10 days at sea and 7 days in Minerva Reef.
Leaving New Zealand; Shelter at North Minerva Reef; Walking the reef; Alien space ships; Catching a giant lobster, NZ Air force Orion and SV Windborne; The last leg is at hand.
Leaving New Zealand
There is always anticipation in leaving a place after a long stay. You touch the country and build relationships and it is hard to say goodbye.
In these last few weeks of May, yachts people have been scurrying to look for weather windows to fit their destinations, to complete the last projects in order to make their vessels seaworthy for the voyage ahead. There is some finger biting whether to go or no go and you can feel the adrenalin flow.
We do, however, find time to let our hair down and meet in the Marina Café on Friday nights to listen to the fantastic Kiwi singer--Robert we call him--belt out song after wonderful song with guitar. His tanned, blue-eyed, sandy-haired open innocent image holds our attention as he sings in a Yankee accent and throws out the odd Kiwi humor tinged with a slight dry edge. He is talented and unpretentious.
Robert the Kiwi at far left belting out beautiful songs with Hans on base at center and a young Kiwi golfer on the right all at the Marina Café in Opua, NZ.
Hans off SV Happy Monster up close playing bass for the Kiwi singer and guitarist in the Marina Café.
There is also Southern Californian Bobby Joe and Roger off SV Hypnautical singing 60s songs with harp and guitar taking us back to another era. We drink flat whites (sort of a late coffee) or hot chocolates and sample an assortment of cakes: lemon coconut, apple date.
Visuals of hot drinks that warm on a late Fall night: Flat white coffee and hot chocolate at the Marina Café.
Sailors Annabelle and her Norwegian beau smile for my camera, with Dean from
Canada in the background enjoying the music at the Marina Cafe.
There was also time to meet in the Cruising Club on a Saturday night for a Jam session. Hans the Flying Dutchman off SV Happy Monster usually takes center stage since the Irish of SV Balu left, and a motley crew of nationalities join him. The night the weather put all in darkness, they lit tea candles and sang on into the night without missing a note--jugs of beer emptied.
Hans and Dory, off SV Happy Monster, having a coffee and telling tall tales on Zulu one blustery night.
On one of these down pouring windy nights we had Hans and Dory off Happy Monster over to Zulu for refreshment. Russ had to ferry them back. His style is to untie the dinghy, throw the line in, then jump in. I usually get in first, then untie the line. Each to his own.
This night after he had thrown the line into the dinghy, a wave banged the dinghy up against the hull and sent it skimming away. Next Russ was in the water at 10 at night successful at grabbing it and levitating on up into it like greased lightning. The Dutchman's eyes were like organ stops watching Russ' dinghy entry.
There was one last time to take the dinghy ashore at Okiato Pt. This is where we moored Zulu for the cyclone season. We were invited for dinner by Christian and Hannelore and Claudia, family of our friends Heike and Johnny who are now our friends too.
The rain poured down as we climbed the narrow, steep, wet, leaf-strewn path to the house on the ‘bluff’. There was candlelight, chilled South African champagne and Kiwi Stoneleigh Pinot Gris, fish stew on rice, mashed potatoes on silver greens with mushrooms, salad, and a desert of ice-cream on chocolate crunch with sweet sliced home-grown bananas. Yum.
We laughed and talked about the fun we'd had with Christian, leader of the pack, sailing to: Great Barrier Island, Arid Island, Mokohinau Islands, Cape Bream, Whangamumu, Cape Brett, Deep Water Cove, Oke Bay, Oma Kiwi, Okiato, Robertson Island, Urapukapuka, Cavalli Islands, Mahine Pua Bay, Manganui, Matai Bay and driving up to Cape Reigne with Heike and Johnny, tip of North Island. There was Isabelle's short visit too, to remember where digging clams at Matai bay for dinner was a highlight.
We said our good bye to the Eckhoff family and to friends they had introduced us to. We said good bye to those salty dogs off Nkwhasi from England, SV Balu from Northern Ireland; SV Chinook from England; SV Happy Spirit from England; SV Atlantia from Scotland; SV Free Spirit from Luxemburg; SV Happy Monster from Holland; SV Light Heart from Seattle; SV Ms Pauline from Southern California; SV Hypnautical from Southern California; SV Kestrel from Canada and others who have slipped out to sea and from memory, but not from heart and mind.
We left Opua in a whirlwind, with Zulu dragging anchor while we checked out and Russ having to do the 100 yard sprint in the dinghy and bring her back alive to the fuel dock where I caught the lines with virtually a Cranberry drink in one hand and a cheese scone in the other. All said and done, Russ was tired out from trying to complete all his ’projects’ and declared-- "We'll leave Monday at first light." I immediately thought of those fronts coming our way and how we needed to move out of North Island fast.
Now we sail away into the day and night and I paint our first daybreak at sea: The midnight watch brings extra darkness, a squall approaches. Lightning strikes. The winds pick up to 24 and Zulu surges forward on course for Raoul Island in the Kermadecs. Christian says, because we left late we might get hit by a low coming in from Lord Howe Island. The isobars are squeezing tight. We head for Raoul Island, now 237 NM away to try to beat it and take refuge.
4:30 AM Tuesday morning Zulu is in the middle of a dark circle of moving seas. Sheet lightening flashes on and off 360 degrees where skies meet the ocean. It is a light show. The rain comes down--a shower. Predawn makes its entrance to the southern hemisphere with a subtle wash of light. The lightening plays games with my eyes turning low-lying clouds into island, figments of the imagination.
To the west it is dark and gray and somber and to the east the hem of sky becomes golden. I am mesmerized. The ‘islands’ now emerge as clusters of clouds. A hot rose colour pushes its way up through the golden light in the east, as if from a tube of oil paint. To the south a giant rose-coloured cloud looks as if it is spewed from a volcano that isn't there. To the west the dark menacing clouds are permeated with glowing pink linings. I turn around full circle with wonder.
The sun slowly makes its morning debut.
The sun slowly makes its morning debut. Pushing its way up over the horizon in a cast of brilliant fire light. The ball of fire is now radiating a new day. And as if in a ballet dance finale to the west, one leg of a rainbow drops from the grey skies into the ocean, bowing out the night. We surely have left NZ behind and new days await us in the Tropics.
Two fronts are coming our way so we head north as fast as we can for northern
Minerva Reef, rather than Raoul Island in the Kermadecs.
Russ speaks to Christian twice a day on the radio. Two fronts are coming our way. One with winds from the NE up to 25 knots and one following straight into the Kermadecs at up to 40 knots. So we swing the compass bearing and head north as fast as we can to the northern Minerva reef. We will catch the tail of the first low Thursday and reef down to take the medicine. And expect to miss the second. But the weather is ever changing and we are grateful to Christian for keeping an eye out for us.
Shelter at North Minerva Reef: Lat 23 degrees.37’S, Long 178 degrees.54’W
“Let us move down to 66.46 USB,” Christian is on the radio to us. “Ja, too bad you did not leave a day earlier like I told you. But you are making good progress. You must not go to Raoul Island in the Kermadecs. You will get hit by a 40-knot front coming across after this one. You must be at Minerva by Sunday to avoid this front. Tonight you will get NNW 15-to-20 knots on the nose and at midnight it will change to W 15 to 20. Have a good watch. I’ll talk to you in the morning.”
What an amazing top-notch weatherman Christian is, guiding us through these southern seas.
I feel as if I am on an Ecuadorian donkey with my kidneys about to land in a NZ pie as we sail with the wind on our nose. It is not that bad. Only gusting to 23, but still an uncomfortable jolt. Then like magic just after midnight the winds change to the west and my kidneys are back in place for the rest of the watch.
I read Papillon, by Henri Charriere, by flashlight--happy that I am free and at sea. The hot herb tea tastes good. I’ve been up 5 hours and it is time to climb down the companionway steps and gently wake the captain.
“Russ, can you spell me?” I gently ask. “Yes sure” he responds always happy to take over. Sleep overcomes and I dream of Papillon escaping Devil’s Island in French Guiana on a sack of coconuts.
Then a commotion on deck wakes me: Russ’ feet scurrying back and forth on deck---sails flapping. The roller furling has broken so down comes the huge head sail not without an effort and up with the staysail in the dark of night. Zulu keeps up the speed. 7 knots. Not bad.
Morning comes quickly and turns into night. Our watches are like the hands of the clock turning, turning over-- day into night, night into day. I watch the screen on the computer. The little red boat symbol crawls into view from the bottom of the screen and makes its way toward Minerva. We’ll be there in the morning.
“Where are you now?” It is Sunday morning and Christian is back on the radio. He wants to make sure we get to Minerva in time to get shelter. “5 miles from Northern Minerva.” Russ speaks into the microphone. “25 miles away from Minerva?” Christian comes back. “No 5 miles away.” Russ corrects him. “That is good. That is good. The Front will come on Monday, tomorrow. 25 to 35 knots by lunch time with a lot of rain.” He warns.
Russ scans the reefs of Minerva, looking for the pass.
Russ scans the reefs with the binoculars. There are two boats in there. One is a motor boat and it is just outside the pass fishing and rocking back and forth on a building sea-- A sailboat is anchored inside.
Minerva is at hand. We’re in Tongan waters. There is always adrenalin running fast when we approach a pass through a remote reef. The electronic charts are a God send. Without them we’d be sitting on much sharper pins and needles. And many a boat, before electronic navigation, met it’s nemesis on these reefs. My heart is in my mouth in any case.
In we go. The pass is wide enough for sure. Down with the staysail. Come into the wind. Let the main sheet fly. Drop the anchor on the fly. Reverse. We anchor close to the wreck Christian showed us on the chart, on the SE side of a circular reef 270 NM from Nukualofa, Southern Tonga, and on the rhumb line from NZ. It is a wilderness. The wind is picking up in Minerva Reef, awash at high tide.
The motorboat comes in now—into view so we can see its name: Starlight. He drops anchor close to us and soon races over in the dinghy with a huge filet of fresh tuna he has just caught. Wind blowing his Crocodile Dundee hat. White caps are starting to form.
I go to sleep. It has been a long night and day. I hear Russ on the radio talking to our Scottish friends off Atlantia. What? They were headed for Fiji, but are coming in to Minerva too. Russ says Chinook is here too, our English friends also headed for Fiji. What a surprise! The Front drove them east for refuge.
Atlantia comes through the pass and circles us. They will anchor closer to Chinook. Welcome! The Ozzie off Starlight gives them fish too.
SVs Chinook, left and Atlantia, right, both bound for Fiji change course to seek shelter from the front in Minerva Reef.
Will and Margret from Scotland off SV Atlantia, bound for Fiji on a journey around the world.
Kathy and Andy from England off SV Chinook, bound for Fiji, alter their course to seek refuge from the storm at Minerva. Andy bought Chinook in Australia 11 years ago and is still sailing onwards.
Lack of sleep has caught up with Russ and he rests his head at the navigation station.
I cook up a brown rice medley, make a salad, and Russ BBQs the fish and I serve it with ginger. We open a very chilled bottle of Oyster Bay Sauvignon Blanc, meant for May 18, our 35th wedding anniversary. But we were at sea then and so it had to be tea.
What a setting we are in. It feels so good to be at anchor, to sip the good wine, and eat the wonderful meal—a gift of fish from a stranger in Minerva. We’ll sleep tight tonight.
Monday the winds start to freshen and skies become overcast. We radio our friends with weather from Christian, very happy for their presence here and hunker down to experience the storm. The royal blue waters are whipped up and white caps fly. The waves bash over the narrow reef separating us from the ocean wide.
The wind is picking up in Minerva Reef, awash at high tide. Zulu is at anchor.
The SV Starlight anchors close by and dinghies by with a beautiful fresh filet of tuna just caught.
SVs Chinook and Atlantia are now pencil silhouettes framed against a backdrop of
grey rain-streaked skies that darken rapidly. Now they are enclosed, out of light, out of sight. SV Starlight is disappearing from sight too. Zulu is wrapped in a blanket of gray. The wrath of the rain gods rip the heavens apart and let the walls of water flow. A torrential downpour is unleashed. There is no seeing beyond.
Zulu is wrapped in a blanket of grey.
The wrath of the rain gods rip the heavens apart and let the walls of water flow. There is no seeing beyond.
I sit in the cockpit under cover of the dodger and watch the elements at work, at stormy best and duck from under cover every now and again to shoot a picture. The balm on the wild dark waters is feeling the presence of SVs Chinook and Atlantia.
I watch the wind indicator: 25 knots, 30 knots, 36 knots. Zulu pulls at her anchor like a wild horse. The tide is high with no reefs showing and the seas are up and against us. We swirl and rock and pull and bounce like a cork, as if alone.
The torrential onslaughts of rain that come down on us in the form of a dark wall from the eastern heavens and flow over us with such great power come in waves. Stop and start. Like an army from heaven, it marches on.
I am soaked even under cover of the dodger, but cannot bring myself to leave the cockpit. It is a baptism. A humbling experience and only 4 knots away from a storm as measured by the Beaufort Scale. Can I fathom The Perfect Storm? No. Never. Ever.
It is all quiet four hours later. The heavens have reigned in their wrath. The winds are down to 15 knots, the seas are void of their white caps. There is a truce called in the form of a rainbow reaching up and over to great heights against the gray. Zulu is bathed in its arc of colour. Silence is at hand.
There is a truce called in the form of a rainbow reaching up and over to great heights against the gray.
The artist of elements is at work turning the sky to blue. The sun sets like a ball of white fire, bringing to light the masts of our fellow sailors in silhouette.
We sleep at last, peacefully.
The sun sets like a ball of white fire, bringing to light the masts of our fellow sailors in silhouette.
Walking the reef
The day dawns. Sunlight. Fresh winds whip through the breaking waves. The wind has changed directions and comes from the west. Too much fetch. Zulu bounces to and fro.
Fresh winds whip through the breaking waves. The winds have changed and we must move.
“The windlass is not working!” Russ calls. “We’ll have to work it manually, I’ll give you hand signs.”
The hand signs begin. We’re up and head for the western shore. Now to re-anchor manually with hand signals. Russ is going beserko. STOP! STOP! STOP! He yells. The anchor chain is one big spaghetti mess. Whatever! It is rewire time. The solenoid has gone west! On with boat maintenance in exotic places.
What are we faced with? Deep calm royal blue waters that meet in a line with aquamarine, that meet in an edge with the reef, blue sky and white puffy clouds. Heaven?
What awaits on the western edge? Deep calm royal blue waters that meet in a line with aquamarine, that meet in an edge with the reef, blue sky and white puffy clouds.
Russ tests the water and anchor out.
Row out to the reefs. To a sliver of a white coral spit. Absolute wilderness perfection. Russ goes on a reef walkabout to where it meets the ocean deep with white curled breaking waves. He becomes a spec on the horizon, one with the coral heads. Far gone.
I stay on the spit and photograph the breathless views. The spit is corrugated in places from water and wind and lies above silver clear water. Just below the surface are giant clams with purple lips and other coral. Sea cucumbers, sea greens, schools of small fish that dart away as I move inadvertently toward them.
The dinghy is a single point of focus. The anchor thrown up on the coral spit, the lagoon is mirrored water, the sky turns dark again. Colours ever changing from turquoise to royal blue to crystal clear to mirrored light.
Now I capture an image close to fish eye. The curve of the world. Water over reefs. Zulu on the horizon. Far removed. Still. Full with silence except for the sound of breaking waves. I photograph the curves of reef and the coral spit in water. Again and again I capture the lone wooden dinghy. I lie down to feel the earth. One with the creator.
Russ is back. Back to Zulu we row, our reef walk is over.
Russ goes on a reef walkabout to where it meets the ocean deep. He becomes a
spec on the horizon, one with the coral heads. Far gone.
The spit is corrugated in places from water and wind and lies above silver clear water.
Just below the surface of the crystal water are giant clams with purple lips (above) and other coral.
The dinghy is a single point of focus. The anchor thrown up on the coral spit, the
lagoon is mirrored water, and the sky turns dark again.
I capture an image close to fish eye: The curve of the world. Water over reefs. Zulu on the horizon.
Mirrored waters of Minerva Reef.
Again I capture the lone wooden dinghy.
I lie down to feel the earth--one with the creator.
Russ is back from his walk about.
It is time to get out of my reverie. Zulu awaits us.
Alien spaceships
I awake to feel Russ’ presence missing in the night. Perhaps he is reading. I sleep in broken waves. There is a commotion on deck. Things dropping, banging. It is Russ returning from a night walk on the reefs under a near-full moon. He’s tied the dinghy up and dropped the wooden oars on deck.
“I saw sea urchins out there that looked like alien space ships.” He said with awe. Between their spines there were green rings that glowed in the dark!”
He lay down and went to sleep and I lay awake seeing the moon and the eerie urchins in my mind’s eye and listened to the waves breaking.
Catching a huge lobster
Another morning breaks gloriously. Blue skies. Blue waters. We have moved again as the wind changes to the NE. We must ever move when the wind changes for protection.
Time to go for a swim. I’m about to get in when I see the fins of a shark stealth fully swimming through the reefs. Perhaps just a black-tipped reef shark. But who knows. I have sharks on my mind, since Christian got nipped here by one while spear fishing.
“Russ, I don’t want to go in.” I chicken out. He moves the dinghy to a different spot and I go in and just swim around the dinghy in royal blue waters. It is heavenly, but still I have sharks on my mind and soon am back in the dinghy and back on Zulu.
Russ goes out toward the wreck alone. He is looking for lobsters where Christian told him to go. He was gone a long, long time. Diving alone. I scan the horizon through the binoculars. He has the portable VHF radio.
After some hours I see him returning. He throws me a line and I tie the dinghy up. What? A jolly mammoth lobster! Wow. It is the biggest lobster I have ever seen and that Russ has ever caught. He says it looked like a huge spider in a hole in the coral. It scared him.
Nevertheless you can imagine lobster in lemon butter sauce with chilled white wine and sliced tomatoes and baguettes and Brie cheese. Fit for the lobster man.
Proud catch of the day--a giant lobster.
Scrumptious lobster dinner with chilled white wine.
NZ Air force Orion and SV Windborne
Next day we hear voices from the sky. It is the NZ Air force in a plane named Orion buzzing us, and asking that we identify our vessel and give next destination. They sound polite enough, but no nonsense. What are they doing in Tongan waters anyhow? Throwing their weight around we muse on a training bout perhaps.
They buzz the only other anchored vessel, a schooner called Windborne, with a Kiwi skipper. They, too, respond with the name of their boat and say they are headed for Tonga next. Avon, Windborne’s owner and skipper next calls Orion and in his clipped Kiwi accent says the following--
“Can you do me a favour and throw me down a newspaper?” Orion responds negative and takes off across the heavens from whence they came. Only a Kiwi would be that cheeky. It got a good laugh out of us. Smile. Crackle crackle and Orion calls two passing sailboats asking for their ID and destination too.
We visit Windborne. A schooner built in the 1920s in England. It then found a home in Vancouver, BC for years and thereafter landed in NZ. Avon is a character. His son and son’ s mate are professional divers and they are making a movie. They dive the pass and film the massive fish out there. Renee, a young Swiss woman is a diver too, and is enjoying a month at sea with them.
Yesterday they speared a gigantic yellow tail tuna and gave us a hunk fit for a King. A tiger shark came toward them and they slithered into the dinghy at such a pace and with such incentive that they punctured the dinghy with their spear gun. Meanwhile Avon was left waiting on the reef with the tide coming up and he, too, was starting to get energized wanting off the reef. All turned out well in the end.
I served Russ sushi for lunch with a cold beer and chili-cream cheese on crackers with sliced cucumbers all surrounded by sliced persimmon. Aaah the fruits of Minerva make up a feast fit for its namesake, the Roman goddess identified with Greek Athena: sumptuous, opulent.
Ocean fresh.
SV Windborne from the Coramandels, North Island, NZ anchored in Minerva.
People on board Windborne from left to right: Renee from Switzerland, Avon’s son (name escaped me) and his mate Duane—professional divers, and Avon the skipper. They are making a diving movie.
Fresh Tuna caught by SV Windborne divers.
Lunch of sushi, crackers with cream cheese and cucumbers ringed by sliced persimmon. Two cold ones to accompany.
The last leg is at hand
On Sunday morning Windborne takes advantage of the NW winds and sails through the pass to sea. We take a last morning swim. We linger in the cockpit with Zulu gently rocking to and fro. Tomorrow, Monday, we will have been here a week. We must take leave. The last leg is at hand. Raise the sails and point for Vavau with light winds from the ESE.
The sun makes its descent on Sunday’s last light. “Let’s pack things away and leave right now.” Russ declares. It’s a little late, but on with the engine and up with the anchor. Find the pass, stick to the middle of the channel, waves breaking on either side and out onto flat mirror seas. We motor all night long. No wind, perhaps just a whisper.
I search the southern skies and see a planet ‘blinking’ on and off. Red-green. It does not look like an airplane. It is too stationary. The next night it is the same. I want to wrap my arms around the stars and planets, know their names, where and how they are placed infinitesimal light years away.
We have three sails up: a short, high-cut Headsail, the Staysail, and Main. The moon, my benevolent light, shines on Zulu’s sails as we cut through the silver-light night waters. Clouds engulf the moon, the sheen on the water recedes, and then like a river runs back to Zulu’s side and the clouds drift on. The moon is waxing. I reach out and hold on to its light—balm in my night.
I think of the Orion Nebula, prompted by the name given to the NZ plane that circled us in Minerva. Orion, the hunter with its bow--dweller of mountains. It is out of reach, out of sight. Where is Sirius, the hunter’s dog? Brightest star in the sky it is only 8.8 light years away!
I read by torchlight, an essay entitled Orion the Hunter by Tim Robinson, from an anthology of Best American Essays. Some poignant paragraphs stand out.
“The Orion Nebula, a cloud of matter millions of miles across, all of a glow from the birth of stars within it. Whorls of gas pulled in on themselves by their own gravity, condensing into spheres, pressures rising, atomic reactions beginning. And when stars have gone through their long evolution—almost as long as all the past—and ever more complex processes in them have built the heavier nuclei out of hydrogen, the simple primordial stuff, they collapse inward, and then explode, and suffuse space with carbon nitrogen, iron, and the rest, the rich and rare.”
“Einstein wondered if a traveler at the speed of light carrying a mirror would find himself reflected in it. What did you see, riding time into my quiet historical garden, O Dweller on the Mountains?” (The writer is in a room, the door of which opens up into his garden. It is night. And he feels or sees Orion enter through the door ajar.)
“The figure opposite me remained absolutely silent and still. All the wild sensations had withdrawn into him and the room was left an empty geometry. Time must have flowed on, though, like a trickle of meltwater under a glacier, for in the end a signal came: a bark (from his dog) that rattled the windows like a cannon shot, from the end of the garden, or the end of the world, I couldn’t tell which. The hunter stood and stretched and yawned, took up his stick—it was a little bow, I saw, with a thin knotted thong for a string—and stepped out into the glow of the dawn. Very slowly the room was emptied of strangeness, as if he were drawing after him long dim tatters, glittering streamers, dazzling billowy starry banners.”
I close the book. Switch the torch off. Close my eyes in silence paying tribute to the writer, to Orion’s visit, to the universe.
There’s a light on the horizon. A boat. Perhaps it is an inter-island boat running between Fiji and Nukualofa, Southern Tonga. It cuts across our stern, far in the distance—ships silently passing in the night.
Dawn breaks with a rainbow round the moon. The wind is building—on the nose 18 to 23 knots. Each wave hits us full on and jolts our very being. Hold on! Reef the main. Take down the staysail after the shackle breaks with a crack.
Christian’s voice comes across the airwaves. “Happy spirit will sail head on into a ‘bomb’ on its way to Vanuatu: two weather systems interceding. I say a prayer for Kalo and Jacky and Phoebe on board, that they pass through the storm safely this their very first ocean voyage. Adventurers for sure.
I took this picture of SV Free Spirit in the Bay of Island, New Zealand with Jacky and Kalo on board. At the time of writing they were headed for Vanuatu.
Kalo in Opua, NZ--always kind and smiling--off SV Free Spirit. He could have gotten hit by two converging weather systems—a ‘bomb’—as he headed for Vanuatu while we took shelter in Minerva. I pray for their safety.
Day in day out the head winds hit us--forward motion north, but with the wind not having enough of an eastern component. We have passed the Southern Tongan Group and Ha’apai the reef-riddled middle group. We look out onto Tofua, a flat topped volcano with a lake in its belly and Kao, asymmetrical with the top blown off. These volcanoes mark the vicinity where Captain Bligh was obliged to skipper a smaller vessel gratis of mutiny on the Bounty. I get a shiver up my spine. Serves him right!
There is diesel in the bilge! A spill resulting partially from Russ having transferred fuel from plastic containers while underway. It gives me a headache and waves of nausea sweep over me. I take a cold shower. Wash my hair. Sit on deck and let the wind cool me. I stand my watch where blue succumbs to gray and gray to blue.
Ahead lies the volcano island formed in 1995 and, as a result, Metis shoals. I saw a photograph once taken of a sailboat sailing through a sea of pumice after the undersea eruption. What an experience.
Further north is the Volcano Late. Russ visited that island on our last voyage. He went over the lip of the volcano and got his foot cooked. Not a good call. A group of Tongans had gone there to check on the King’s vanilla beans. The memories return and I am impatient to arrive.
We cannot get enough easting to pass both shoals to our port, so pass the first to our starboard and then tack for four hours. Head SSE. That is how we will get our easting. We are moving at a good clip and tack again for a straight shot to Vavau.
One more night. And we will return to Vavau—pass through the southern passage as we did 30 years ago with my young brother Bastian and young son Ian and young husband Russ. Joy then and joy now. Turn right up the channel to Neiafu, the capital. We have arrived. Tonga awaits us.
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