Gryphon, Part II

What a place! Someone described it as what Hawaii looked like 50 years ago. (Only a lot smaller, I'll add.) We have truly enjoyed being here - the island offers a lot: people with a cultural identity, plenty of history (Polynesian and European), good diving, excellent hiking, nice beaches, fresh fruits and vegies, and enough restaurants to satisfy any cruiser. Our second day here, we hiked up and over the island past an incredible vertical rock feature called "The Needle", and yesterday we went diving on the dropoff and on a decently healthy reef. We've been to a house warming, been conducted all around the island - complete with historical and cultural narrative - by a Rarotongan who happened to give us a lift, and spent hours and hours with friends who moved here from the BVI.

What Rarotonga lacks is a decent anchorage for yachts. We're anchored in the main harbor with our stern tied to a sea wall about 10 ft behind the boat. The harbor is never calm - a swell from the easterly wind waves comes into the harbor and Gryphon rolls and tosses constantly. And this is in settled weather. When the wind gets strong or if the wind goes into the NE or north, it would be impossible to be here.

And so, our otherwise unbridled joy of hiking, diving, eating, and being with old friends is constantly tempered by concern for the sea conditions and a weather eye to the next passage. It's about 600 miles to Niue from here and the ocean in between has a reputation for poor weather. So, you sort of pick a not-as-bad-as-it-could-be weather window and go. Which we intend to do later today.

For now, we have to finish with the Customs and Immigration, get some food and water on board, check with the local meteorologist, and start putting away the lines that hold us to that sea wall.