About Me

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Sacramento, California, United States
so salty pieces of coral from surfing Hawaii in the 60's and 70's getting reef pounded living in my body fall through my skin from time to time!

sailing to Oahu

Jimi Hendrix was playing on Oahu. I had never sailed. Surfed Mexico, California, Hawaii! Aw, how hard could it be to sail 90-110 miles from Kauai to Oahu? Piece of cake, right? Remember it was the 60's! This is so bad. We thought we were looking at Kaiena Point,Ohau, knowing we weren't going to make the concert! But at least we were in site of Oahu-wrong! Coy, who had never sailed before, me,who had never sailed before, jeff and Abbott etc. We were looking at the sleeping giant on Kauai! We had done three-sixty's in the night! We sailed on the only tri-marran I've ever sailed on ( except later ) in my life, missed the concert! It was at the Waikiki Shell Ampitheater ( Moon eclipsed . We finally made Nawilwili Harbor! The Skipper tried to give us his boat saying, " It's trying to kill me"! We watched him go stark raving mad not even realising that had we got caught in the channel current we were on our way to Japan! Remember it was the 60's and we were going to see Hendrix. I left out some of the good stuff but I will make up for it later!

Sunday, July 26, 2009

Fijian Coup

I just loved running aground within the leads of Suva, Fiji, Harbor! You would think their government, which was commonwealth sponsored by New Zealand, a prisoner of Mother England, a nation of great sailors and discoverer/conquerors of the unknown world in it's day! Notice my blogs real title? Captain Cook Rules!! So Guinevere, a faro cement, ketch, built in Bluff N.Z. 7'6" draft, full keel, steel ballasted, one yard wide runs aground weighing in at "40" tons, something has to move! Or go and it was never Guinevere. We ran aground five times and always got off with no damage to the boat but much damage to whatever was in our way. It wasn't a power trip, it was weight, gravity, inertia and no brakes! That would be a great invention? Brakes on a boat! A drogue is a type of brake as is a sea Anchor, but running aground is always a problem, especially for fiberglass! Wouldn't a sky hook be awesome? Anyway , I wander, Even with updated charts , radio, etc., it is hard to keep up with what the weather has done with channels and fluid rivers washing silt into traffic channels which sometimes need to be dredged. That was this case. Shit, we wanted a beer! We had already come ashore illegally, without clearing customs to buy cigarettes and a case of quarts of Fijian Bitters!! Anyway we got a friendly tug-boat to tow us off the sand bar we were hard on for a qt. of scotch! I said we were out of beer not out of alcohol! I'll tell you a story later of how and why we never ran out of alcohol!! So we are off and now moored at the Yacht club. Suva is a fun place unless you are sleeping at the stadium on the night that the Indians from India decide they HAVE had enough of the Fijians from Fifi who now are a minority in their own country and are over-run by the third generation of born and raised Indians from India. The only reason I speak of the Indians from India is so you don't think of the Indians from America that slew General George Armstrong Custer!! It really was an honorary rank. He was lucky to be a colonel during the civil war. Why do they call it the civil war? I would think it would be called " The Un-civil War "! That's like Civil Disobedience! There is nothing civil about disobedience! Sorry I rant! An American girl and I were sleeping ( yea right ) at the stadium in downtown Suva which happens to be right next to Government House. The riot was quick and efficient and got the job done because the next morning the Indians from India had a controlliung voice in the politics of Figian government. Can you imagine a group of people coming into your country and breeding like rabbits so that by the third generation their vote is the voice to be listened to! Amazing or what? Duh? Habla English?

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