Hey, that title almost rhymes!

It’s 1830 here about Wings. Conni is below fixing dinner, and I’m here in the cockpit writing. We’ve got some nice music playing softly in the background, remnants of our sundowner food on the cockpit table, and a fresh refill of Conni’s new drink. Life is better than good. The drink, as yet unnamed, is local rum, Zuko guava and fresh lime. Zuko is a Mexican powdered drink mix that we buy in quantity in Mexico and haul to the boat because it tastes so good. Mmmmmm…

It rained and rained last night, but at least it was cool enough that we didn’t roast below with the hatches closed. We were up at 0800 and did our morning chores. We’ve started to run the generator at 0900 or so to get an hour or two of charging done before the solar panels can get started. It seems to work very well. Our opinion is that solar panels are worth the expense but probably not wind generators. When sun’s out, the panels can run the fridge and still provide 10 amps to the batteries.

Opunohu Bay is the face of the South Pacific in many ways. It’s been the background for many big name movies through the years, taking the place of many other islands, because it’s so beautiful and the mountains are so rugged and magnificent. Our Lonely Planet guide book says that the 1984 version of Mutiny on the Bounty was fined here rather than Tahiti, and the movie version of South Pacific also had sections filmed here. When you see it, you’ll say, “Oh, yeah…I remember that!” For my vote, I think it’s much more beautiful than Bora Bora, to say nothing of its less commercial life style.

Not all is roses, though. A friend of ours, a Brit named Rick, had his dinghy motor stolen from his dinghy as it rested on a nearby beach. Evidently, there’s a strong market for stolen outboards and it can’t happen without the complicity of the locals. We’re voting with our pocketbooks and won’t spend a penny in the area and will let anyone know why. A few other boats have had items stolen from them, as well.

Our friend, Rick and his wife Yasna, we met in San Carlos Mexico in 2011 or 2012, so many years ago. Their boat is another Bob Perry design, a Hans Christian. Hans Christians are absolutely beautiful boats, full keel, bowsprit, external chainplates, and that unmistakable Bob Perry shear. He paddled over (he doesn’t have a motor any more, of course) this morning and said that he and Yasna had been admiring our boat, and we admitted that we had been admiring theirs. Like many cruisers, he’s a good diesel mechanic, and jack-of-all-trades. He said that he’d just rebuilt that dinghy motor and used it to dinghy to the beach to enjoy a celebratory beer. On return, the damned thing was gone! Personally, I think that it’s a terrible thing, but he was reconciled to the loss and was telling the story with humor. Great guy.

We jumped into the dinghy and went on a cruise of the bay, staying close enough to shore to see things. The heavy rain from the night before had eroded a lot of soil and had washed it into the bay, creating that two-tone red and blue that we’ve seen before: red near the outflow, and a clear line with no mixing at the blue salt water. Since it was totally opaque, I stayed away from shore enough to make it unlikely to hit coral or such.

There are two large power boats in the upper bay. One, Dragonfly, is 240-ft long, according to the Web entry for her. She’s of that modern style that I don’t find attractive, but she’s definitely a “James Bond” boat. The other boat was a mere 100-feet or so. By the way, it also goes to show the depth of the pass we all entered. [An amendment is that there is now a very large sailboat also in the inner bay. She has one of those illuminated masts that are so neat. And, it’s a tall mast!]

We toured the entire bay, and when we reached the other side, we followed the shallows markers out from the shore. I don’t doubt that it’s shallow when I see their markers! Still, we didn’t know exactly how things lay, and ended up in VERY shallow water. I was motoring, looked over the side, and there was rock! Holy smokes! Engine in neutral, engine pulled from water, engine off, oars out: All of that took seconds, and we paddled our way to deep water. What a team! Several dive boats were motoring into the shallows to dump their customers, so I imagine that there are some beautiful coral gardens.

We motored through a small pod of local porpoise, although they moved away quickly from us. We passed by a huge church that we’ll visit tomorrow. We read that it’s the oldest European building in the South Pacific, the headquarters of the London Missionary Society. If you’ve read a single one of my blogs, you’ll know that I’m not a fan of the LMS or what they did, but they suffered for their work, to be sure. A church of that history and importance is worth a walk, I think.

We did follow the markers around the shore shallows, but never found a way to shore. Tomorrow, we’ll try again. All in all, we had a lovely three-hour boat ride, powered by our dependable Mercury.

Here in the little anchorage area, there are 18 boats of all types and sizes. There is even a real cruising motor yacht, similar in design to the unlovely-but-interesting Idlewild that we saw as it went up for storage at the carenage.