture while at the same time honouring our own.

Frisbie's writing is of course dated, and our brief encounters with island culture do not compare with his nearly native existence. But I like the overall sentiment here, and I think about it every time I crumple myself awkwardly on the floor or instinctively reach for a spoon when I'm meant to drink from the bowl. I feel silly and inwardly admonish myself for my cultural clumsiness. I am constantly aware of my “privileged” heritage and tread lightly on what I perceive to be fragile Fijian turf. I often find the sharing of western wealth around these parts distasteful, dripping in a kind of cultural imperialism and superiority that I try my best not to perpetuate. I even shy away from the typical kaivalagi's predilection for colourful sulus and tattoos and flowers behind the ear — I recognise it's an attractive and easy way to express appreciation for something beautiful, but I also perceive it as a kind of cute fetishisation that makes me wary. I don't want to see island life as a novelty for me to wrap up and take home.

Kids and kava, back in 2009  -- all part of the cultural exchange

But then I think that perhaps what Frisbie was saying was this: that just as these encounters are special to us (and we proudly proclaim it with our flowers and sulus and tattoos), they are special to the islanders too. Because we are different. Because I ask them about their history and they ask me about my family. Because we wonder about the Good Friday Coup and they don’t wonder about leaders beyond their village boundaries. Because we can't remember all their children's names and they say, a little sadly, when they meet our daughters: “only two?” Because we ask to hear Fijian radio and they turn it on and play Michael Jackson. Because my five-year-old asks why they are brown and they in turn want to pinch her soft pink cheeks and stroke her straw-blonde hair. Because they think it's a pity we don't have cassava and taro where we come from, and I realise I favour a life filled with books over all the taro fields in Fiji. Because I regret that I can't climb a coconut tree yet still prefer using a spoon to sip my soup. And because they boil bananas and I fry them. There’s no escaping Louisa's good-natured guffaw as she passes the plate of fried banana fritters on to Manini, and then Kalesi, and then Liti. Each time they pass the plate, they tell about the crazy kaivalagi cooking up the bananas in a pan, and they laugh a little harder.

I don't admit that I eat those with a spoon, too.

[1] All quotations from Robert Dean Frisbie's letters taken from James Norman Hall, The Forgotten One and Other True Tales of the South Seas (1952: Little, Brown).

SE Asia Impressions: Bali Street Scenes March 2014

June 30, 2015, 7:22 pm

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We've been in SE Asia since November 2013 and now that we're looking at saying goodbye to this part of the world, it's high time we post some updates. A different world that we stepped into when we arrived in eastern Indonesia (see earlier posts about our the paperwork shuffle upon arrival in Tual, Indonesia and Ambon, Indonesia). From Tual, we traveled through the Spice Islands, Ambon, Komodo, Lombok and Bali over nine months. From Bali, we sailed north to Malaysia, and we've been in Malaysia and Thailand since July 2014, spending time on the peninsular east coast (up into the Gulf of Thailand) last year, and on the peninsular west coast since Christmas.

Here's a brief look back at Bali, where we spent too many months with engine repairs but also managed to settle into a life there that we grew to really love. These photos are various street scenes from around the time of Nyepi, the particularly Balinese Hindu 'Day of Silence' holiday that celebrates the new year according to the Balinese calendar (it fell in March in 2014 and 2015). 

Next post will include a closer look at Nyepi. 

SE Asia Impressions: Bali Nyepi, March 2014

July 1, 2015, 2:37 pm

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Continuing with our look back at our time in SE Asia, here are some photos from Nyepi.

Nyepi is a celebration of the new year, according to the Balinese calendar, and fell in March in both 2014 and 2015. It is a many-day celebration that includes various rituals, parades and colorful costumes. In preparation, villages and streets are cleaned, and offerings are made to gods and ancestors. Rice is used frequently and abundantly -- placed on alters, on faces, in the streets. Women carry tall baskets of food and fresh fruit on their heads; children don their village uniforms and play a central role, too. On the day of Nyepi, all of Bali turns out for solemn prayer at temples and parades to chase away demon spirits -- usually lurking at crossroads. Huge effigies of great monsters and demons are made of paper mache, flax and other materials and decorated lavishly; then, they are displayed on large floats made of bamboo scaffolding and supports, carried at dusk through the streets. This was our favorite part of the whole celebration: like Mardi Gras, Balinese style. A spectacular sight to behold, and a celebration with good cheer and powerful vibes.

We were in Ubud for Nyepi, and we took a day of rest, like the rest of Bali, from our engine work. We left Serangan Harbour and ensconced ourselves in a small guest house and enjoyed being in the heart of the celebration. A day ahead of time, we ordered food from a local restaurant, whose cooks put together gorgeous packets of fresh foods wrapped in banana leaves and placed neatly in hand-woven baskets (below). The food must be ordered ahead of time, as once nightfall comes no cooking or any work of any kind may be performed. On the night of Nyepi, the power is cut, and Bali spends 24 hrs in silence. No one uses any appliances. No one speaks. All energy is focused inward,while the silence also encourages the demons flying overhead to miss Bali and fly on to another island. A pleasant way to welcome the new year: a day of quiet, spiritual cleansing, with the happy knowledge that the evil spirits will be going someplace else for the remainder of the year.

Hotels make accommodations for guests, of course -- we did have power in our hotel, but we were warned not to leave the premises and go onto the streets. The only people on the streets are a few occasional village 'guardians' who look over the village and ensure no one is breaking the rules. We became friends with a taxi driver during our time in Bali, and Kitud was one of these guards for his small village; it was fascinating hearing how he had not slept the whole night when we saw him the next day, how he spent his night on duty. Below are some memorable floats and people from Nyepi 2014,