Rangiroa to Oahu - Week 2

noon, Saturday - December 21 05 30.4N / 157 17.4W Week 2 of our passage from Rangiroa, French Polynesia to Oahu, Hawaii has been much better than week 1. Conditions have been mostly benign, wind direction and resulting speed have been good. We ended up sailing 880 miles, vmg 855, maybe our best...

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Rangiroa to Oahu - Week 1

noon, Saturday - December 14 08 20.6S / 150.56.1W As planned, we left Rangiroa, French Polynesia for Hawaii (Oahu) on December 7. We thought we weren't going to make our tidal gate as our windlass failed and the chain had to be pulled up manually, which, due to complications, took about two hours....

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Rangiroa

Our gear cable and throttle problem luckily turned out to just be an adjustment and after stocking up on yet more fresh baguettes, we left Ra'iatea enroute to Rangiroa, about 250 miles to the northeast. We were now leaving the Society Islands and heading east towards the Tuamotus, another of the five...

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Bora Bora

We were stuck in the boatyard in Ra'iatea for almost four weeks waiting for our new gearbox. We'd been able to locate one in Australia (we'd highly recommend Minard's Diesel, with whom we've done business before, as a source for Yanmar parts in the South Pacific). It arrived, by air, in just two days...

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Hawaiki Nui

There was a silver lining to being stuck here in the boatyard on Ra'iatea waiting for a new gearbox to arrive. It meant we'd be around to view the arrival of Hawaiki Nui, the annual interisland outrigger canoe race between Huahine, Ra'iatea, Taha'a and Bora Bora. This is a really big multi-day event,...

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Ra'iatea - Boatyard Blues

Yes, the title of this post is correct. We're back in Ra'iatea and unfortunately stuck in a boatyard. Before leaving Hurepiti Bay, Tahaa enroute for Bora-Bora, our pre-departure check of the engine room showed a lot of oil had sprayed out from somewhere. Further investigation revealed that it was gear...

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Ra'iatea/Taha'a

From Huahine, the next islands westward are Ra'iatea and Taha'a, just a short twenty or so miles away. There are eight entrances through the barrier reef into the large, deep lagoon which both islands share. Taha'a, the smaller, northern island can be circumnavigated within the lagoon while you can't...

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Huahine

Our favourite island so far has been Huahine. It's one of the leeward islands, Iles sous le Vent, about ninety miles west from Tahiti/Moorea. The distance meant an overnight passage which was uneventful, the best kind. We wanted to arrive at dawn to ensure a daylight entry through the pass. Our approach...

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