After a week of being stuck in Maupiti while waiting out a severe swell event that had come up from the south, we were finally ready to head to our final island in French Polynesia, Maupihaa. We prepared to depart by securing everything inside and tightening down the hatches. It was going to be a wet and bumpy exit out through the pass. The waves had stopped breaking across the pass, but there was still an impressively large swell rolling in, amplified by the opposing current. I’m certain our keel came out of the water as one wave thrust us up and our bow plowed down, submarining into the next wave. Conditions were a bit unnerving for the first few minutes but calmed down as we got farther from the island.
Once underway, we establish a watch schedule of 4 hours on, 8 hours off. Eitan took the first turn, followed by Evan, who had unfortunately become very seasick. The sea state wasn’t very comfortable, but not that horrible, so I gave him the organics bucket to throw up in since hurling overboard isn’t safe in these conditions. Eitan tried to load him up with some seasickness meds but he was too nauseous to keep them down. I felt horrible for him. One of the reasons I invited him onboard was for him to get a real sense of what is it like to sail on the open ocean. He didn’t have any blue water sailing experience despite having quit his job two years ago to refit his own sailboat for a circumnavigation. I couldn’t imagine going all in on the cruising life, only to realize you get seasick in these conditions.
Halfway into Evan’s first watch, Eitan and I were relaxing downstairs when we hear a knock on the hatch. Eitan went up to see what Evan needed and learned that he, somehow, accidentally set off his emergency personal locator beacon. Eitan worked with him to turn off the beacon transmitter and logged onto the satellite phone to contact the emergency response office in Tahiti, letting them know it was an accidental activation in case they received an alert. I was surprised to hear that the emergency response officials were on top of it and had already contacted Evan’s wife and tried to reach Eitan by e-mail and phone. It’s good to know the emergency devices we attach to our life vests actually work and I couldn’t imagine the panic Evan’s wife must have felt! Evan contacted her with the satellite phone, letting her know everything was fine and we were all safe.
The rest of the trip went by easily and eventually Evan was able to hold down the seasickness medication long enough for it to kick in. We arrived at the island the next morning. It was another pristine atoll, just like the ones in the Tuamotus! Conditions were flat calm as we entered the pass and we all fell fast asleep as soon as the anchor was set.
The next day we awoke to placid conditions in the lagoon so I decided to take the paddle board for a spin. Since the water was flat and calm, I could easily see the reef below, it was like dry snorkeling. I noticed a little black fin sticking out of the water and recognized a baby blacktip reef shark! Then another! And another! It seems the lagoon and reef act as a kind of nursery and offers protection for these little sharks as they grow up.
Once I finished my morning paddle board, we grabbed our snorkel gear and hopped in the dinghy. By some miracle, we happened to get to the pass during an incoming tide. This is the best time to snorkel the pass because it brings in clear water from outside the lagoon and it is also safer since you get sucked into the lagoon instead of out to sea. We arrived at slack tide, just as the incoming current began, and had perfect conditions that just got better and better. We saw nurse sharks, blacktip and whitetip sharks, eagle rays, and even a turtle, which is uncommon since turtles are caught and consumed by the locals. As we swam against the gentle current, the visibility just got better and better, eventually extending over 100 feet and revealing the structural members of an old shipwreck, sunken in the middle of the pass. As we got closer to the outer end of the pass, we began seeing larger and larger fish including big tuna and wahoo. Of all the passes we dove, this one turned out to be our favorite and Eitan even ended up getting his new freediving record of 90 feet!
After a morning of paddle boarding and an afternoon of snorkeling, we finished off the perfect cruising day with a bonfire on the beach. I couldn’t wait to see what the island had in store for us!
