(331) Setting Up the Pole-Out
04 October 2018 | Suwarrow, Cook Islands
HB
I think we’ll be here a week maybe two, I wish longer. The decision to leave will depend on weather, how long our provisions hold out (including water), and whether we want to carry on with our friends or go by ourselves the next 400nm passage to Samoa. Ian just wants to sit and read and relax, and I long to snorkel and explore this amazing place. But boat projects always seem to get in the way. John and Ernie were over yesterday for a pancake breakfast and they both extolled the benefits to Ian of poling out. Something I’ve tried to convince him of since Mexico but instead went nowhere while we gybed back and forth for days and days across the rhumb line, even on this last passage from Bora Bora. Even John made the remark that he occasionally would see Nightide cross his rhumbline track and disappear across the port or starboard horizon. After looking over John’s setup on Aftermath Ian this morning dug into the extra gear storage locker under the front berth and came out with all kinds of shackles, line, and cams. I’ll leave him be, he is in project mode now, and I sense/hope we’ll have a downwind headsail poling system by the time we leave here.