Passage from the Marquesas to the Tuamotus. Into Our Fifth Day

Passage from the Marquesas to the Tuamotus. We’re into our fifth day. During the night, the captain got in touch with outer space. “What are they saying?” I ask. “Better have a look at what they’re drawing first!” With a mischievous smile, the captain handed me the iPad with the latest weather forecast. Against a backdrop of dots and isobars, I first saw a swirling storm, and then another, more powerful tangle bearing the resounding label Typhoon Trami. Wind speed: 115–140 miles per hour. “Aaaargh!!! Mummy!” my inner coward wailed. “Which way do we ru-u-un?” “Just hold on,” I tell my inner coward. Then I ask Andryukha, equally sweetly: “Darling, where is that?” “Oh, come on,” my darling replies. “Don’t panic. That’s in Micronesia, not where we are.” “Phew!” My inner coward buried its face in my neck and fell silent. . From bucking bronco to calm By evening, we had folded the butterfly’s wings in anticipation of 20 knots of headwind. At four in the morning, heeled over at a jaunty angle, the first mate finally woke up for good, at the risk of crushing Nastya, who was sleeping beside her after the night watch. My thoughts began circling around a rhetorical question: HOW COME, out of all the months when the trade wind blows where it’s supposed to, we managed to choose the one five-day weather window when a cyclone had spun the wind round the wrong way? At about 10 a.m. (which is late, considering that neither the captain nor I had slept since the night), clouds swept in and knocked a third off our speed. And the close-hauled sailing—the wind on our bow—became more or less tolerable; we could even finish frying yesterday’s baked breadfruit in a pan and rustle up guacamole from the tomatoes and avocados that had started to go off. We gobbled it down while the sailor was dead to the world, so we wouldn’t have to share. While we were at it, the captain and I decided to conduct an experiment: how late would the sailor sleep if we didn’t wake her? It turned out to be half past three. Nearly 11 hours of sleep. Not bad—perhaps the captain and I won’t have to stand watch at all next night. Hooray, the holidays have begun! Our daughter Nastya knows nothing yet of our dastardly plans, so she is calmly reading in the cockpit, wrapped in a blanket. It gets cool among the clouds toward evening, and the crew are delighted. Meanwhile, with the close-hauled course we now have, we can’t lay Makemo Atoll (also known as Kutuzov Atoll) and are heading farther north. Andryukha says that in this weather we may sail straight past the entire Tuamotu Archipelago, because the forecast shows no easing of the wind, there’s no sun, and entering a narrow pass with the wind in the wrong direction and poor visibility could be dangerous. And our planned meeting at Makemo with the crew of the yacht Manaia may fall through as well. Tommaso and Rosetta did not leave the Marquesas as planned and are waiting for a decent wind while repairing their sail. Makemo was supposed to be our first-ever atoll. Do you know how an atoll differs from an ordinary island? Imagine a collar tossed into the ocean. A collar made of coral dusted with sand. Inside the collar lies a calm lagoon—in this case a large one, no less than 65 km long and 5–8 km wide. And the collar’s clasp is the pass leading from the ocean into the lagoon. The people of Makemo—about 750 of them—harvest wild pearls and farm cultured ones, and they also catch fish, which we’re not allowed to eat. Nastya is overjoyed about that (she likes neither fish nor washing the dishes after it), while continuing to yearn for Tahitian chicken. Two chickens. One for me. Repairs and “tailoring” Yesterday, while hiding from the sun behind the side panel of the aft awning, we discovered that I—laid low by ciguatera —and then Nastya, a newcomer to the art of sewing awnings with a sailmaking machine, had missed a seam that was halfway split. And half the panel was threatening to fall off unless we raised the alarm. We had to sew it up in situ, without taking it down, two metres above the deck. It took four hands to stitch a very, very long seam. I was inside the boat, while the kamikaze volunteer—alternately the sailor and the captain—roasted in the sun, balancing above the guardrails with the needle in one hand and a shroud in the other. We patched it up; we’ll see how long it lasts. The zips on our well-used awning are so completely shot that every time we take it down, we worry the whole structure won’t survive another removal. . Instead of a conclusion 🙂 The young sailor and I are continuing our covert operation, code-named “While Everyone’s Asleep.” This morning we watched another full-length animated film in English and polished off the last Bounty bar in Andryukha’s secret stash. Then we topped up with breadfruit and avocado. I have a feeling that, at this rate, the 8 kg of body weight I lost during the ciguatera will return to me very soon—with a little extra added on. On that cheerful note, we wish everyone fair winds and willpower. And now, to the chart! Our current coordinates are 14° 17′ south latitude and 143° 10′ west longitude. Kaukura Atoll is 150 miles away. Assuming we don’t sail straight past that one too (