About Me

My photo
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!

Thursday, October 8, 2009

Rabaul-PNG

Water is very important to a sailor. One of the greatest quotes ever stated was by Magellan. " Water, water everywhere but not a drop to drink"! What did he mean by that? Oh yea! He hadn't been able to catch rain and wasn't near land to gather fresh water from a river but was surrounded by an ocean of salt water. Well in a small way sailing into Rabaul was like this but different. In the " South Seas " good water is still a blessed thing. Some atolls only fresh water is the rain they catch off of their tin roof, guttered into a barrel to be used casually as they deem fit. In Raboul the drinking fountains taste of sulfur from the active volcano which shaped the underwater cauldron you sailed into thinking, Oh what a natural harbor! Sorry, I have found out that since we were there it blew! The sulfuric content Guinevere ( our vessel ) was floating in killed all the skirting ( living moss ) clinging to our hull. We normally had to dive and scrape off our hull so we could maintain a forward speed under sail without unneccesary drag! If the water from their town tasted like and smelled like sulfer why would anyone contaminate their water tanks with smelly water? We didn't but the alternative is just as rank! We found a man in Rabaul, an expatriot, who said we could take on water from his rain catch on the other side of the bay. The water was sulpher free but it had mosquito larva in it o'plenty. We siphoned the water through a screen-filtering, jury-rigged process before it ever entered our 300 gallon tanks. After we loaded the water we dropped in just enough clorine to kill all micro-organisms but not taint the tanks. Sticky wicket but! It took a team effort but the sulpher contact to water storage tanks from an active volcano is way more lasting than the smell of rotting eggs. What happens is your water tanks have to be replaced as the taste and smell can never be put aside. All new water takes on that flavor which is not desireable. I do recommend however, that whenever possible pull into any volcanic harbor as it cleans your bottom as it has never been cleaned before! AARRGHH, Matey

Blog Archive