We arrived during the night, slowed down and tacked up and down fishing–no luck… At 8 the pass looked do-able (still quite some standing waves inside the pass, so wind against current, not so ideal), but the pass is so wide that we went in anyway, were tossed around a bit, but not too badly. Now we’re sailing close-hauled again to the S side of… Continue reading »
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2020
25
Aug
2020
25
Aug
Many factors to consider
‘Sailing where the wind takes us’ sounds romantic, but in the end chosing an atoll relies on many factors: we have to reach it tacking through neighbouring atolls so the wind must play along, atolls have only tiny openings that are greatly affected by tidal currents and a yacht must never try to enter with wind against current (resulting in high, standing waves) and thirdly… Continue reading »
2020
23
Aug
Towards the Tuamotus
260 confirmed Covid-19 cases in French Polynesia, the president announced ‘new measures’ for Monday–it’s good timing that we’re fully provisioned, prepared and ready to go. The SE wind (mara’amu) that was blowing strongly for the last few days is easing off a bit and we should have good conditions to set out towards the Tuamotus. Over 70 ring atolls are out there–we’ll set the windvane… Continue reading »
2020
19
Aug
Fuel consumption
We went to the petrol station this morning to top up our diesel tank and jerry cans–180 litres and we were full again. To us living on a sailboat means being close to nature and treading lightly, so we try to use less than 300 l a year. The boat before us (German sailboat, young, hip couple) had taken a long time, so I asked… Continue reading »
2020
17
Aug
130 new Covid cases
Despite all safety measures it looks like the opening of borders resulted in the second Covid wave we dreaded. In the last month 130 cases were recorded in Tahiti–at the moment the counter hops up by a dozen on a daily basis. Of course that’s nothing compared to other countries, but still very worrying in a large island nation with 67 inhabited islands, but only… Continue reading »
2020
12
Aug
New Gallery Viewer!
Yeah, our blog has finally got a new photo-gallery viewer! It’s modern, intuitive, user-friendly, supports swiping, and works great on desktop as well as mobile devices (at least in my humble opinion). Please let me know if you encounter any bugs. Enjoy all our galleries with the new viewer–happy swiping!
2020
10
Aug
Travelling in times of Covid-19
I had to fly to Austria for family reasons and just got back to Tahiti. My greatest worry was that French Poly would close the borders again while I was away, so I only dared to stay for ten days in Austria. I was a bit shocked, how careless the majority of people act there: masks only in supermarkets, waiters wear them half-heartedly underneath their… Continue reading »
2020
01
Aug
Article on shaft seals in All-at-Sea August issue
Birgit Hackl, Christian Feldbauer: Dripless Shaft Seals, All At Sea Caribbean, August 2020, p. 40–44. Free download from allatsea.net.