Author: cruisingrunner

August 4, 2014

Pago Pago ended up being fun for the kids, because in addition to Lady Carolina, there were two other kid boats in the harbor.  One was a boat called Wildlife with an Australian family who are now based in the Ha’apai group in Tonga, and they had a boy and girl, probably 14 and 12 or something like that.  The other was a boat called Moonjoos with some guys from South Africa, including a 15(?) year old nephew. 

The day after the storm the weather couldn’t have been more different.  The wind stopped, the rain stopped, and the sun even came out a bit.  So, we were able to proceed with our plans to celebrate Alex’s birthday with a BBQ on board Exodus.  The kids all came over and hung out, then we grilled up some burgers and dogs, then the kids went to shore to play while the adults drank and chatted on into the evening.  It was nice and relaxing, especially in contrast to the chaos of the previous night.  That was August 3rd, which meant the next day was Alex’s actual real birthday, and it was our intended last day in Pago Pago, since we had been tracking a weather window to leave for Tonga.  On Alex’s actual birthday I dragged the boys around for last minute provisioning, but don’t feel too sorry for Alex.  The day DID include lunch at McDonald’s and a bus ride that included all of the latest hip hop tunes.  I usually let the boys pick out presents for each other, so Brenden picked out a small speaker for Alex to use with his new iPod nano.  Yeah, we gave Alex a new nano for his birthday.  We were able to find one in a computer and electronics shop just outside Pago Pago.  He is really getting into music, and he wanted a nano so he can listen to music as he does dishes or moves about, since “his iPod doesn’t fit in his pocket.”

Originally posted August 4, 1014, by cruisingrunner

I just wasn’t feeling today’s run. It was a beautiful day with no rain and just a slight breeze. But every step took every bit of determination I could muster, and I did stop a few times to rest, under the guise of stopping to snap a few photos, of course. Maybe it was the searing sun, maybe it was the red wine I drank last night, or maybe it was my to do list clicking through my head since we are leaving for a two-day passage in the morning. But really, I think it was the feeling of dread I just couldn’t shake after hearing the news this morning that a boat we know of went aground on the reef in Suwarrow. Suwarrow. We were just there. I can picture the anchorage and the reef vividly in my mind, and I remember a sheltered anchorage with good holding even if there were scattered coral heads just dying to wrap the anchor chain. I don’t know all the details but either their anchor dragged, or their ground tackle failed and one minute they were just regular cruisers like the rest of us, and the next minute their world was ground to a halt. I don’t know if the vessel will be salvageable. Sometimes they are, but a lot of times they just become those underwater wrecks that we snorkel and dive on because they collect all sorts of marine life.

The thing is, we’ve all had close calls where we only scraped by with a little bit of luck. Pretty much everyone out here has such a story to tell. For us, our cruising journey could have ended within the first month if it weren’t for that little bit of luck finding us at just the right time. Our anchor dragged and we hadn’t started using an anchor alarm yet. Luckily it happened while 1) Tim and the boys were still awake, and 2) They were outside and in a position to notice rather than inside watching a movie or something. If it had happened after we were all in bed, we would have ended up on the rocks. I shudder to think of it.

My heart goes out to the people in Suwarrow.

-D.

Another excerpt from my cruisingrunner blog (https://cruisingrunner.wordpress.com/2015/03/23/cyclone-pam-and-our-worst-cruising-moments/)

Upon arrival, we found what we thought was a pretty good spot to anchor in a shallow patch near the “marina” with a good view of McDonald’s. The anchor set the first time and held steady as we backed down on it with both engines, and we were soon enjoying our safe arrival cocktails, reunited with Lady Carolina. Our first few days there we didn’t have any issues, so we thought Lady Carolina was being a little too precautionary by not ever leaving their boat unattended. We soon learned that they were not.

I think it was our third night that we dragged anchor in the middle of the night in moderate winds. This was the first time we had dragged since getting the new Rocna (and the only time since, I might add). And while it was a pain, because OF COURSE these sorts of things always happen at night, it really wasn’t too much of an issue, because we learned our lessons about dragging a long time ago. We had the anchor alarm set, it woke us up, we reset the anchor (OF COURSE it didn’t set the first time since it was the middle of the night, and it was raining). Close to daybreak the anchor alarm went off again, and we went through re-anchoring process again. I stayed up at that point, because while I’m talking this down like it was no big deal at this point, anchor dragging is ALWAYS a big deal, and my nerves were a bit shot. The anchor alarm kept going off as Exodus continued to slowly drag back again, but I let Tim sleep and figured we could reset again in the morning, which we did. But at the time when the sun came up, we were about 100-150 ft back of where we had been the night before, and don’t think the boat behind us didn’t notice. I got a VHF call from them in the morning, and they very politely let me know that we seemed a bit closer to them this morning than we had been before.

After that we went another couple days without incident. Except for the rain. Have I mentioned the rain yet? It rained pretty much the whole time we were in Pago Pago. Sometimes just light showers, sometimes torrential downpours, but I think the only day it didn’t rain was our very last full day there, which just happened to be my son’s 13th birthday. Anyway, after a couple days with a firmly set anchor I was spending the day at the laundromat doing about 10 loads of laundry. Our friends from Lady Carolina joined me, and after having had their own anchor firmly set for over a week, this was the first time they had left the kids alone on the boat. So, of course, all hell broke loose.

They got the radio call from their son that their anchor was dragging, so Steve, Father and Captain, rushed back out to the boat. From my own little handheld VHF radio I was monitoring traffic after that, and I gathered that they were tying up to a huge industrial mooring, since they couldn’t seem to get the anchor reset. Just when it all sounds like it’s going fine, and I’m settling in to wait for my clothes to be done in the dryer by watching the most excellent movie they are showing that is called “Sharknado,” I pick up half of a VHF conversation between Steve (Lady Carolina) and Brenden, my youngest son who was left alone on Exodus while my husband and older son went to help Lady Carolina.

All I can hear is:

Steve: “Not now Brenden”

-Pause-

Steve: “Oh! Well, can you start the engines?”

-Pause-

Steve: “OK, Alex will be right back to help.”

That’s right. Exodus picked this exact moment to ALSO start dragging anchor. Being stuck at the Laundromat watching low budget sci-fi movies during a crisis like this has its advantages. Admittedly, there was NOTHING I could do, so all I did was listen and wait. Eventually, I heard that my husband was back on Exodus and together with help from the boys got the anchor reset. The story I heard later was that Brenden had gotten the engines started, but was at a loss of what to do after that, so he grabbed a fender from one of the lockers and was running around the boat prepared to fend off anything we might hit. Comical. Alex was able to rev forward enough on the engines to hold Exodus in place, so Brenden didn’t actually have to use his fender and together they kept Exodus safe until their dad was able to come take over. Later, we noticed the boat behind us had put out all of their fenders as well. Probably a good precaution.

It’s a funny story now, but if only that were the end of it. We knew the weather forecast for that night was pretty grim, with the gribs predicting 25+ knots, which usually means much higher. There was lots of radio chatter about the forecast, and one of the boats even decided to just leave and face the weather out in the open ocean rather than in the confined harbor with boats dragging all over the place. Tim always says, “It’s not the ocean that’s dangerous, it’s all the hard stuff around the edges.”

Anyway, of course the winds started to pick up as the sun went down. And shortly after that the calls for help on the VHF started. First, a vessel near the back of the harbor called Pago Pago Port Control to let them know there were two boats dragging, both unattended. One of the dragging boats had actually fouled the anchor of another boat, but luckily that boat had its crew on board and they were able to free themselves. The other dragging boat was at the very, very back of the anchorage on a mooring ball. Port Control never responded. A bit later, a call came from a fellow Lagoon catamaran that was anchored in front of Lady Carolina’s industrial mooring. Apparently, they were dragging and then their windlass cut out so they couldn’t raise the anchor. Tim jumped in the dinghy to go help, and together with a skipper from another vessel they were able to get the situation under control. They radioed Port Control to see if there was somewhere along a dock they could tie up to for the rest of the night. Again, no answer. So, they just tied up to a tug boat that was tied to the quarantine dock. They figured they would ask forgiveness in the morning, if necessary.

Later, Exodus got into the dragging fun. We basically just got into a routine of monitoring the anchor alarm as we slowly dragged back and then at some threshold we would raise anchor and reset and repeat. The wind topped out in the 45 kts sustained range, and to top it off, it rained cats and dogs, so every time we had to reanchor, Tim had to go get wet. It was a long night, and the when the sun came out the next morning, it was a very welcome sight.

This was a pretty big storm, felt across a large area of The Pacific Ocean. In fact, this same night when we were dragging anchor, resetting, and repeating, another vessel in the atoll of Suwarrow in The Cook Islands went aground. Although the two people on board were safe, the vessel was lost. So, aside from the foul bottom, Pago Pago is actually a pretty decent place to weather out a storm like this. The shape of the harbor eliminated any substantial fetch and probably protected us from even higher wind speeds.

Something that I totally forgot to mention in the blog post, was that the night when we were dragging, Tim tried something new with the anchor that did seem to help a bit, althought it’s hard to say for sure.  He basically attached our mushroom dinghy anchor to the anchor chain near the main anchor.  This is referred to as a “kellet” anchor, and apparently it enjoys a bit of controversy regarding how effective it really is.  Here’s a link to some info: http://www.coastalboating.net/Cruising/Seamanship/Anchoring/Kellets.html

Although not the most effective way to improve your anchoring situation (a heavier main anchor and more chain out is ALWAYS better), in a situation where your options are limited a kellet is certainly worth a shot.  The theory is sound in that it should provide SOME benefit, how much benefit and whether that benefit is overall negligible depends on many, many factors.  Like I said, using it that night seemed to help, but it could just be that the main anchor itself set better, so we will never know for sure.

Originally posted August 1, 2014, by cruisingrunner

Pago Pago is the capital of American Samoa, an overseas U.S. territory in the south pacific. Before we left home, I didn’t even know the U.S. had a territory in the South Pacific, and it wasn’t until we arrived just a few days ago that I started wondering how and why that came about. I assumed it had something to do with WWII, given the Pacific was such a huge theater in that war, but I was wrong about that. It actually goes way back to around the turn century, after the Spanish-American War but before WWI, when the U.S. was getting its first tastes of imperialism. Apparently, the U.S. liked this location as a refueling station for coal burning ships, and a dispute with Germany put that access at risk. The dispute was settled with a treaty that granted Germany the western islands of Samoa and the U.S. the eastern islands (nevermind what the Samoans actually wanted). After that the eastern Samoan islands became known as American Samoa and were pretty much under occupation by the U.S. Navy. The last King of Samoa was strong armed into stepping down and agreeing that there would never be another King. It was, after all, incompatible with the U.S.’s constitutional democracy.

Today, it is still known as American Samoa, and I find it a bit like a paradox between American and Samoan cultures. In many ways, it’s very American:
1) The “golden arches” are gracing the edge of the harbor, and we can see them from our boat in the anchorage
2) A costco style warehouse store has most things you’d find at a costco. They even have Tim’s favorite vanilla coffee mate creamer. (We never did find that in Mexico) and Honey Nut Cheerios.
3) There is a Starkist Tuna processing plant. I’m not even sure if Starkist is American, but it sure seems like it.

4) The national currency is the U.S. dollar.
5) Everyone speaks English.
6) There are coin operated do it yourself laundromats.

However, in other ways, it’s nothing like being in the U.S.
1) The infrastructure (roads, buildings, etc.) are much more run down. Better than many places in Mexico, but nothing like the U.S.
2) The men wear skirts, the traditional Samoan dress known as the “lava lava.”
3) There are stray dogs everywhere.
4) There is lots of chatter on VHF channel 16. The USCG would quickly smack that down.

5) Everyone speaks Samoan.
6) There is a totally unscheduled, public bus system. But the buses run so frequently, you never have to wait long. They play excruciatingly loud music, and they will even drop you off somewhere off the route if you ask.
7) They have graves in their front yards. We saw this also in Mauptit, French Polynesia, but only Maupiti.
8) There is trash everywhere. There’s an aggressive ad campaign (billboards and radio ads) to reduce littering, so maybe it’s getting better, but it’s still pretty bad.

9) The Samoan people are very friendly.

I finally got out for a run this morning. Yes, this is our 4th day here, but I had an excuse every day:
Day 1 – I had to walk around town to 5 different government offices (The Port Captain, Customs, Health, Port Security, and Immigration) to fully clear into the country. Then when I got back to the boat and was unloading my pack I realized I only had 3 passports. Panic!!! I had to go back to the immigration office, where our 4th passport was still in the photocopy machine.
Day 2 – I was hungover. I know, I know, terrible excuse, but we had the most enjoyable potluck on one of the other boats and the evening ended with just us and our hosts sipping Drambuie and having pleasant conversation. We didn’t get home until after midnight. We did rent a car and do heavy provisioning, so I did torture myself for my late night imbibing, just not with a run.
Day 3 – We were awakened at 4am by our anchor alarm and found we were dragging and had to reanchor. It took a couple tries to reset, and after that I stayed on anchor watch while Tim went back to bed.

I finally ran today, on day 4, and I headed around the bay to the other side. I didn’t really think this through. My rationale was I had already driven the other way, so I knew what was over there, but what I failed to realize was that I would end up right by the Starkist Tuna plant. And in case you were wondering, it smells even worse up close. Then, on the way back I was caught in a torrential downpour. Have I mentioned I hate running in the rain?

-D.

Originally posted July 30, 2014, by cruisingrunner

In my last post before we left Suwarrow I presented the picture of a jerk, a real jackass, if you will. He is one part passive aggressive victim and one part out and out jerk bent on making the net controller’s life miserable. Of course, in painting this picture, I fell into the fallacy of treating human nature as black and white. Two-dimensional. Good and bad. This is not real life, and I can’t believe I did this, because a proper treatment of the complexity of our species is something I’ve always appreciated in art. In movies like “Crash” and even TV series like “Lost” (the first season anyway, before it “jumped the shark.”) you sometimes lose track of who’s good and who’s bad, and isn’t that real life anyway? We all have good and bad in us, and we all have shining moments and then the duller ones we’d like to sweep under the rug but can’t because they are a part of us too.

On one of the evening radio nets during our current passage, someone underway, much further south of us, asked if anyone had weather information for his area. I was only half listening, I had a poor copy on him after all, and I was also simultaneously preparing dinner. Nevermind that I HAD downloaded weather only a half an hour before, but I didn’t really hear where he was, and I just really couldn’t be bothered. Well, after the net was over, Mr. Jackass, who must have been listening the whole time even though he didn’t check in, called the vessel requesting weather and told him he’d download it right away, so stay on frequency and he would get back to him. Who’s the jackass now?

I’m sure this guy, this “jackass” has many sides and many angles, just like all of us. That doesn’t mean he isn’t as annoying as all hell on the net sometimes, it just means he doesn’t deserve to be painted as a two dimensional cartoon character.

We should arrive in Pago Pago, American Samoa late this afternoon. Since I haven’t really had a proper run since Mopelia, I am looking forward to stretching my legs on a road, rather than on sand, rocks, and coral.

-D.

July 26-29, 2014

When we left Suwarrow, we were part of a community, with most of the boats going to Apia, Western Samoa, and a few heading for Pago Pago, American Samoa.  Lady Carolina was in Pago Pago and True Blue V was in Apia, so we decided to let the weather decide our ultimate destination.

We left towards the back of the pack at about 10 am July 26th, and by noon, both engines were off, and we were sailing along nicely.  Then by 7 pm we had over 20 knots forward of the beam and we were reefed down and still pushing a speed over ground of 8 knots.  It wasn’t exactly comfortable, but it’s always nice to see the miles tick away, especially at the beginning of a long passage.  On the SSB radio net, all of our monohull friends were really complaining about how uncomfortable it was, so either they are just bigger whiners or catamarans ARE more comfortable.  At least in these conditions.  Even though the seas were bigger this passage, Brenden and I weren’t feeling nearly as bad as on our passage from Mopelia to Suwarrow.  It’s not always about the size of the seas, but the direction and frequency.  Random, high freqency, beam on swells are very uncomfortable in Exodus.

By 6 pm the second evening (July 27th) the wind had shifted behind us, and we were moving along nicely under headsail alone, but that didn’t last long.  The night brought sporadic wind and lots of squalls, and by morning (July 28th) we were motoring without sails. Unfortunately, our configuration stayed that way for about a full 24 hours.  At this point we knew we’d be going to Pago Pago since the wind wasn’t cooperating for us to make it all the way to Apia.

We finally got wind again the following morning (July 29th).  It was pleasant sailing for a brief time, but then conditions deteriorated, and we got seriously slammed on our final approach.  After motoring for a day we were so happy to get wind again, but sometimes you have to be careful what you wish for.   By the time we passed by the east tip of the island we had 25-30 kts of wind, 4-5 meter seas (the biggest we’ve seen since our San Felipe passage), pouring down rain, and fog.  And to top it off we had a 2+ kt current pushing us north making it hard to round the island.  We still had to use the engines in order to point at our destination!  We were close enough that we had VHF ratio contact with Lady Carolina, which made those last few hours a little more tolerable.  It was seriously uncomfortable and we couldn’t get there quick enough, but it was never scary.

When we made the turn into Pago pago harbor, the sea state changed instantly and we had a nice motor to the anchorage, except for the fact that it was so foggy we could barely see.  My log keeping wasn’t very good on this passage, and I don’t really remember the details, but by the time we arrived BOTH of our head sails were torn, so we limped to the anchorage with scars to document our experience.

Originally posted on July 25, 2014, by cruisingrunner

We’ve observed, and we’re not the only ones, that the cruising community as a whole is more friendly, relaxed, and fun to be around than society at large. There is less stress and more free time (except for all the boat projects) than back at home, and it really shows. Unfortunately, as with any cross-section of society, there are jackasses out here too. But at least for me they stand out more, and I also find them more amusing now than irritating, which may be a reflection of my own shift in outlook since becoming a cruiser.

Well, there is this one particularly amusing fellow on one of the morning SSB radio nets [note 1] that just has me floored. We first noticed him the morning they announced that they would be starting up a new net for all the boats west of Bora Bora. This makes a lot of sense as the fleet gets more spread out over more time zones, and it will also make each net a bit shorter in duration, and people can decide if they want to listen to one or both or neither. I was immediately on board, not that it mattered, even if I wasn’t it certainly wasn’t my place to make any judgments, and I certainly would never have complained. Well, this amusing fellow was obviously not happy about this at all. He made sure that he was, “on the record,” as severely disagreeing with this decision. He kept saying, “Why are you trying to divide the community!?!” He wasn’t constructive. He wasn’t nice about it. He was just sour. We listened to him rant on and on, and Tim astutely observed, “What a jackass!” I have a real problem with people who complain over volunteer activities when they themselves aren’t doing any of the volunteering. It used to irk me back in our Little League days, and it irks me now as well. And now we notice him when he checks in, and wow, what a jerk. I hope we don’t ever run in to that guy.

I was a little bit cranky during my run today, which may be why I’m a bit spun up about the jackass. I’m sure I was partly cranky because it was so hot out, about 31 deg C. But also a bit because we are preparing to leave Suwarrow tomorrow. Not that I’m particularly attached to Suwarrow, I mean it’s very nice and everything, but so is everywhere we go these days. It’s just that I’m getting a little dissatisfied with the pace we are having to move. When we were in Mexico, we had all the time in the world, and we got the chance to plant ourselves in a few places for awhile. Here it’s go, go, go, because it’s a big ocean, and there’s so many places to go and only so many months in the cruising season before we have to leave the tropics to avoid the cyclones.

We will spend a couple of months in Tonga, and I am really looking forward to that.

-D.

[note 1] SSB stands for Single Side Band and it’s basically a type of HF radio, just like a HAM radio. We use it for long range communication out here, and cruisers often organize daily radio nets where we can connect and share information on weather, destinations, or whatever.

For a follow up see Who’s the Jackass Now?