Comino's Chronicle

[Asmodeane]

Man, you're an inspiration! I love you youtube chan and blog, keep up the good work, and good luck!

[ahun]

Thanks again.

Here is an excerpt from a coming blog post, from the middle of the Pacific Ocean:

'I did not even bother to make a note of trivial stories, like when I hove-to to have a swim and make an attempt to scrub the hull to free it from the growth we accumulated the past weeks. I contemplated this for days (in fact for months, even on the Atlantic crossing) but it is quite scary to leave the safety of the ship and jump overboard deliberately despite all the precaution you take. I will never do it if I don’t do it now, now is the chance I kept saying to myself. I was reading the book Shrimpy, from Shane Aston about his circumnavigation (on a 6 metre boat in the ’70-s) and he did the same roughly on the same spot (well, +/- couple o’hundred miles), but he had a crew. He suffered a jelly-fish sting and was unable to move his left side of his body for 24 hours. I went for it. I took a deep breath, did a last check on our speed, it was under 0.5 knots, drifting, and dived. The sea temperature was pleasant; my heart was beating overtime adrenalin level high up, and I surfaced as fast as I could. Comino was already some distance away and it took a few strokes to reach the pull pit and pull myself up back on deck again. Many different feelings like a turmoil whirled in my mind, but I took my tools to scrub the hull and jumped again, this time on the other side. I opened my eyes while I was underwater and the picture I saw will stick with me forever in my life. Visibility was extremely good and the sea calm and crystal clear. Floating 4000 metre high in the most interesting substance in the universe, a few feet above me was my boat, almost seemed to define the law of physics. Underneath me, in the opposite direction, a group of mahi-mahi fish was looking at me, questioning my senility with their eyes and in general unapproving my behaviour. They were following me for awhile hiding in the shadow of Comino, which was their base and where they, one by one went hunting from, chasing the flying fish. They stayed with me all the way until the Marquises. I surfaced again and did a vague attempt to try to clean the hull. In a minute or two I felt a sting on my left shoulder and got a fright. What if it is a jelly-fish, and I will not able to climbed back aboard? *Before it had a chance to spread I retreated to the comfort of cockpit. I am still unsure if it was real or just a trick of the mind, but I had enough excitement for the day, set sail again and continued on westwards.'

I will be in trouble with the YouTube uploads, they still use 2g in French Polynesia. I spent 10 hours one night sitting outside a closed bar using its WiFi trying to upload a video. When it finished it wouldn't process it and the whole work was lost... Did I ever mention I hate working too hard for free?

attilavedo.wordpress.com

[Steadman Uhlich]

Originally Posted by ahun

Thanks again.

Here is an excerpt from a coming blog post, from the middle of the Pacific Ocean:

'I did not even bother to make a note of trivial stories, like when I hove-to to have a swim and make an attempt to scrub the hull to free it from the growth we accumulated the past weeks. I contemplated this for days (in fact for months, even on the Atlantic crossing) but it is quite scary to leave the safety of the ship and jump overboard deliberately despite all the precaution you take. I will never do it if I don’t do it now, now is the chance I kept saying to myself. I was reading the book Shrimpy, from Shane Aston about his circumnavigation (on a 6 metre boat in the ’70-s) and he did the same roughly on the same spot (well, +/- couple o’hundred miles), but he had a crew. He suffered a jelly-fish sting and was unable to move his left side of his body for 24 hours. I went for it. I took a deep breath, did a last check on our speed, it was under 0.5 knots, drifting, and dived. The sea temperature was pleasant; my heart was beating overtime adrenalin level high up, and I surfaced as fast as I could. Comino was already some distance away and it took a few strokes to reach the pull pit and pull myself up back on deck again. Many different feelings like a turmoil whirled in my mind, but I took my tools to scrub the hull and jumped again, this time on the other side. I opened my eyes while I was underwater and the picture I saw will stick with me forever in my life. Visibility was extremely good and the sea calm and crystal clear. Floating 4000 metre high in the most interesting substance in the universe, a few feet above me was my boat, almost seemed to define the law of physics. Underneath me, in the opposite direction, a group of mahi-mahi fish was looking at me, questioning my senility with their eyes and in general unapproving my behaviour. They were following me for awhile hiding in the shadow of Comino, which was their base and where they, one by one went hunting from, chasing the flying fish. They stayed with me all the way until the Marquises. I surfaced again and did a vague attempt to try to clean the hull. In a minute or two I felt a sting on my left shoulder and got a fright. What if it is a jelly-fish, and I will not able to climbed back aboard? *Before it had a chance to spread I retreated to the comfort of cockpit. I am still unsure if it was real or just a trick of the mind, but I had enough excitement for the day, set sail again and continued on westwards.'

I will be in trouble with the YouTube uploads, they still use 2g in French Polynesia. I spent 10 hours one night sitting outside a closed bar using its WiFi trying to upload a video. When it finished it wouldn't process it and the whole work was lost... Did I ever mention I hate working too hard for free?

attilavedo.wordpress.com

I enjoyed reading this post. Good writing.

Here's a bump for your good story.

Brought back some memories of similar swim in 16,000 feet of water in the Pacific when we were becalmed.

Your comment about slow uploads wasting time is felt too, as I have done that while sitting and waiting and waiting and waiting for uploads to complete when working remotely. Then when you find out the upload did not work for some reason.

Good thing cruising is done at a sailboat's slower pace.

Bon Voyage!

[ahun]

Here is a Christmasy topic: how much it costs? From the start, I documented my spending and now the first 14 months of data is here to publish. Cruising, it is worth it.

Happy holidays.

https://attilavedo.wordpress.com/201...ts-talk-money/

[ahun]

Disaster. The harddrive in my laptop is dead. Hundreds of gigabyte of data is lost, all the software I used for writing, photo and video editing etc. are gone. Internet is useless here in Nuku Hiva, it will be hard to replace them even if I can patch up the computer somehow...

[terah]

Not an immediate fix, but unless your drive is encrypted your data may be recoverable.

We've used a company in the UK for this a few times and they will assess the drive for free and list the files which are recoverable. Actual cost varies based on disk size and difficulty of recovery but we've usually been around £300 for up to 500Gb drives.

[ahun]

In Takaroa atoll. Should go back to civilisation soon, I am running out of buckets and electronic equipment...

[Asmodeane]

Great to hear from you! Such a shame about the hard drive, would have been wonderful to see another one of your videos when you get back to places civilized enough for a Youtube upload..!

[ahun]

Leaving Papeete soon, for Tonga.

[ahun]

A teaser from a future blog entry. As they say, with love from Nuku A'lofa:


It was a hard sail down here to Tonga. Mainly, because of my expectation for an easy run, and partly of my heart not being hundred percent in it.

I didn't realize before I left from Tahiti, that Tonga is on the southern edge of the south east trade wind belt, and the winter storms from the south can have their stormy effect on the sailing route. Not to say anything about the long nights of the Australian winter, 12-13 hours darkness. And the rains. Never seen rains like that. I was 14 Nms from the entrance of Nuku A'lofa harbour when the wind died. I turned on the motor, it was just about that I might make it before dark. The autopilot doesn't work for awhile now, so I had to hand-steer. The fog came down and it started to rain. It wasn't even rain, just water everywhere under, above and around. I was sitting naked in the cockpit because any clothing would have just soaked through immediately and there was already water inside and out of the boat everywhere, I didn't want to bring in more, coming in and out. It was getting cold and I didn't make progress, it was miserable. Then the rain stopped, and at last I could see the island where I was heading. Or I thought it was it, but in fact, it was just a small reef emerging out of the waves in front of the island of Tongatapu. I still had to go around it to get to my way-point, which in fact was still miles away from the destination. When the wind came back from the west (yes, right from the bow) was the time when I wasn't sure for awhile, if I am not going to lose my mind.

At least, the air dried up a bit, I put on some clothing (winter hat, rain jacket, trousers) and kept motoring towards the now setting sun. It was only a couple of days before new moon, and even that little crescent of moon was going to come up only after midnight, I knew. Soon, it was complete darkness and I was doing the very thing, the stupidest action a sailor can take, entering into an unfamiliar harbour on the under-chartered Pacific Ocean, with improper equipment and unprepared. (I only had a tablet for navigation, the depth sounder is unreliable and I didn't do any passage plan or pilotage.)

It wasn't adventurous, it was foolish, the pass is tricky and reefs are all around. But it was after three weeks of hard sailing, and being alone, and I wanted some rest and change. Presently, I could only think of the bottle of red wine I saved for the time when I arrive. How I am going to gulp it down if I survive this, and the boat too. Sometimes I had to stop completely and listen the waves if they break too close. The channel was narrowing and twisting around, and I couldn't trust the tablet, functioning as chart plotter, I have seen serious position discrepancies on it before. Sometimes I turned around and traced my route back and started again to make sure I am where I should be.

When I dropped the anchor at 2100hrs, at some shallow patch I found, not too far from the actual anchorage, I hardly felt any emotions, no satisfaction, no accomplishment, no relief. I opened the wine bottle, just for promise's sake, but I was in bed and sleeping 10 minutes later.

[ahun]

Sailed around a big wind hole, went through a volcanic ash cloud, had no rain and light winds, did nearly two thousand miles in three weeks, I am half way around the world and now at the gate of SE Asia.
In Port Moresby, PNG.

[ahun]

Torres Strait is next. Single handing. ��

[category4jay]

Originally Posted by ahun

It is happening... Less than 50 days to go and I am off to sail the high seas. Made the big decision around last Christmas and planning and working on it since. Gave my notice at work and to the letting agent, notified my family, I have fought the emotional battles with my girlfriend whom I leave behind – just to talk about the hardest part of the consequences. Work on the boat, deciding the safety and comfort features which fit the budget what not, is like taking a holiday from the problems. Had no time to go sailing since early spring (maybe the occasional fishing weekend or sleeping on the boat locally at anchor) so I am extra excited to leave land behind for a while. Lisbon is first stop (if no need for emergency stop) then Madeira, then the Canary Island. If all goes well and the boat is behaving herself, only Neptun knows where we end up.



I will try to keep this thread updated about my where being, and I will be glad to meet with fellow cruisers if our routes are crossing each other on this small planet.


Fair winds!

My hats off to you Sir. FWAFS!

[ahun]

In Darwin, Australia. Arrived on the exact day, of the two years anniversary of leaving Dublin, Ireland. Nearly 2/3 around the world, I need a break...

[liquidice]

Very inspirational!