Passage to American Samoa

These past few days have been pretty hectic for me. Ok lemme clear that up. The past few days have been great sailing weather absolutely awesome sailing!! Unfortunately I have had a fever of 103 and I can't shake it. Nights sweats, body aches, severe pain behind the eyes and high fever. Havent been able to eat anything or had the energy to cook in 4 days. Ty said I had dengue  fever!!! :( I still make it to the helm to do my watches but if I'm not lying down I feel like crap. We finally called Dr B on the sat phone and he said to take the meds he left us with and call him in a few days. He said I had the bloody flu....:( 

I've never been sick to where I had so much pain behind my eyes it's so bizarre. ...

No luck on fish yet. We had 3 lines out and now we r down to 2. We got a good bite but we can't seem to set the hook and reel em in..... 

We hit out first squall out here. Ty n I saw it comin so we ran all over getting sails put up and down and furled away, kicked on both motors and waited for the worst. It looked baaaad and huge In the distance. It dumped a ton of rain on us and stole our wind!!!!>=[  we were ready for all the worst winds and all it did was rain for a bit and left us with no wind!! Lame. 

Finally got over the fever when we landed in Suwarrow!! This place was so beautiful! White sand. Palm tree after palm tree. Crystal clear water and tons of sharks! We had about 12 pet black tip reef Sharks that hung around our stern all day every day. We stayed for about 3-4 days. We snorkels the reefs and swam with the manta rays! Yeah I am getting better about getting in the water. It's getting easier and I like it more and more every time I work up the nerve to get in;). The Suwarrow rangers are awesome btw. There are two that stay on the island and we had an awesome beach BBQ potluck on our last night there. I made a massive batch of tortillas and they were gone by the end of the night. We left the next morning after swimming with the mantas and we are now gonna be in American Samoa tomorrow morning. Yay McDonald's and free wifi!!!

We caught a massive dorado finally! I reeled it in and when we finally got him on board he made a huge bloody mess but we are eatin pretty good right now:) 

We have had a few squalls but no high winds or anything hectic so far. It was quite nice actually. Having a huge downpour, in the dark, eating lamb chops and drinking wine inside....radar on of course and popping my head outside every 5-10 min .... A little island music and we had a nice evening. Even let the rain fill our water tank! 

We did laundry in the jungle from the well water. Or rain water collected in this well it was pretty awesome doing laundry in the jungle and then hangin to dry on a line in the middle of the island. We also got to watch the rangers feed the sharks. They feed them on the other side of the island twice a day. It was pretty intense watching them all fight over scraps and watching the big ones come in so close to shore! 

Off we go

Well here we go!! Just left bora bora and we are off to American Samoa. Had a wonderful time. Met lots of cool people. But it's time to say goodbye. Next stop should be about 2 weeks from now. We may stop in Suwarrow  along the way for a night or 2. Google that place if u can!!! Sposed to be ridiculously pretty. Then going to pull into Pago Pago American Samoa around October 1st.  

Gale force!

Maaaaan the wind is PUMPIN!!!! It's been a hectic and consistent 25 knots of wind here in the marina. Glad to be secured on a mooring but still get a little uneasy feeling when it gusts up to 30 knots. With wind like this it's hard to get anything done outside but the inside is spotless lol.... So we figured out how to rig the mainsail so as soon as the wind dies a bit we can put the baton cars on and be on our way outta FP! 

So Ty and I noticed there are sooo many fanny packs going on here...we can't figure out if FP stand for French Polynesia or fanny pack! Haha either they are makin a comeback or they never left;) ill be sticking with my lil Hurley daypack but to each their own. 

So our friends on Privateer loaded up our hard drive with all the best 80's movies!! I'm so excited!! And they added THE PRINCESS BRIDE!!!!! I'm in heaven. ;) they got all our good music to choose from and repaid us with awesome movies. Can't wait to watch The Lost Boys and Princess Bride. 

Friday the 13th...nothing bad has happened but we DID see a boat dragging anchor near the moorings...then we saw one person up at the now taking the anchor up so we thought it was all ok but then we were on the dinghy dock of the yacht club and the person is jumping up n down and waving both arms (international symbol for Help) ...it seemed they were able to navigate thru all the boats but ya never know...maybe they needed help maybe not but I let the guy from the yacht club know so he got on the radio... Seemed like they were in control so no worries. 

Some other friends we have on Just Drifting said there were whales in the marina the other night!! So sad we missed that. We did see whales on the way from maupiti to bora so we didn't totally miss out. 

My Tahitian pearl;)

Lela and Chris....nice Cali peeps and they bring us cake!!!

Gotta rep my team all over the world. ;)

All choked up...

Here we are sitting in the most beautiful place in the world...and all I wanna do is teleport to LA for a couple days!!! My new cousin baby Nico Francisco Barajas was born yesterday and everyone is healthy and couldn't be happier;) 

Isn't he handsome!?!?!?! So happy for my uncle J and aunt L-Boogie;)

Ty n I are currently moored at the Bora Bora yacht club...taking a few days to relax and hang out until the wind picks up in our favor. We met another couple from Cali and they have been a blast to hang out with. I am quite jealous of all their toys and now I must have a paddle board!!! They have a kayak and paddle board and a lil dinghy that they made a sail for... I would like to have a two person kayak and an inflatable paddle board. So prolly gonna pick em up in American Samoa when we get the rest of our work done. 

We had the best chicken tacos last night!!! Oh so good! Our friends brought over the tacos and I made a salad and some rice. Ooh and she brought chocolate cake with Nutella icing! Yum. 

We saw manta rays this morning otw back from an anchorage we stayed in last night. We also had our steering wheel lock break off so now we need that fixed as well a the main sail and the spinnaker block....always somethin....

Mermaid thievery!!!

We had an amazing trip with the boat owner and we said goodbye to him yesterday. We had to get pulled out of the water again to replace the seal on the port sail drive. The work was finished within a couple hours and we were put back in the water and grabbed a mooring ball.  :( ya know when you live on a boat your flip flops become your new high heels. I had the most beautiful havianas and kicked em off on the transom when we came back from dropping off The owner. Overnight a mermaid took our shoes and left us with a fish....not amused....I miss my lovelies!!

Luckily someone left some flip flops here on the boat so I'm using those for the time being. Yeah they are too small and don't exactly cover my whole foot but they'll do for now.... Damn u mermaid!!!

 

Maupiti

This island is just a short day sail away from Bora Bora. We left around 7am and got to Maupiti at 12:30 and anchored in one of the two anchorages. The climbing trail takes you up the mountain at 360 meters and you can see the whole island around you. It took us about an hour to hike and climb up and I bout died on the way there but the view was so worth it!:) there were some pretty sketchy spots where you must pull yourself up with using the rope that is anchored in the rocks there and go straight up but it was surprisingly easy. On the way up I just kept thinking How the hell am I gonna get back down!?!?!? Buuuut it was even easier to get back down so no worries. We walked thru "town" and saw some locals playin games n ridin bikes. We decided to make our way back to the boat and begin prepping dinner. Mmmmmm steak potato and corn on the cob. A little but of wine and everyone slept just fine:) today we are going to snorkel and dive and look for more manta rays. We heard they have some here as well. 

I think it's a whale skull...?

Mornin sunshine!!!

Bora Bora

This place is so friggin beautiful!!!! The water is clear and so blue. We moored at the bora bora yacht club and had dinner there. That was probably the best meal I've ever had in my entire life. The beef carpaccio was amazing. The steak with duck con fit was also amazing and of course the wine was perfect and the sunset is beautiful from the dock there. We left there in the morning and went to the lagoonarium and just anchored by the beach. At the lagoonarium we swam with blacktip reef sharks, lemon sharks, stingrays and tons of fish. Yes....I got in the water....and swam with sharks....on purpose....it was actually really cool! They just kinda swim around you and try to avoid you really so we started chasing them lol...trying to get good shots with the GoPro n all...the lemon shark was big tho huge so he was kinda scary. They serve you a platter of fruit to snack on and they feed the sharks dead fish...weird...

The next day Ty and Greg did some diving next to the coral reef in that same area and saw the huge manta rays! They look so beautiful and so graceful in their slow gliding. 

We stopped by the famous Bloody Mary's for a beer but there is really not much going on there so we left and moored at the other yacht club for the night. We walked to town and got some more groceries n stuff and had a feast! Now we are on our way to maupiti for diving and hiking tomorrow. 

The boat sails nicely with just the genoa. We have the mainsail now but the factory forgot to include some essential parts and now we have to wait for them to ship us those pieces and install it later.