Landfall on Marquesas
- labadiemichael
- 14 hours ago
- 2 min read
We made landfall in the Marquesas after 22 days at sea. The rest of our time out there was pretty uneventful; the wind died down to 5 knots there for a while, and being so close it was quite frustrating to slow down so much, but hey, that’s sailing. A 22 day passage from the Galapagos is neither fast nor slow, so we cannot complain.
Making landfall after so much time on the water is personally one of the things I was looking forward to the most on this trip. Nowadays, a travel experience is considered crazy when you disembark from your airplane after a 10 hour flight without a jetway and have to walk down steps and wait in a customs line outside in the sweltering heat for 45 minutes then stand around looking for your luggage in a humid baggage claim area then walk out of the airport only to get heckled by cab drivers. This cannot give one any idea of the significance of the distance they just traveled to arrive there. This is a recent development in human history, however. Humanity has been sailing around the globe for thousands of years. It feels good to keep up the tradition. Sailing up on a lush island paradise after so much time with nothing around but a big blue disc is a feeling unlike any other!
After we dropped the hook at last that evening of the 20th we were all thankful to be so near to land and to have a long awaited beer. The next week was pretty busy; a lot of things needed fixing and all the tanks needed filling. One of the things that needed fixing was the water maker; we did not have success in this endeavor. We will have to pick up a part in Tahiti when we get there. This meant the laborious task of lugging Jerry cans around the island to fill the boat up with 120 gallons. Hard work, but people do much crazier things for water. Jeff decided to get off the boat, so we picked up another crew member named Felix. A 21 year old German guy on a trip around the world is the most recent addition to Song, and so far so good.
Since we’ve been here we have gone to several anchorages, all of which have been absolutely stunning. One of the highlights certainly was the Taipivai valley, or Typee valley. This is the setting of Herman Melville’s book Typee, which both Mike and myself read on the way over. If you want a feeling of the culture of the Marquesan people and the rugged beauty here, give it a read.
We will be sailing around here for about one more week before we head on to the Tuamotos. We will keep all of our dear readers updated!
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