Month: June 2015

June 26, 2015

We’re in Fiji now, tied up in the strange but wonderful marina at Vuda Point (pronounced “Vunda”). I’m happy now, with a big smile, but this is how I looked for most of the passage from New Caledonia to Fiji. I shouldn’t complain. It wasn’t as bad as it could have been, but that’s kind of like banging your head against a plaster wall versus a brick wall. Plaster’s a little softer, but it still hurts!

By not as bad as it could have been, I mean that a 750 mile sail against the trades can be really bad, or even impossible. We had a pretty good weather window – probably as good as we could have asked for, and a brilliant weather router – Bob McDavitt. The wind was on the beam the whole way – never going forward into I-want-to-die land. Yet still, it made my face looked like this kid’s for five days and ten hours (it actually still looked like this as we sat on a quarantine buoy, bouncing around in the waves, awaiting clearance).

For me, this life out here can be so much worse than any life I’ve experienced on land. And it can be so much better too. It’s the so-much-better parts that makes me forget about the so much worse parts.

During this passage, I told Cyndi I never wanted to do this again. She suggested I wait until after we were in before making any life-changing decisions. Probably a good idea, I guess, but I maybe I shouldn’t wait. If I wait until even one beautiful bay, or one wonderful evening with friends, I’d end up making another passage and swearing that I’ll never do it again. A vicious cycle!

If I’m honest with myself, at times, my life on land was much worse than a passage. Times like when clients didn’t pay and we worried about where our next house payment would come from, or times when it looked like there’d never be any work for me again. We always managed to make the payment, and find a project. I’d forget about the bad times and the cycle would continue (hum, sounding familiar?).

Anyway, I’m already telling myself that this last passage wasn’t so bad (hard feelings cured by lunch and drinks with wonderful friends after our customs clearance). My passage face is gone, at least until December and the next passage, but lets not think about that now! -Rich

P.S. Are passages really equivalent to having the flu? See this link.

June 16 and 17, 2015

(A rare current post from Cyndi)

New Cal is not just about visiting its little islands. The main island Grand Terre, 215 miles long, is beautiful in its own right and worth at least one big road trip (or several little ones which is how we prefer to travel).

We had a few options for a car trip, but a great internet deal made the decision easy: a night at the Sheraton New Caledonia Deva Resort was available for a great price. It was about a 2-hour drive north, and there were several places we could visit along the way. Baie des Tortues, La Roche Percee, Poe Beach, Bourail, Sarramea’s La Cuve pools and cascades were all worth a visit. Plus it was definitely worthwhile spending a night in the Sheraton, quite a fantastic sight in itself.

We have a lot more we hope to see on both Grand Terre and the surrounding islands of New Caledonia. So why did we leave for Fiji a few days later? The main reason is we only have a 3-month visa in New Cal. That means within that time we need to find a weather window to our next destination and be gone by August 16.

If we were going on to Vanuatu, this wouldn’t be much of a problem as weather windows do come around periodically. We could probably safely start looking by the end of July to be gone by mid August.

Fiji, on the other hand, has very infrequent suitable weather windows; so we needed to start looking earlier. A window came long on June 20, and we decided to go for it. We could have gambled and waited longer, but it starts to feel more and more like the clock is ticking and we’d be nervous about whether another suitable window would come along.

We’d gone back and forth on going to Vanuatu this year, but with the post-cyclone rise in malaria and dengue fever, we’ve decided to stick with our original decision to see it next year. Meanwhile, we have yet to see the west side of Fiji and now seems like a great time to start.

Whether we’ll be back to New Cal this season remains to be seen, but we will definitely be back at some point. We love this place and don’t feel anywhere near done. We’ll just have to wait and see what happens.

Below, a gallery from our New Cal road trip, including a few pictures of that wonderful Sheraton Resort. It’s new and has a few wrinkles to iron out, but the place is gorgeous! –Cyndi

June 20, 2015

I’m so sad to be leaving New Caledonia and especially Noumea. But leave we must. We’re heading to Fiji. It’s a bit of an uphill trip (into the prevailing winds) but with the front moving through, it might not be too bad. -Rich

We’ll check in on YIT… here

June 18, 2015

I’m not really afraid of dying out here, nor of serious injury. I am terrified of discomfort.

A lot of people don’t seem to have what I consider an adequate fear of discomfort (or I guess I might have too much). First off: discomfort is uncomfortable, but secondly, it’s expensive. The conditions that make me uncomfortable also tend to break expensive gear—after all, there’s no such thing as inexpensive gear on a boat!

My perhaps-more-than-adequate fear of discomfort keeps me in port during marginal weather windows, prompts me to use a professional weather router like Bob McDavitt, and, if I manage to avoid enough discomfort, even keeps my marriage intact!

“Why are you talking about this all of the sudden? Are you uncomfortable?”

No, we’re fine. In fact, as I write this, we’re comfortably tied up in a slip in Noumea, safely out of the weather. However, we’re looking at weather windows to sail to Fiji, watching boats come and go in weather we’d never venture out into of our own free will. I guess they have a greater tolerance for discomfort, an inadequate fear of it, or lots of cash to replace the broken stuff.

June 15, 2015

We get a “slide show” every time we use our computer, and it’s fun.

(Windows tip. Sorry Mac-ers – but there’s probably a way to do this on a Mac that I just don’t know about… and it’s probably easier than this!)

There’s a little gadget that comes with Windows called Slide Show. To put it on our desktop, right click anywhere on the desktop, select Gadgets and then Slide Show. Oh wait, there’s another step. Hover your mouse over the Slide Show gadget once it’s on your desktop, and select the wrench icon that appears. From there, select the folder that has the pictures you want. We like the “Shuffle Pictures” box checked.

Now there’s another trick. When a picture comes up that you like, you can select the right, enlarge button that faintly appears at the bottom of the Slide Show gadget. From there, you can step through your pictures (we mostly do it to find out where a picture was taken) or right click on an image you love, select Locate on Disk and then, once you see that picture in it’s folder, right click on it and select Set as Desktop Background.

Warning: sometimes, when there’s less than exciting work to be done on the computer, we can distract ourselves for hours by wandering through pictures from our cruise. -Rich