December 2019

Date: December 2019

Position: Niku Hiva, Marquesas, South Pacific

Bon jour from French Polynesia again!

Captain Bonzo here with an update from Ari B!  For those of you who don’t know me, I am the Captain of Ari B, a multitalented stuffed dog, that speaks 5 languages, has sailed half way round the world and barks orders. I also write the newsletters for Alex and Carla....

By the way, if you have sent emails and didn’t get responses from A&C, that is due to the lack of internet access in the Tuamotus, and by the time they had access, the messages were 2 months old! Apologies from our side.

When we last wrote to you, we had been in the Tuamotus for a month or so and had all sorts of weather – mostly windy and unsettled, so I am happy to report that this did not continue and after the storm had passed through in June, the weather settled down and everybody was enjoying the nice weather and calmer seas.

Makemo’s festival was attended by a good few cruisers and the Miss Makemo contest on the night was quite a show! Alex had to have his photo taken with the previous Miss Makemo winners and Carla, not to be outdone, got her photo taken with one of the oiled up young men who were escorting this year’s contestants to and from the stage. We were now travelling in a loose group of around 6 boats, and after the Makemo events spent a few days at the North pass to dive and snorkel. A nice weather window provided a pleasant day sail to Tahanea, an uninhabited Atoll some 45 miles south. We spent a few weeks there with some incredible diving and snorkelling in the 3 passes and we collected spider conch to add a little more variety to the food. Carla celebrated her birthday with a party and a fire on the beach together with our friends from 5 other boats. At Tahanea we said goodbye to catamarans Making Memories and Gemini Sunset as they headed to Tahiti.

The rest of us headed to Fakarava, one of the more “touristy” atolls, but much to our surprise, it was fabulous – really laid back with a great kite spot and a world class dive spot within 5 miles of each other. The south pass in Fakarava, Passe Tumakohua, is famous and renowned as one of the top dive spots in the world. It is especially known for the large concentration of grey reef sharks that inhabit the pass, together with white tips, black tips, silver tips and occasional hammerheads. Carla dove the pass several times and reported seeing literally hundreds of sharks. There is a small cave at 27m where you can stop and watch the sharks just a couple of metres away...so close that you can see abrasions on their skin and small fish cleaning the sharks teeth. After a few days of diving, the wind was reported to be getting stronger so we headed over to Harifa, a great kiting spot with a small kiting school run from a catamaran and really good holding in sand behind the motu (small island). After a couple of days and a few tips from fellow kiters, everything finally clicked for Alex and his days of Carla rescuing him in the dinghy are a thing of the past. The other nice thing about Fakarava atoll is that it has a buoyed, lit channel from one end of the atoll to the other, so when it is time to stock up on supplies you can sail 30 miles inside the atoll in flat water to the village. A supply boat arrives every Wednesday bringing in fresh fruit and vegetables from Tahiti. Here it was time to part company with more friends, Miraj, Moondust and Kisu, and it was down to just us and Alia Vita.

Next stop was Toao just a short sail from Fakarava where we moored on a buoy in Anse Amyot which is a false pass on the north west side of the atoll. A family lives on the motu during the non-cyclone season together with some pigs, dogs and cats, and they provide meals for the passing cruisers, including their own fresh roast pork and lobsters from the reef. Carla did some diving with Alia Vita but it didn’t really match up after Fakarava.

All too soon it was time to head to Tahiti so that the crew could fly to Europe, visit family and stock up with boat parts. We were fortunate enough to get a berth in Marina Taina -French Polynesia changed the rules a couple of years ago allowing boats to stay 3 years rather than the previous 3 months so marine resources are now completely overwhelmed. The crew had a great time in the UK, Alex flew to Austria to see his parents, and they managed to catch up with some friends. Unfortunately time was restricted so apologies to those of you that they didn’t get time to see. A big thank you to Carla’s Mum, Lucja, whose hospitality was fantastic as always.

A month later, back in Tahiti, and after some restocking in the huge Carrefour, a perfect weather window allowed us to sail direct to Fakarava. The weather was glorious and we spent beautiful days walking the outside reef (right on the very edge, a couple of metres from deep ocean one side and shallow lagoon the other), snorkelling and kiting. Carla bought some kiting gear in the UK and practised a lot with the training kite on the beach but not yet in the water. Luckily another perfect weather window presented itself and we were able to sail east direct to Raroia, Carla even caught a big tuna on the way, plus a marlin that fortunately shook the hook loose!

The team then enjoyed another couple of weeks in Raroia atoll, hunted crab and octopus, went snorkelling and kitesurfing. Unfortunately we hit a submerged bouy (not happy about that) and did some damage to the propeller. So it was Alex’s turn to use our homemade hookah (dive regulator with 20m hose connected to a fishpond pump that sits on deck and supplies the air to the diver underneath the hull. Technical design: Tim on Wild Bird) to go in the water and ding the prop back into shape where possible. The challenge in Raroia is that the atoll is inhabited by lots and lots of very curious blacktip reefsharks – not usually aggressive or dangerous to humans, but they are very nosey and come very close to see what you are and if you can possibly be eaten. The hammering of the propeller was obviously heard a long way away and shortly after work commenced, 12 sharks circled Ari B, wondering what was going on. Mercifully Alex was too busy to see more than 2 or 3 at a time....

The pesky sharks are also quite a distraction when you are going kiting! Ok for Alex now, as he chases them across the shallow lagoon, in full control of his kite and board, but not so for Carla. It seemed she had problems concentrating on her kite movements when she went for her first water session – there were 5 sharks within a 10 meter radius, wondering what that contraption entering the water was. They lost interest soon, and Carla had her first dunking... J She managed to body drag upwind but then crashed the kite and no amount of trying would relaunch it. She returned to the boat sulking and licking her wounds. A few hours later I spied her watching the kite surfing instruction videos again so looks like she hasn’t given up yet.

Eventually a ‘weather window’ presented itself for us to make the 420 mile trip northeast to the Marquesas. This is a difficult trip and the prevailing winds at this time of year are northeast especially the further north you go. So we picked a window with predominantly easterly winds and even some south in the east at times. As always, the weather forecast turned out to be completely wrong, and we battled against 30 knot squalls that kept heading us and once they were through, left us with hardly any wind and a horrendous sea state which meant we could not make headway. The conditions were tough on the boat, with some minor damage to rigging, which we are in the process of fixing. Carla did however manage to catch two huge yellowfin tuna, one of which she released J, as the freezers were already pretty full with crab and octopus.

Having arrived in the Marquesas, we caught up with John and Bev on Dandelion and diving commenced – and what a delight, the visibility was much better than when we were here 6 months ago and they spent entire dives with groups of manta rays and hammerhead sharks – Carla wouldn’t shut up in her excitement after seeing her first hammerhead and Alex threatened to bait the sharks next time she goes in the water!

The local people were getting ready for the big Marquesas festival, celebrating their culture, music and traditions – and they were staging a dress rehearsal in a village not far from town, so we upped anchor and the team arrived at the venue at about 09.30 – and were almost the first people there – the event didn’t kick off properly until mid afternoon. I was advised not to attend, as the locals were cannibals not too long ago, and who knows what they’d make of a stuffed dog than can talk. The team returned full of excitement of the amazing drums, dances and rituals. There is no doubt that if they had encountered such fierce warriors outside a festival, they would have run for their lives!!!! As pictures say more than a thousand words, we have uploaded a short video to facebook. The locals are also amazing tattoo artists, using traditional techniques to produce their ink and break the skin using a small blade and hammer – no machines in sight!

French Polynesia is a truly remarkable area of geographical diversity that has to be seen to be believed. For example:

The Marquesas, Tahiti and the Tuamotus could not look more different, but are all essentially extinct (hopefully) volcanoes – at varying stages of sinking back into the sea. The Tuamotus, with their low lying atolls are the oldest, and the mountain has gone leaving just the rim (a bit like the edge of a bowl), Tahiti is next, not sunk yet, but already with a coral ring around the island and the Marquesas are the youngest, still mountainous with the reef not yet formed - all of that within a thousand miles.

Certainly breathtaking and interesting, so we are looking forward to the next 3 months in the Marquesas or maybe the Gambier islands also.Who knows.....

As the festive season approaches we would like to wish you and yours a very Merry Christmas, A Happy New Year and a healthy 2020.

Au revoir

Ari B out

Captain Bonzo