Nuka Hiva

After 3 days at Ua Pou the Arc rally boats left and we had the anchorage all to ourselfs. After a couple days a lone boat came in. This is a beatuiful quiet island, every day you see a few locals out in the bay paddling their canoes around the bay and sometimes playing in the surf.

After 5 days here it was time to leave. I spent part of the day scrapping of the goose neck barnacles from our last passage. The next morning we upped anchor and left for Nuka Hiva 25 miles to the North. We had a brisk sail in a 25 to 30 knot East wind. It was a beam wind but do to the cross current we had to aim a bit hight of course, so wind was just forward of beam and he spray was flying occasionally. We figured this was a warm up for the passage to Hawaii. After half way there the wind eased to 20 knots or so and we let out a bit more sail.

We dropped anchor in the late afternoon in the large bay of the main town. It is a bigger and more lively place than Ua Pou, more traffic on roads and not as peaceful. About 15 boats here in the large anchorage.

After a few days here we are off to Oahu Hawaii.

INFO

-Anchored in 38ft at 08 54.94S 140 05.91W Anchorage is somewhat rolly as the swell comes into the bay. But holding is good.

- As at Ua Pou they have a public tap with drinking water. There are taps by dinghy dock, but they are only good for laundry etc. The potable water taps are at far end of town by bridge in a big parking area, a 10 or 15 minute walk.

-We bought diesel at the gas station by the main dock where the supply ship comes in. We jerry canned with the dinghy, as it is a difficult dock to bring a yacht along side, not yacht friendly at all. A catamarran we talked to backed in between two of the huge bumpers. Price of diesel was 165 francs a liter, very expensie. You could get a duty free form from the yacht services people on dinghy dock area, but would only be worth while if you bought more than 300 liters of fuel, we only needed half that.

-There is a little market every morning by the dinghy dock area you can buy fruit and some veggies, good to check every morning as things come and go. We got a bunch of cabbages after watching for a couple days. Everthing expensive.