Hello dear and old friends,

It seems that if you are putting up with these "escapades on paper" that I send out, you have to be in the category of dear; and "old" always pertains to quality in people as far as I am concerned so if you are kind enough to read them and then to even respond, well you are both old and dear to me.

Of course, these updates are me so Chuck may not feel the same way. How do I know? I have not asked him.

That is one thing we are finally learning; that we are not responsible for the other person's behaviour and so shouldn't take it personally, although the flip side is,
"well, that embarrasses me so yeah - I'm pissed."

How is it, we can still be working on basic stuff like that? Shouldn't it all be easy as pie by now. We are both wondering if we are slow learners. You have to give us a thumbs up for the effort. I mean 30 years married and 37 living together - well, seriously though, it was likely more like 10 years out of the 30 that we were actually under a roof together. Funny life but many do it - not that unusual these days. So maybe that is why we are still learning so much about the other person. Acceptance of someone who has changed, grown, morphed into a better version than what you thought you had. As the song says, "he drives me crazy but I love him anyway". Don't know it? Maybe it is a new song in the making. Life is a wonderful educator. Just when you thought that perhaps you had it nailed, it jumped up and bit you in the ass.

So, what has been going on? Well, let's see. I had to erase all my history so I sort of don't remember exactly where I left off but as it is impossible to tell everything, I will try to think of something you might be interested in.

For the sailors.... the watermaker works, has great pressure, good flow, making what it is supposed to, clear and does not taste like salt. (However, the TDS is still high sometimes over a 1000 but comes down to 890 ish- latest). Never mind, we can use it for everything except drinking so that is working well. Furler - working. Autopilot - working. Mainsail repaired beautifully, stack pack repaired by us, as well as all the worn-out stitching on the sun cover redone.

Now we are on a batten search - human error. BOOM!! Done that report! For the travellers, likely the most historical in terms of Fr. Poly would be the visit yesterday to the Marae of Taputapuatea. Large religious area made by the islanders by making fires below the coral at low tide and as the coral broke into pieces they would haul it up to land. This place is right beside the ocean. There are some big pieces standing up and a large field of big rocks flat enough to walk on. There are several of these in a large grassy flat area . Raiatea is quite mountainous so flat land is not abundant. Ceremonies included human sacrifice and immolation of children (no dictionary or internet so all I can say is - does not sound good to me). There were several wars and then the Europeans arrived. I enjoyed the place, interesting and a cool vibe. Alright, enough said.

Day to day life: So, day to day life is not a whole lot different except you are on a boat and floating. The place you float changes. That is one of the benefits - scene changes - water, foliage, sand, colour, amount. Raiatea has no beaches. We saw one that was obviously man made. They do beautiful stone work on this island and the breakwater is a work of art. It is so different than any other island we have been to. Not that we have been to that many. Enough to get a sampling of how very different each island and its culture is from the next. Just like at home where sections of the country have different habits, ways of talking, community happenings.

Raiatea is also one of the cleaner islands. the marinas are crystal clear and you can see to the bottom of these marinas. At least the one that our sailmaker worked in fit that description. I was over at the carenage ( the boat yard and dry storage) on my batten search and that was a bit of a different story. Could have been the grey day and rain but the water was definitely more the Mexican quality of marina water.

Listening to lots of music but all old stuff that we have had for years. We were serenaded till 3:00 am on Friday night by some techno stuff, French and English, loud beat, loved it. Not exactly like the staying power of the Mexican nationals who go till 6:00 am without fail. and for those of you non Canadians try Tragically Hip. Long live Gord Downie- hope he is still with us - what an icon!

The newest album we have which we love is Amelie Patterson's Roll Honey Roll and if you have not heard it, I highly recommend it: great lyrics, sultry, folksy westerns/ bluesy. Yes, her own style. Just a little plug for Amelie as she is a young and budding talent and good work deserves a helpin hand. Advert over - hahaha. Tricked ya, now you will all want to go out and buy her album on iTunes or Amazon. She is also Banff's first official poet laureate!

The quiet that I thought would be abundant is not. The water is always making sound, as is the air. So tuning into the sound gives a lot of information about the weather. Weather becomes focal in one's life at sea. I think I said that previously though. But you see how very important it is to us when it comes up again. It looks like the next weather window to American Samoa may be next Sat. In the meantime, we head (hope hope) to Bora Bora after our batten search tomorrow. Wish us luck on the batten which jumped out of its pocket yesterday.

It is lightly raining or raining lightly and after an almost entire day off, being Sunday. And nothing happens on Sunday - I have made another one-pot wonder- don't under-estimate the magic of one pot - first, boil the cabbage, second, add the onion, third add the already cooked potatoes and then add the chicken franks, diced, cayenne pepper (my go to - as you know Julie and Tim) and garlic. And it's all ready to consume. I need to bake a chocolate cake or Margaret's Disappearing Oatmeal Cookies (yeah Cahoots) or perhaps both - or none if I run out of energy.

Hugs to all,

The ever hopeful, Karen