US Samoa - Pago Pago

                    

25/10/2013

Trusty Honda Generator, Rod's night watch crew approaching Pago Pago


Pago Pago, the capital of US Samoa, is pronounced “Paango Paango”, with a soft “G”. After our experiences there, we felt “Pongo Pongo, 3 times a day!” would have been a more appropriate name!

      

The anchorage with the tuna factory on the left

As mentioned previously, adverse weather combined with electrical problems forced us into an unscheduled stop over there. The unsavoury smells emanating from the huge tuna processing plant, the filthy brown water in the anchorage, combined with the notoriously bad holding, did little to make one warm to the place as a cruising destination.

Pretty island with lush vegetation.......pity about the chocolate brown water!

However, other positive aspects combined, to turn things around for us, and when we left US Samoa, after nearly 2 weeks, it was with relief on the one hand, and quite some regret on the other! All the officials and people of US Samoa have got to be amongst the nicest and friendliest we have encountered anywhere.  The island itself is quite pretty, and we really got to enjoy the colourful local buses, the market, and cultures we found there.

Wonderful buses.....converted trucks with wooden passenger coachwork

Intricately carved treetrunk in front of the museum

The helpfulness and camaraderie shown by the few cruisers to one another, during all the drama of the SPCZ (South Pacific Convergence Zone) rain squalls, the 30-35knot winds and the 10 or so boats which dragged during one horrid night, was absolutely heartwarming.

In front of Sheer Tenacity is Michael's Cherokee Rose

Behind us is Inspiration at Sea with an enormous bowsprit that was too close for comfort after our 85m drag!

Nobody did more to turn our own problems around, than Michael Moyer, from “Cherokee Rose”. He was a mine of useful information, an engineering guru, and a really nice guy to boot!! He and his lovely partner, Anita, had been anchored in Pago Pago for 3-4 weeks, and had the whole place sewn up! As is sadly so often the case in this cruising life, one no sooner meets some really great people, and starts to form great friendships, than it’s time to say goodbye!

Whilst US Samoa is not blessed with an infrastructure of chandleries, repair facilities etc, it does enjoy one very definite advantage…… it is part of the USA, and as such, US Postal deliveries to Pago Pago are cheap,  duty free ,and quick!

With Michael’s help, we fitted my no.3 spare alternator, and decided to order a new replacement Balmar alternator, and  60A Xantrex battery charger, from the USA, using  the US Postal priority services. Despite a bank holiday and a weekend in between, I received my order within a week.  I collected the goods on Saturday morning, and gave the alternator to Michael, who was able to machine the body, in the same way as the engineering guys in Trinidad had to do, in order to get the original Balmar to fit the Perkins. 

I had spent the week wiring the boat for the new Battery charger, and to take the Balmar’s Smart regulator.  Shortly after lunch on that Saturday, Sheer Tenacity was back in the power business, with both bits of new kit fitted and working!

We were able to check out on the Monday, with a weather forecast of rough seas, fresh winds, squalls and rain…..not great, but do –able, to reach Tonga before the next wave of the SPCZ was due to hit Tonga. We were not looking forward to hauling anchors in this rubbish strewn anchorage. In our case, it was compounded by the fact that I had removed the anchoring ball from my trip line, and dropped the line, after seeing a catamaran homing in on my anchoring ball, thinking it was a mooring buoy! In Scott Free’s case, there was no certainty that the anchor was still not wrapped up in some of the spinnaker , which had caused all their drama earlier.

Once again, it was Michael who was there to help! As we were raising the anchor, the first thing that emerged from the brown water, looked like a bloated  white/pink carcass of a pig, as, belly up it emerged tangled up in a bit of fishing net, wrapped around our chain! It was with huge relief that I saw a muddy peddle sticking out of the side of the “corpse”, and I realized that it was a child’s rockinghorse!  Michael, in his dinghy, cut this free, and was on hand to retrieve the trip line, while we drifted in neutral, before it could foul my prop.

He plonked it on my deck, and was off to help Scott Free, whose anchor had indeed hung on to a few metres of spinnaker cloth! He cut that away too, and we sadly waved good bye to “Good New Friends”   as we headed out of the anchorage.

En route to Tonga....if you look really closely you can just see the island

Thankfully, the weather for our 340 mile leg to Tonga was nothing like predicted! A bit rough on day one, we still managed 150 miles, and another 160miles on day 2 in more manageable seas. We knocked off the last 30 miles in good time, and were able to anchor in Port Maurelle by about 15.30h, after a dry, fast, and good sail. As a bonus, I boated a nice Wahoo on the run in to Tonga.

Rod in his PJ's with Mr Wahoo!

Not all plain sailing!!

                                                    13.10.2013

Problem children......Balmar and Lucas

As we finished posting our Suwarrow update, I looked back at previous blogs, and reflected on quite how much we have done this year!  I also realised that that they paint a somewhat misleading picture of our lives seen through rose tinted spectacles!

There is as often as not, a snake in the grass of “Paradise”, so this quick blog covering our last 10 days, seeks to balance out that perspective!

No sooner had we changed our course from Tonga to Samoa due to the weather, and boated the tuna, than our woes began!  Firstly, the Balmar high output alternator died. A big problem, as we need to run the engine for 1-2 hours per day to keep the batteries charged to feed the Raymarine Autopilot, and the freezer! With overcast skies, even the big solar panels do not do enough.

Our only alternative was to run the Honda genset in the cockpit, and to use the Mastervolt battery charger, which has also been on a “go slow” for the past year!  Every test says it is 100%, and the Mastervolt technical advisers keep pointing fingers at the Honda’s output, or the various Marina’s power supplies! Whatever, it only produces 15-25amps instead of 70-90amps, and we had to run the genset for 5 hours per night to keep us going.

Doing night watches on pitch black, overcast, starless, moonless nights, is never much fun!  Night watches spent hugging a smelly, noisy and vibrating genset just makes it worse! Add in 35 knot rain squalls, and rough seas, while trying to keep the genset secure and dry, just makes it plain ghastly!

American Samoa, we thought would offer us a sanctuary of peace and quiet, in which to address our problems. Not so!!! After spending our first night alongside a coastal supply vessel on the customs dock, we were required to anchor in the designated yacht anchorage area, where the holding is notoriously bad, and the bottom is littered with all manner of junk after a recent Tsunami.

Given that we had no alternator, the windlass becomes pretty non- functional for lifting and resetting the anchor. I decided up front, to lay out a full 60mts of chain, and to attach a retrieval line to the Rocna anchor, kept afloat with a marking buoy.

Having done that, I set about tackling the alternator problem, by removing the Balmar, and trying to re fit the Lucas, the original alternator that came with the engine. That day however, was literally the lull before the storm, and the yachts were drifting around and swinging all over the place. The first sign of our drama, was the bumping of the anchor ball against the hull. Investigation revealed that the anchor chain had wrapped itself around, and caught on our trip line! Instead of having 60mts of rode, we now had 8mts… straight down.  Just then, a nasty weather front arrived, and in our efforts to untangle the chain and trip line, we started to drag! I managed to separate the two, but the ball only moved off about 30 mts, indicating that the chain was either in a big loop in the mud, or stuck on some other obstruction.

Meanwhile, a local mechanical expert, who was assisting me, continued trying to fit the Lucas, so that we could at least use the windlass, but we met with no success.

As dusk fell, the front hit with a vengeance, and we started to slide back again. We immediately started the engine, and were on full alert! In the teaming rain, and with the aid of our million cp spotlight, I could see that the ball was now a full 60 mts away, meaning our chain was now straight!  PLEASE, SIR ROCNA…set yourself!!

With only 30 mts between our stern, and the bowsprit of the single handing lady on “Inspiration at Sea”, we seemed to stop. I marked a way point, and set the anchor alarm at 20mts. Our worried lady behind us was on the radio to tell us we were dragging down on her, and that she too had no engine or windlass! We assured her we were watching the situation, and had the engine running, and she relaxed….. far sooner than we did!

Meanwhile, there was chaos in the anchorage, as about 8 or 9 other boats were dragging, including “Clara”, a French boat, whose crew were still ashore! Crew members from other cruising yachts were rushing around in dinghies, in 30+knots, doing whatever they could to help, laying secondary anchors etc. One of the crews had just dived on, and marked with a buoy, an old anchor lying buried in the mud. They invoked the help of another cruisers dinghy crew to secure a rope between Clara and the old anchor, and hauled her into a safe position by hand, with 4 young men providing the muscle. No sooner was this done, than a RSA catamaran “African Star”, reported that they were dragging, and had broken their steering. The teams were off to help them drop a second anchor by dinghy.  Almost immediately thereafter, they had to rush off to aid somebody else. We dubbed them "the primary response unit"!

While all this was going on, we were beginning to paint a very nice moustache over the waypoint, indicating that for the moment, we were holding well. At about 9.00pm, another big Yacht, Miluna, was dragging back fast towards the rocks, and requested help, as he could not start his engine. I had no option but to launch the dinghy, and go over to offer what help I could. With his stern only 20mts from the rocks, his anchor fortunately got stuck on some rocks, just as I got there. It gave him time to sort out his wiring problem, and jump start the engine. Then just as I was about to help him lift the anchor, two more dinghies arrived, and we were able to get him up and away. I went back to a relieved wife, and Miluna got permission to moor alongside a freighter on the docks for the night.

Mary and I stayed on anchor watch until 3.00am, by which time the wind was down to 25knots, and we had a good solid moustache!

During the night, our buddies on Scott Free had also dragged about 70 mts, before the anchor re set. In the morning, they wanted to lift the anchor, as they felt they were too close to a neighbour. They asked me to help flake the chain, so they could haul in the chain without stopping. Just as the anchor was reaching the surface, we saw that the chain and anchor were completely wrapped up in a white cloth.  Then their engine stopped! The other end of the white cloth, which turned out to be an old spinnaker, had fouled the prop! We had to immediately cut through the cloth, and drop the anchor, laying out another 60 mts of chain.

Two more dinghies arrived offering to help, and with the aid of my 12v diving compressor, two fellow cruisers spent about 2 hours diving under Scott Free, in zero visibility, chocolate brown water, cutting off mountains of spinnaker fabric wrapped around the prop. By mid morning, it was back to Sheer Tenacity, and the alternator problem!

This time, with the help of yet another cruiser, Michael from “Cherokee Rose”, a super helpful and knowledgeable guy, we ascertained that the Lucas had  been connected incorrectly, and was now “cooked”! We set about installing my 3^rd and last resort little 50amp spare alternator which I had bought in RSA, before we left, and which I had tried unsuccessfully to sell in Trinidad, when I fitted the Balmar! At last, we got that right, and had some charging power…… nowhere near enough, but better than zilch!

By 5.00am the next morning, I had gone on line to the US mail order suppliers, Defender, and had ordered a new Balmar smart charger, AND 60 amp Xantrex battery charger, for delivery next week.

 Once again, the problem  will get fixed by lashing out “wads of wonga”, helped by the fact that American Samoa is considered an “internal” delivery, and enjoys a quick and inexpensive Priority US Postal Service !!!    

The really wonderful side to all this drama, is the number of super, amazingly talented, helpful, and courageous cruising folk who are only too willing jump in to help when things go wrong  for fellow cruisers!

Suwarrow Atoll…… well worth the detour!

11.10.13

Nearly 700nm ENE from Bora Bora, lies this northern most of the Cook Islands. It is the very picture of a deserted coconut palm treed atoll, and is in fact the one on which Tom Neale lived out his dream life as its sole resident and about which the book “Island of my own”, was written.

Our passage from Bora Bora was a real mixture of good and bad! Wind, no wind, rain and squalls, decent sailing and a good sized Tuna! The trip took exactly 5 days, with us having to slow down through the last night, to arrive in good light, after a 170nm fifth day.

Mary is NOT enjoying this!

Not sure if this is a vellowfin or a bigeye,but as sashimi it was delicious

Our beautiful new sails BUT look where the 4th reef is!!

The main island, Anchor Island, is no bigger than a rugby field, lying just north of the pass, and provides a good anchorage for about 20 yachts, in gin clear water. 

The island is now also home to two Park Rangers (currently Harry and Charlie), who are based there for 5 months of each year.(June-Oct)

The only visitors to the atoll are cruising yachtsmen, making their way across the Pacific, between French Polynesia and Samoa/Tonga /Fiji, and Sheer Tenacity was the 137^th yacht to visit this year. A $50 park fee entitles one to a 14 day stop over, and we found it hard to tear ourselves from this little spot of heaven!

Suwarrow yacht shelter and Harry's office for check in

Each evening, the cruisers migrate to the island for communal sundowners, to watch the sun go down over the atoll,  play boulle (old men’s marbles in the sand with steel balls!), or attend a “pot luck”.

Anyone for boulle?

Sundowners and no Green Flash this time

One evening the rangers organized a pot luck, with Yellow fin tuna caught by Charlie that morning, cooked over the fire in Coconut milk , and giant grilled coconut crabs . The Cruisers provided the salads and side dishes, while Harry and Charlie entertained us with some traditional Cook Island Polynesian song and dance culture, which morphed into Van Morrison as the evening progressed!

Harry the Chef cooking coconut crabs

Harry and Charlie the entertainers

Feeding frenzy! 

Most evenings at 5pm Charlie throws the heads and innards of his daily catch to the sharks on the ocean side of the island. This is done on the ocean side to avoid whipping up the sharks in the anchorage and around the yachts into a similar frenzy

Ebony and Ivory?

We are anchored in 6m of crystal clear water, which is like being in an aquarium, …. Including anything from 5 to 25 Black tip Sharks, shoals of halfbeaks, garfish, Jacks, parrot fish, Angle fish, and Trigger fish! 

Looking off the back of the boat........scary!

Holding the camera underwater from the back platform

Now swimming with them.....note the pilot fish (Remora)

About ½ mile from the anchorage is a shallow patch, where the Manta Rays have a daily appointment with the Cleaner Wrasses, between 8.00am -9.00am! Snorkeling with them at this time is a real privilege!

See the Cleaner Wrasse doing their job

We took a day trip with Charlie down to the Seven Island  spot, about 3 miles south. En route we went to Bird Island, where we walked amongst hundreds of Sooty Tern chicks (spotty and much bigger than their parents!), some red tailed Tropic bird chicks, a gazillion Lesser Frigate Bird chicks, all left alone in their nests (twigs!), by foraging parents, as there are no predators around, plus 3 types of Boobies with chicks…( Red Footed, Brown, and Masked)

Redfooted Booby

Sooty Tern Chicks

Redfooted Boobies

Red tailed tropic bird and below a chick

Masked Boobies

Lesser Frigate bird chicks

And more!

"Nog 'n Piep"

All shapes and sizes!

Get out of my face!!!

Wing exercising!

Dad, egg and neighbourly chick

Too small to be left exposed

Got to get out of this place..........

Female with chick

Male with chick

Sooty tern with very young chick

 On the biggest of the 7 islands, we saw numerous giant blue /red Coconut crabs. One big fellow I picked up..(very carefully),  must have weighed 2kg, and his pincers could easily amputate a finger if not careful! 

All too quickly our two week limit loomed up, and we had to hit the road again. 

Our destination was Va’vau, Tonga, but as we left the weather painted a horrible picture for Tonga, so we made for US Samoa, which was only 500nm away, offering a safe haven before the nasty stuff arrived. Apart from a couple of squalls lasting about 8 hours, we had a very good passage and one fair sized bonito.

One major benefit of coming to US Samoa, is that we can order boat bits from the USA as an internal  postal delivery, in quick time, and should be able to leave for the next leg in much better shape iro the “Power Struggle”! …. Dud alternator, Mastervolt battery charger at half speed etc! We have bitten the bullet, and ordered a new Balmar alternator, smart regulator plus a new 60 amp Battery charger, which should be delivered here by the middle of next week.  We will have old Balmar rebuilt in NZ as a spare, and get Mastervolt in NZ  to finally sort out the low charging levels in the 100A charger.

Hopefully we should be up and running again by the end of next week! As I was once told by my T shirt supplier’s delivery man….. “If you use it… it must broke!!”