Passage from Tanna to Noumea, 10-13 Oct 2014

For the couple of days right after visiting the volcano on Tanna, there were good conditions for sailing to Noumea.  We wanted to visit the neighboring “John Frum” village for their weekly gathering, though, and that wasn’t till Friday.  The John Frum movement is at the outer reaches of absurdity.  Robyn wrote a note about it, but you might want to Google it to learn more.  Anyway, we missed that good weather.

The forecast for Saturday and Sunday was poor, so we settled in to wait at least till Monday.  Saturday morning, however, the weather for that day looked much better than it had been forecasted the day before.  It’s hard to change gears, and scramble for an ocean passage at a moment’s notice, and the forecast looked even better for Monday, so we decided to wait.  Big mistake.  Take it when you get it.  Monday’s weather deteriorated, followed by worse and worse weather.  Thursday had torrential rain and dramatic thunderstorms.  We didn’t get out until Friday, and the weather that day was none too good.

The direct line between Tanna and the pass into the lagoon at New Caledonia runs right through Maré, one of the Loyalty Islands (part of New Caledonia).  We planned to pass around the south end, a shorter distance and a better wind angle for the rest of the way to the pass.  There was a front between Tanna and Maré, though, which had other ideas.  Besides being unpleasant, it forced us well off course.  Starting out, the wind was from the west, forcing us to beat well to the south.  Mintaka doesn’t much like beating to windward, so neither do we.  Each wave we hit pitches us up and slows us noticeably, after which she falls off to leeward to accelerate, only to do it all over again, and again, and again.  Sometime during the night, we passed through the front, after which the wind was from the south, forcing us to beat again, this time to the north.  After another whole day of this, we still couldn’t weather the south (upwind) end of Maré, so we bore off downwind to go around the north end.  That yielded a faster and more comfortable ride, but a longer distance, and set us up for a worse beat even further upwind to the pass.

Before we had gone very far from Tanna, before the front and all, I took a bad fall in the cockpit.  I was retying some bananas hanging on the mizzen gallows to keep them from swinging so wildly when the boat lurched and I lost my balance.  Spinning as I fell, I landed hard against a winch, breaking a rib just below my scapula.  Kind of a bad situation.  Excrutiating, but we still had to sail.  Noumea was a couple of days away, yet.  Robyn took over many of my jobs, but I still had work to do.

Because of the broken rib and unfavorable winds, we decided to stop briefly at Maré.  Unable to launch the dinghy, we stayed only long enough to catch our breath, and to time our arrival at the pass.  The wind was more favorable by that evening when we weighed anchor again, and the ride over to the pass, sixty-five miles away, was fantastic.  Mintaka flew fast and smoothly under clear skies and a gibbous moon.  We sailed in through the pass just as the tide turned to flood, and rode that flood all the forty miles through the lagoon to Noumea.  A great sail, despite the pain.

The exertions since the fracture didn’t do me any good, and by the time we dropped anchor in Noumea, I was in bad shape.  No rest for the wicked, though.  Still unable to launch the dinghy, another yachtie gave us a ride to shore to clear in.  Returning after a bit, we found the harbor authorities about to tow us out of the way of the cruise ship entering the harbor — we were infringing on the fairway because the anchorage was so crowded.  Just in time, we janked the hook and moved.  Still not finding any space within the anchorage boundaries, and with a strong wind blowing, and my back screaming at me, a friendly local dinghied up to us and offered his mooring.  Needless to say, we gratefully accepted.

OK.  Now we’re safely moored, but we still can’t launch the dinghy to get ashore.  And there are no open berths in any of the marinas.  But, it’s nice to have friends, particularly local friends who have a little influence.  Steffan and Carolyne, the friends we came here to visit, have a very large slip for their long and narrow boat.  There was actually enough room within their slip for us, too, without infringing on their neighbor’s space.  They arranged permission for us to tie up to them, nestled closely between their boat and their neighbor, a highly unusual arrangement.  They even rounded up some helpers for us to come in at 0600 this morning, before the daily wind began to rise.  So, happy ending.  We’re safely tied up, and all I have to do is rest and heal over the next few weeks.