Ironie's Pacific Adventures

the passage from wallis to tuvalu is about 350-400 nm nxnw passing a series of "seamounts"(a eamount is a drastic uprise of the sea floor to almost top the surface but not quite which can cause confused seas and freak waves in the area they are in),with names like "water witch seamont"as we would
start making our way north after clearing wallis island.my copy of sailing directions enroute discribes the area as to experience a troublesome
sea in the area under "fresh"trade winds.we hoped to avoid the later and slip through the area "untroubled".as we set out from wallis to the usual downwind roll
we headed wxnw for the first 50 miles.as night approached we started working our way through the area of the seamounts. may and i definely noticed a more queasy feeling as we
started taking the seas on the beam.we had 15 - 20 knots though this area which kept the seas under control.i would'nt want to pass this way under 30 knots sustained...
as we continued north,we experienced a squally morning and afternoon as the winds slowly started to clock to the north and go very light.we motored a few hours in the light winds rather then suffer the roll put up by the still existant swell.no sooner as i lay down for a catnap i was awakened by the unmistakeable smell of fresh diesel.one of the hoses in the fuel system decided to blow out a pinhole and ws spraying a heavy mist of fuel as the engine kept running.not having spare hose of this size ,i did the ol' clamp over tin foil trick which seemed to plug the bugger up until i could fix it properly....as we were still in the south pacific at 11 degrees

i was'nt expecting to have a notherly component to the wind until we got much farther north.the winds stayedlight for two days then filled in from the north and ocassionally northeastat 15 to 20 kn.
,making our nxnw track dead on the nose with ironie pinching the wind hard.
so it goes....luckily the seas were no more than a meter or two high in long rollers allowing ironie to make way without the "hobby-horsing" effect she would experience in shorter
steeper seas like we had in the carribean.
so on we went.slowly making our way towards funa futi atoll at 8 degrees south and 179 east
crossing the international dateline enroute and gaining a full day as we passed 180 degrees.
we made our approach to funa futi from the south east and headed towards te ava pua pua pass
where we would enter the inner lagoon.i was able to contact our friends matt and elizabeth
on the boat "rubicon"who gave me more details on what to do once we were in the lagoon /check-in
proceedures ,etc...we anchored near the main commercial wharf and i went to complete customs/immigration etc...
i was reeling in a heady spn afer a long sleepless passage to weather and the heat of the day.
the strange surreal enviroment of the atolls was like a new strange world to my senses.the light,heat and endless shades
of lagoon blues going to my head.
after finishing check in in a little grubby office in the dark with no a.c.,(generators were down)we weighed anchor and set off to the sailboat anchorage to join friends
"katey lee","rubicon" and soon to be friends "creola"....we dropped the hook in 10 meters of
blue and after cleaning and setting the boat right promptly too a well deserved swim.the water was an elixer bringing ironie and crew back to life afer a 5 days challenging sail.
tuvalu is a series of atolls streaching se-nw like stepping stones from polynesia proper to micronesia and the equatoral islands of kiribati.
tuvalu recieves alot of attention as a poster child of the effects of sea rise as a result of world climate change.
the errosion is apparent but i defintely expected to see a much more drastic view.i could'nt even find any agencies or offices
dealing with the issue.the place just seemed like another south pacific atoll,slightly busier and more crowed then the ones i'd seen in french polynesia.
the problem seemed to be overpopulation here.as far as i know there have been alot of tuvaluans
emmigrating to other "higher" islands in the pacific such a "niue"near tonga.
the main freature of capitol islet(the main island on funa futi atoll) is the airport set dead smack
in te middle of the islet.we arrived on a "flight" day and enjoyed a cold victoria bitter beer while watching
the gings on around the open air airport from the small restarunt ajacent.there were little stands set up
around the town square selling shell necklaces and tuvalu fans for the departing folks.the main
town square is right next to the runway.after the plane took off the town reverted back to it's very sleepy languid self.we
spent the next week or so taking in the various sights of the atoll,enjoyed the bus ride from one end of captol to the other(about 1 hout total trip)
had a nice snorkel with larry and trinda from katey lee collected some small shellfish that may showed us how to prepare and eat.
we wer very happy to discover the "taiwan veggie garden" here as well.it seems the taiwanese are helping the tuvaluans
learn the art of gardening on an atoll with very little soil.this is an experimental project
but seems to be going gangbusters.we were given the tour of the garden by our guide who intoduced himself as peter pan.he showed us how they were growing
thier veggies and let us buy some of the crops.there were pumpkin,cucumber,eggplant,okra,green been
cabbage,bok choy,basil green pepper and hot pepper.an amazing fing on the usually veggieless atolls....rock on peter pan!!!
we would have liked to seen other atolls in the tuvalu group but the (unreasonable,in my opinion)rules don't let yachts visit
other atolls on thier outbound journey unless they return to the main island (funa futi) this is very difficult as the distances between the atolls is substantial
so we decided to move on to our next stop which would be an equatoral crossing and the islands of kiribati 650 nm to the nxnw ,next stop tarawa atoll in the northern pacific!!!