rain rain rain

Funny how it works... I'd just spend the better part of a whole day hauling fresh water in the dinghy out to the boat since we want to leave for the Tuamotus with full tanks. There's no fresh water available there, and we hadn't had any significant rain since we were trying to approach Clipperton Atoll about a month ago so we could take on around 300 gallons... wouldn't you know it that it absolutely poured rain last night and most of today. I have a water catching system that I'd set up but never tried: A foam plug for the scupper on the side deck and a bilge pump with a hose to a 5 micron water filter that can pour directly into the deck fills for the water tanks.

It rained so hard that the streets flooded. Flood waters washed down to the waterfront and washed out a good portion of beach behind our stern. We've got 2 anchors out (bow and stern) because it's a tight little anchorage, and to keep our bow pointed into the swell. Our stern anchor may now be buried under 2ft of silt and debris. That'll be fun to retrieve. It was almost comical last night with 30kn gusts blowing thru from every direction and rain driving so hard that it was blowing horizontally under the cockpit awning and getting everything (including me) absolutely soaked. Some other boats were having trouble staying far enough away from each other and pulled anchors and moved several times during the night. At least we're all clean now and the salt is washed off every part of the boat!

We were catching enough water on 1/4 of the deck that the 800 gallon per hour pump wasn't keeping up! It took about 10 minutes to get the same amount of water in the tanks as I'd spend about 5 hours doing in the dinghy trips the day before... Oh well, at least I know the system works well. Every bucket and jerry jug is full too, so it'll be easy to do laundry as soon as it looks like the sun will come out soon.

Today a local lady brought us 6 pamplemouse (grapefruits about the size of Ellie's head), a stalk of bananas that must weigh at least 40 lbs, and 4 papayas - two that are "normal size" and two that resemble a slightly skinny watermellon... absolutely HUGE. We'd met a Frenchman on the wharf a few days ago who mentioned he had a pamplemouse tree in his yard. They were just falling on the ground and we'd be welcome to come by and pick as many as we wanted. We found his house and took him up on it, and now have another 10, plus a bunch of lemons he gave us as well. Neither of these incredibly generous folks wanted anything in return. We gave the lady some gifts anyway, and the Frenchman mentioned he was having great difficulty finding help to clear some land he's planning to build a house on... I offered to give him a hand, so he'll pick me up at 7am.

We don't have a definite plan about when to move on. We'll at least wait until the weather is settled, maybe sail around this island (Ua Pou) and check out some of the other bays. The other Marquesan islands are all upwind from here, so we may miss them and go to the Tuamotus from here. -Pete