17.16S 155.28W 11th September 2011
Mojo 2
Andrew Partington
Sun 11 Sep 2011 23:43
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Very quiet 24 hours for us. We have sailed not much
more than 100NM since yesterday. The upside is that despite the wind being a
very light 7 knots we have had beautiful weather. Since leaving Tahiti
we had been seeing the remnants of the big southerly swell that had
pounded the island for a few days but this has now dropped away completely. The
ocean is virtually flat and we are just considering a switch to the motors. When
I send this blog I will likely get a weather update from Gerard and make a
decision from there.
Last night the moon was back to full with a clear
sky. Stunning, but it would have been good to have a little [spoken
quietly] more than the 10 knots we had for most of the night.
Late yesterday afternoon we sailed within 12
miles of Maupihaa Island. even though we were so close we could not see it even
with the binoculars. This low coral Atoll was wiped out by a cyclone a
couple of years ago with all buildings being destroyed. They have rebuilt the
village but given that we were unable to see the island from so close a cylone
must be a terrifying thing for the island's inhabitants. I'm not sure if anyone
stayed on the island during the cyclone because most of these atolls have
airstrips. Palmerston Atoll, which we will visit in a few days, has no
airstrip!!
445NM to go to our next stop. Hopefully a little
more wind to help us get there and preserve some diesel for the next leg to
Niue and then Tonga.
Andrew.
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