This is Christpher's parents and little brother Nicholas in the garden in The Quarry , Northleigh, near Witney, probably about 1949.Photo taken by Christopher
Today we completed our crossing of the open Pacific Ocean when arrived at the island of Fatu Hiva, the southernmost island of the Marquesas islands. Paul was on watch as dawn broke at 05:42 and was the first to spot the island as we approached from the south west. At this point the island was 30 miles away. The first impression was of the huge vertical cliff on the southern end.
Since leaving Puerto Ayora in the Galapagos on the 23rd March we have sailed and it has to be said, motored for some) 3024 nautical miles in 19 days 1hr. We had scurried around to source extra diesel on our last day in the expectation that we may have had to motor for nearly 2000 miles if there was not enough wind to keep us going at 5.5 knts. As it turned out we only had to motor for the first 3 and a bit days before we got enough wind to exceed the minimum speed we needed to get me to Hiva Oa in time for my flight to Papeete on the 16th April.
The crossing went very smoothly, we had enough a few thing...
The cry of 'Land Ho!' went up at 10:16 GMT on the morning of the 26th October. Skipper, 1st mate and deck hand Niall had made the crossing of THE bay whiteout so much as a hint of it's reputation. This brings our voyage total mileage to 613 nautical miles. As we approached land we wondered how far ahead of Tormalind, an Estonian boat which left at the same time as us and who we kept pace with until the second night of the crossing when we suspect that they reduced sail for the night which we did not! We have an advantage in that we can reduce our fore sails without having to leave the safety and comfort of the cockpit whereas Tormalind have to venture out and manually remove one sail and bend on another. maybe they were just tired of us being in such close quarters!!? Thanks to the wonders of modern telecoms we were able to put out a request to the Tin Tin WhatsApp group and sure enough the answer came back that they were about 27nm astern.. Satisfying for us! (Photos wil...
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