unfortunately....

The digital camera took a swim yesterday. It's a weatherproof model, but apparently that's a far cry from waterproof. We were having a birthday party for Wolfgang (from Wet Nose) on the beach and it looked like a good photo-op, so I dinghied back out to the boat to get the camera. We always pack the camera in a ziplock bag for dinghy drips, but I thought I'd get a shot of the "crowded anchorage" (15 or so boats lined up in one of the more remote places in the world with motus and palm trees in the background), so took it back out of the ziplock to be at the ready... then fumbled it while stepping into the dink. I dove right after it (fully clothed - well, at least in shorts and a t-shirt) and managed to catch it somewhere around 5ft down. After climbing back aboard and stripping off wet clothes I disassembled, rinsed carefully and put all the parts in the warm oven to dry. Unfortunately, after re-assembly it only beeps... bummer, especially since Kellie's friend, Carrie, just bought a special underwater housing for it and is bringing it to Tahiti with her in about two weeks. Now hopefully she'll be able to get us another camera to fit in the housing. We've taken over 2000 pictures, so at least it helps a little bit to dwell on the money we've saved by not buying and processing film...

It's feeling like it's time to move on. We'd like to get our "chores" done in Tahiti (provisions, food, water, picking up few spare parts) before Carrie arrives so we can focus on having fun when she's with us. Also, we've only got a little over a month left on our French VISAs and would like to see the Societies (Tahiti, Moorea, Huahine, Bora Bora) before we get kicked out. It's really too bad to be leaving all these kid boats, but now that we've met them, we'll keep in touch and meet up with them again along the way.

-Pete