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Thursday May 17th<\/p>\n
We left the Harbor from Hell, Traitor’s Bay in Hiva Oa,
\nyesterday morning. Five to ten foot swells were running into
\nthe harbor and we were closed in front, back and sides by other
\nboats. Luckily for us, the boat from Mexico that we had
\nanchored very close to the day before had left which gave us a
\nlittle room to maneuver. It is very tricky to pick up both a bow
\nand a stern anchor in a crowded anchorage. It is typical to
\njust have a bow anchor out, and you motor up to it, while
\npulling up the anchor chain, and then when the anchor lifts out
\nof the water you can head out. But with both a bow and a stern
\nanchor set it can be much trickier. We knew the harbor bottom
\nwas quite muddy and we had seen other boats pull out their
\nanchors with great difficulty, as the heavy mud makes them very
\nhard to pick up. There is no electric windlass to lift up the
\nstern anchor, it has to be done by hand. We let out extra chain
\non the forward anchor so that we could move back close to the
\nstern anchor. I was manning the steering wheel and the windlass
\n(which controls the release of the bow anchor), while Mark stood
\nin the aft of the boat, balancing himself against the big
\nswells, and painfully pulling up the stern anchor. All the
\nneighbors on their boats came out to watch (which is what we all
\ndo), and the guys on the small boat in back of us, “Namaste”,
\nwere particularly interested as we had to move our boat within
\njust a few feet of theirs to get a good angle on the anchor.<\/p>\n
After a few minutes of maneuvering, and a lot of pulling, Mark
\nmanaged to get up the stern anchor. Then it was pretty easy to
\njust move up to the bow anchor and pull out. We were so happy to
\nbe leaving that place. What an uncomfortable anchorage. We saw
\na number of boats there that seemed to be there for the long
\nterm and we just can’t understand it as there are such beautiful
\nbays all around.<\/p>\n
Just before we left the anchorage, we got a call on the radio
\nfrom our friends on Vera, who said they were on their way to the
\nanchorage on the northern side of Hiva Oa ,an anchorage called
\nHanamenu. (There are so many bays with the word Hana in them
\n(guess who it makes us think of?). There was no wind, so we had to
\nmotor the 2.5 hours there, with several rain squalls following
\nus, and within an hour, our friends were in sight, just a few
\nmiles ahead of us. We both pulled into the bay without
\nincident. We were the only two boats there for the entire day.
\nIt is a pretty bay with a dark sand beach at the foot of the
\nharbor, with wild horses and cows on it, and a seemingly
\ndeserted coconut palm plantation. The walls of the bay are
\nextremely steep and rocky. There is no town, there are no
\npeople. There is not even a path that goes to a road. In the
\nevening Michael and Britta came over to help us make sushi with
\nour terrific tuna from the Pearl Restaurant. They came over
\nequipped with all the trimmings : pickled ginger, wasabi, and
\nwine. We provided the fish and the rice and the dessert and had
\nsuch a great evening. They are very interesting people and
\nMichael tells great stories with Britta good naturedly
\ncorrecting his exaggerations. They stayed late by boat
\nstandards (must have been almost 9:30!!).<\/p>\n
This morning they left, which left Mark and I the only boat
\nhere. No one else has come into the harbor today which is kind
\nof a treat. We went to shore on our kayak, and found a little
\npath leading into the jungle. There are dozens of mango and
\nlemon and lime trees and we had a great time picking as many as
\nwe could carry in our beach bag. There are hundreds of mangoes
\non the trees, but most of them are way out of reach. We had to
\nuse a long stick to pick the lower hanging ones. So now we are
\nset with about 30 mangoes (small) and enough limes to make
\nlimeade for weeks. Right near the beach there was a small
\nfresh-water spring and we swam in it. It was great ! The first
\nfresh water we have seen and it was so cool and refreshing. We
\nhad yet one more treat today when we saw several manta-rays
\nswimming by the boat. We had seen one very large one when we
\nanchored yesterday, but had not seen him since. Suddenly, after
\nlunch, there was not one, but 5 of them, just swimming around
\nthe boat. They are huge and really beautiful. The largest has a
\nwing span of about 8 feet, and it is about 5 feet long. They
\nare black on top and white on the bottom. They swim around with
\ntheir huge white mouths open (18-24 inches wide), occasionally
\nflipping up their wings. One of them came right next to the boat
\nand did three somersaults underwater showing off his beautiful
\nwhite belly. It was incredible.<\/p>\n
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So, what else is new, you might ask? Not much.
\nL.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Thursday May 17th We left the Harbor from Hell, Traitor’s Bay in Hiva Oa, yesterday morning. Five to ten foot swells were running into the harbor and we were closed in front, back and sides by other boats. Luckily for us, the boat from Mexico that we had anchored very close to the day before … <\/p>\n