Becalmed at Sea: Sailing 9 Days to the Cook Islands - Episode 126

[Music] by sailing long distances on our floating home we get to visit some of the most beautiful places in the world here we are at MTI a Hidden Gem located west of French [Music] Polynesia we have been here for quite a while enjoying this island paradise but although the conditions inside the Lagoon are idic the ocean swell outside the atol coupled with strong winds has made the only way out andoss for the last few days we've been running our dinghy out to check the conditions of the past and we finally feel like we can make our exit safely but soon after our departure we are reminded that as Sailors it doesn't matter if it's rough or dead calm the weather is always in control [Music] [Music] I feel comfortable with this what do you think it's day five of checking the pass the waves have stopped breaking over the channel and the current has subsided the conditions we've been waiting for so we headed back to the boat so we could finally get underway [Music] [Music] [Music] it's go time finally after waiting here in M PT for over a week for conditions to improve we went out and checked the pass this morning and it looked a lot better the wind has shifted so it's a little bit out of the north now instead of out of the South and that makes a huge difference because with the current flowing out and the South Winds against it it just stands up and makes gnarly gnarly conditions in the past but now it looks a lot Tamer so we're going to make a run for it it's been a nice stay here although the last 3 or 4 days have just been super rainy we really enjoyed this island the hike was absolutely incredible our favorite hike in French Polynesia now it's time to go we are out of French Polynesia and onto the Cook Islands we're going to sail about 700 miles to Saro which is a really small at to in the northern part of the Cook Islands it's going to take us about 5 six maybe 7 days to get there hopefully we have nice conditions and a nice easy sale because it's a long one we're getting ready to approach the p and I have to say my pucker level is about a 10 right now oh the anxiety it's real I think I'm going to let Gary take it once we get close here once we leave through this [Music] channel although we had checked the p and felt comfortable with the condition we also know that when exiting such a narrow channel that one wrong move or system failure could leave us washed onto the surrounding Reef so it was important for us to be alert and ready to make any quick [Music] adjustments woo a weight has been lifted for sure I was uh really stressed out about that [Music] [Music] and it feels great to be sailing again underway just kick back and relax for six [Laughter] days hopefully that's the plan rain's coming you like hear it like how mhm it's a heavy gust yeah wow look at the SLO [Music] that escalated quickly always does our water speed isn't working right now um we assume that there's like some algae or something or a barnacle that's down there but it's saying that we have about 16 knots of wind from behind and we're going about 5 to six knots so it's actually probably about 22 knots of true wind that we're seeing so we decided to bring in our head sale and roll out our sail we didn't like the look of these clouds which ones which clouds are you referring to the ones that way that way that way or that way all right it is 8:00 p.m. we just did a watch change I was resting um but it's kind of been a little bit of a challenging Cale so far we're currently motor sailing I know you can hear our engine in the background but we've got a lot of really unsettled weather um so the wind is going from 5 knots to 20 knots literally in a blink of an eye it's just very inconsistent and the sleeves are really sloppy so we're just trying to make miles north as much as we can to try to get out the unsettled weather but this is our first long sale in quite a while and to be honest I was feeling a bit squishy earlier so starting to subside a little bit and hopefully Gary can get some rest and hopefully the swell calms down swell is so we have uh wind against swell so it makes the Seas really not very nice but otherwise we're doing okay [Music] is wow we had a pretty hectic night with lots of squalls and sail changes and no wind and motoring and Rain uh but the sun just came up and and it looks like the sky is starting to clear so that looks like a good sign and I have radar on and I don't see any any storms in the distance forming right now so hopefully it'll be smooth sailing for a while and Gary wasn't able to get much sleep last night because he was up a lot doing sale changes and stuff so hopefully he's resting now and I'll let him get a couple extra hours of sleep I just well actually I made iced coffee yesterday so I just poured that I'm just going to chill in the cockpit I'm so thankful for this enclosure it kept us nice and dry last night and that's so important so important to keep ourselves comfortable out here as much as possible we've been slowly losing our wind so right now we only have about two knots three knots and our head sale was just flopping um at was our main cell so we just brought both of those in and Gary's going to jump in and take a look at our water wheel and see why it's not working we think that there's just a barnacle stuck in there or something [Music] with Gary out of the water the Barnacle removed and our water speed working again we decided to motor slowly until the sun [Music] [Music] set how's your night going not too good so we turned the engine off um it's been a frustrating pretty it's been a pretty frustrating day um we don't have much wind at all and we also have a really long way to go before our next fuel stop so we need to conserve our fuel as much as possible um so we're just bobbing out here and we're drifting in about one and 1/2 knots towards our destination so that's good but there's probably about a 2 m SW and so the motion of the boat isn't very comfortable but we're just going to wait for the wind to fill in and uh I don't know it looks like it's going to be pretty calm the next few days we've been checking the forecast and it's pretty calm I think our problem was we had to get out of the pass when it was calm so it left these conditions out here a little bit inconsistent for us I don't know hopefully the wind fills in the next I don't know next night or two we drifted all through the night and it was quite comfortable actually it was pretty peaceful uh but we just didn't have much wind but this morning as soon as the sun came up we decided to go ahead and rig up our whisker pole and see if we can go just a little faster maybe even in the right direction uh to our destination we have 555 miles to go that is the first time that we've drifted all night like that um we just don't want to we do have fuel but we just don't want to take the risk of using it since we know the next place that we can get diesel is 1,000 mil away from us right now so we want to try to conserve it as much as possible [Music] I'd shoot it in some more that's good yeah I don't know I think it's just a two rway not enough wind right I think with like eight knots of wind it would work but with like four or five knots of wind We Roll yeah if there's eight knots when we roll it at least we keep it filled but we hoped our Spiner would stay filled enough to give us slightly more speed but our whisker pull allowed us to keep some wind in our Genoa so that was the better option [Music] days 5 through 9 turn into a hazy [Music] memory each day Blended seamlessly into the next blurring the boundaries of reality we cooked we slept occasionally we would turn on the motor but otherwise every day was the exact same [Music] wow we drifted our minds drifted and the notion of time [Music] faded with each passing moment we slowly inched our way closer to to our destination but with each passing nautical mile we felt ourselves slipping deeper and deeper into the ocean's endless expanse almost like we were in a dreamlike trance [Music] so here we were just a tiny dot in this giant blue ocean chilling between the waves and the sky waiting for the tiniest Breeze of wind to propel us forward [Music] on the morning of day N9 at Sea we spotted land and suddenly sna back to reality L hoo Ranger Station Soro Ranger Station this is sailing vessel one life I'm saying I just want to ask if this is the Rangers I just want to ask uh uh which was your last port Bora Bora French poesia yep do that um how many your your yacht there are two people on board this afternoon you can come a short uh with your landport clearance papers uh all passports and ship uh registration a copy okay copy that we will remain on board until you call us this afternoon so come ashore R standing by on six thank you very much one life standing by on6 very professional very professional Soro is a coral at to only 50 miles in circumference surrounding a central Lagoon it's literally in the middle of the Pacific Ocean but despite this being such a remote location as an international sailing vessel we are required to follow the entry protocols so we hoisted our Q flag to prepare for [Music] entry well we have finally arrived in sororo after let's see eight nights N9 days let see only 670 miles our slowest sale to date um we average about 70 m a day so we were going very slow um we never had much wind and I think the most wind we saw was when we had a Squall and it only lasted about an hour um and I think we saw like 25 knots or something otherwise all of our wind was around well below 10 knots the whole time and it was all downwind so um we used our pole the best we could and it was just really slow going but um Soro is actually a really cool place and first of all I just want to say that I am so thankful to be here U I know sometimes when we're on a sale a long sale especially and we're tired and it seems like oh like maybe we're not having much fun but the reason we're out here doing it is exactly for places like this um so we're probably five four five 00 miles from any sort of land you can only get to this island by boat and it's mostly uninhabited except there are two Park Rangers yes good afternoon uh look uh I'm just calling you uh to come in uh about uh 4:30 uh so we can do your clearance okay thank you we'll be over at 4:30 okay we see rers standing by6 so right now we're going to run in and do our official clearance uh into the Cook Islands because we are officially in a new country and meet the park rangers there's a lot of rules here um you need permission to do things like scuba dive and fly the Drone um you're not really allowed to do any water sports without their permission so we're going to go over there talk to them uh get our passport stamped and see what the situation is but yeah really happy to be here I used to see this place on a map uh back when we were still in the Caribbean I was like man wouldn't it be cool to get here someday and here's the day we are here you guys and uh yeah it feels really good are you ready let's go check into the Cook Islands lots of little fish a long that yeah our friends [Music] blackon what did you think of that chickin process uh they were very nice and friendly and made it real easy a lot of forms to fill out as always but pretty cool just the two Rangers here on island for 6 months at a time no one else around for hundreds of miles they get dropped off with their supplies for 6 months and they get picked up later and they rely on Sailors to bring them things that they need they actually said that their freezer went down so they've had no frozen meat for the last few months yeah maybe we can make them a nice meal orbe we can them frozen chicken yes sure they would appreciate that yeah kind of No Nonsense type of deal huh there are a lot of restrictions here because it's a national park and it's very regulated so no scuba diving no fishing no spear fishing inside the Lagoon uh no stepping foot on any of the islands except for the one that the Rangers are on so pretty restricted but that's okay we're going to hang out enjoy the beauty and we can go do a bunch of snorkeling I mean we're the only ones here which is wild and the Rangers now that we're officially cleared in Brook's going to hoist our Cook Islands courtesy flag [Music] [Music]

Channel: Sailing One Life

Views: 30,434

Keywords: sailing, one life, ocean, offshore, bluewater, south pacific, french polynesia, scuba dive, nomad, challenges, life at sea, off grid living, travel, maupiti, problems, stuck, Cook Islands, adrift at sea, Suwarrow, becalmed

Id: TarYP5LHMEk

Length: 25min 32sec (1532 seconds)

Published: Sun May 12 2024