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June, 2012:

Life Goes on in Tahiti

Jun 26th, 2012
by Sara.
7 comments

We’ve been in Tahiti for over two weeks now. Tahiti – sounds exotic, huh? Beautiful women everywhere, tattooed muscled men, white sand beaches, showers of flowers. But we arrived in Papeete with a list of things to do and despite our initial decree to just enjoy this island paradise and not focus on the list so much, we’ve found that a city is a city, no matter how exotic and the list always wins.

Leah talks to Grandpa 4000 miles away

We’ve shopped, we’ve washed the boat and many loads of laundry (albeit at $9 a load in the coin washer everything’s been washed in the sink). We’ve visited the giant Carrefour store (a sort of French Walmart) a number of times bringing back cartloads of crackers, pasta, chocolate, cheese, meats, produce and boxed French wine. Our diesel and water tanks are full, engine oil changed, calls made to family, our few bills paid.

It hasn’t all been work here though; we met up in the park with friends to celebrate an 8th birthday, Leah had a slumber party with another 6-year-old girl on an Australian boat we met here, we took the bus to the Tahiti museum for a field trip one afternoon. The girls were delirious with delight when we treated them to Happy Meals at the downtown McDonald’s and I must admit my strawberry shake tasted like mana from heaven.

After sampling the ordinary delights of Tahiti we were all set to sail to Moorea in the Tahiti-Moorea Rendezvous this past weekend. On Friday I got out a mirror to look at a tooth that had been aching a bit for the past few days. Back in Mexico, I had gotten a long-needed crown (my first) on one of my molars. Apparently this crown was temporary as it had developed a lovely hole right in the bottom surface and I could see my tooth right through it.

We got on the bus and headed downtown from our anchorage near Marina Taina. There was an English-speaking dentist right across from the yacht quay so we went straight to his office. Happily he saw me right away. “I am obliged to remove your crown,” the French dentist said. “Ohay,” I replied with my mouth open, palms sweating. He poked and (after numbing the tooth) drilled around for a bit. “You come back Monday for a root canal,” he stated. Oh boy.

Shopping with Holly, Papeete Marche

Later that night we met another American family on a boat and the dad happened to be a dentist. We talked for a while about my options. “Honestly, since your tooth is on the top and in back and it will just end up coming out eventually you might as well have the thing pulled now and get out of Tahiti,” he opined. As thrilling as having a tooth pulled in Tahiti sounded, that was my gut feeling too as the tooth had given me loads of trouble over the years.

We stayed in Tahiti over the weekend and arrived at the dentist’s office Monday morning. I spoke to him of my desire to have the tooth extracted rather than undergo weeks of expensive visits to try to repair the half-rotten thing. He refused. “That is just stupid to pull out a perfectly good tooth! Crazy! I won’t do it!” I paid my bill for the previous visit and left with my head spinning.

Two hours later, with another dentist’s name in hand we are back on the bus to this office which is near the marina. I am in tears the entire ride. My crownless tooth is killing me now. I don’t want to pay $1000 to a complete asshole for a root canal and another crown that will take two weeks to complete. I want to leave Tahiti; we only have three weeks left on our visas and the rest of the Society Islands to see. But right now, I want to get on one of the planes that take off every few minutes from the airport the bus is passing and go back to the places I know. I want to drive my car to my old dentist’s office in Olympia. The girls hug me, say “feel better, mama.” Living so close together we share so many things, emotions included.

We find the new office easily and this dentist sits me down to examine what is left of my tooth. He is much friendlier with a clean, modern office. After taking a quick x-ray we discuss the options. I tell him that I would really prefer to remove the tooth. “That sounds like a fine solution. You can come back tomorrow to have it done,” he smiles warmly. I make my appointment and we walk to the store for ice-cream before heading back to the boat to cook dinner.

Update 27 June: The tooth came out quickly and without a hitch yesterday. The dentist was excellent (Dr. Dairou), I couldn’t feel a thing and three things were confirmed:

1. The more nervous I am about something the less of a big deal it really turns out to be (see: “Rounding Cape Scott”).

2. Keep trusting my gut: the tooth’s roots were all twisted and wonky and the dentist said a root canal would have been impossible.

3. As Leah suspected, the tooth fairy does not bring money for an a adult tooth. I only got a new toothbrush and a packet of dental floss. Boo.

Photos from Fakarava

Jun 21st, 2012
by Sara.
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Hover over photos for a description, click to see full size.

April – May 2012 Cruising Expenses

Jun 15th, 2012
by Sara.
4 comments

The best parts of cruising are free

“I’ve always wanted to sail to the south seas, but I can’t afford it.” What these men can’t afford is not to go.

 –Sterling Hayden

They say that cruising to the South Pacific is expensive. But somehow — after blowing our budget month after month in Mexico — we managed to spend less in each of our first two months here than in any month on our cruise so far. I think there are a few reasons for this: since we bought 3+ months worth of food in Mexico we haven’t needed to buy many provisions other than fresh items like produce, meat and eggs (and ice-cream of course). Second, many things are so expensive that we don’t even bother to buy them. For example: eating out with drinks for our family of four can easily cost over $100, internet is $5/hour so we aren’t checking Facebook much other than a quick peek now and then to see if anyone has been born. Laundry is $10-15 per load so nearly all of ours has been done in buckets in the cockpit and dried on the lifelines. Finally, there just isn’t a whole lot to buy in the middle of nowhere, like most of the Tuamotus and many Marquesan anchorages.

Some things were rumored to be very expensive and it turned out to be just not true. We paid less per gallon for duty-free diesel in Nuku Hiva than we did in California. A returnable 17 oz. bottle of Hinano beer is $3 in the Marquesas ($2 here in Tahiti). Many grocery items are very reasonable and on par with US prices such as pasta, rice and French cheeses (and of course baguettes!). Overall, we’d say that prices down here (at the current exchange rates) seem to be about 10% over what we were paying in Canada – south seas paradise cruising is a very good deal so far for us.

S/V Wondertime’s April & May 2012 Cruising Expenses

beer – $119
diesel – $100
dinghy gas – $36
dive tank fill – $10
eating out – $390
groceries – $482
internet – $97
laundry – $88
music CD – $26
personal care – $5
pharmacy – $31
phone card – $21
postage – $3
propane – $44
souvenirs (incl. tattoo) – $757
taxi – $6

total – $2,215

Fulfilled

Jun 11th, 2012
by Sara.
1 comment

"Mom, I sure hope Tahiti has a playground!" Even after all these miles, a playground still excites the Wondertime girls like nothing else.

We just arrived in Papeete, Tahiti today and are tied bow-in to the downtown quay. We’re still rubbing our eyes, can’t believe we are really here. For some reason, arriving here on this iconic island on our own sailing boat makes the whole trip seem kind of shocking, in a good way of course. Tahiti is one place we’ve always wanted to go but never really thought we’d see. And now we are here taking in this lovely exotic city nestled on this mountainous green island, which appeared on the horizon this morning like a mirage.

On our two-night passage across from Fakarava, I made a list of things we needed to get and do during our time in Tahiti. I hear there are supermarkets here. I haven’t stepped inside a market bigger than a 7-11 in three months, since March. Food, we do need. Particularly Nutella. We are plumb out of Nutella. And vegetables of course. I’m craving a green salad the size of a turkey platter.

I tried to remember the other things that passed through our minds in the last few months, things we wanted to get when we had access to stores (and indeed, there do seem to be a lot of shopping opportunities here). I wrote down: “fill water tanks, get diesel, propane?”. I couldn’t remember what else it was that we wanted to buy when we next had the chance. Which was weird, because a hundred or two things have crossed my mind these past few months. An iPad would be nice. But not really something we need. We’re getting by with our quirky old PCs for now. The girls’ Crocs are holding up just fine, no one has lost their hat yet.

I really couldn’t think of anything else we really wanted to buy while we are here. Even the boat seems to have all her needs met at the moment (though there are a thousand things we’d like to do to improve her). The girls have plenty of clothes and toys and books (in fact we need to shed some of the outgrown ones).

It’s amazing, really, how easily our needs have been met, as we’ve traveled on our small boat over this past year. We swing, mostly, on our own anchor and chain, catch sun for power and rainwater for washing. Our wardrobes are simple: swimsuits at the beach, underwear when it’s just us onboard, shorts and t-shirts for when guests come over or we head into town. We always have enough food, although it’s certainly not fancy. Even in Fakarava we came across a box of new crop New Zealand apples for sale. They were the best apples we’ve ever had. Everyday we eat a bit of bread, some protein, something that’s come straight from the earth. A bit of dessert too keeps the crew happy.

Now we find coming to our first city since Cabo San Lucas, where we could likely get anything we wanted that our wants have gradually diminished when we truly have all we need.

A South Seas Birthday Wish

Jun 5th, 2012
by Sara.
10 comments

Around the time I turned 30, Michael and I made a promise to ourselves that we would sail to the South Pacific before we turned 40. It seemed a reasonable deadline, if even having such a deadline is reasonable to start with. But it seems to have worked: a few days ago on Fakarava atoll in the middle of the South Pacific ocean I turned 37.

Over the past five years we scribbled countless timelines and schedules on scraps of paper. We added up numbers, formed numerous plans. In the end, we went with the one that got us to our goal the soonest and here we are. Not only does it feel marvelous, but now we have even more years to plan for the next one.

There were so many moments along the way where it seemed absolutely impossible; at the beginning we had a newborn and a toddler and with the two girls in tow we had to sell a house, buy a(nother) boat, give everything away, get the new boat ready…. I can’t even count the number of times we just wanted to give up, concede that it wasn’t going to happen. Usually though when either Michael or I were ready to throw in the towel one of us would remind the other we are almost there. And we really were.

My birthday wish is for you to start, or keep, making plans for whatever big or small thing you must do before your next big birthday, whether it’s 30 or 40 or 80. And keep at it, you’re almost there. If you wish, we’d love to hear what you are planning in the comments below.

Michael took the girls birthday shopping for me in Nuku Hiva and they picked out, on their own, this writing tiki for me. Instead of war clubs, he holds two pencils in little holes tucked under his arms.

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