Safely anchored at Palmerston Atoll

We arrived this morning at around 10am after a very fast and dark sail all night, mostly 8-9kn with some surfing speeds in the high 10s and low 11 knots, no moon and the stars were obscured by heavy cloud. Taking down the pole and jybing the genoa at 3am with 25kn of wind went very smoothly, thankfully. 5 boats all arrived before noon, we all met our hosts and checked in with the island official, got a tour of the school and a quick look around the island. We're all looking forward to a good nights sleep as it wasn't a very restfull passage.

You all are lucky to be reading a post this evening, as the computer unfortunately took a direct hit by one of the only waves we got aboard. I immediately dissasembled it and cleaned it all out, which was quite difficult considering the conditions. This morning wouldn't power up. Three more dissasemblies and reassemblies, testing at various stages resulted in diagnosing a shorted switch that senses whether the monitor lid is shut or not... I can live without that. Anyway, we're up and running for the time being, but would sure like to get ahold of another computer. The spare we've got is very old and doens't have USB or network ports and the CD drive won't read CDRWs so just getting data onto it is a challenge...

We'll write a bunch about the unique culture at Palmerston in the next few days... right now we're just looking forward to a (hopefully) good nights sleep.

Got word on the radio this morning that Ocean Breezes was 1 mile from Tonga, Wyndeavor is halfway to Nuie, Aurora B is in Nuie and that getting ashore there is quite an experience (there is no beach or place to land - you haul your dinghy out of the water with a crane in between crashing swells!) Mahi Mahi, Nowa Days and Plane Sailing are all on their way here and should arrive tomorrow.

Cheers, -Pete