Jim is on his way to Hawaii.

  He and his crew of two left Vanuatu right after we girls boarded the plane.  It was another rough trip to weather with 25-30 knots of wind.  The crew was green, literally.  The charts showed a little atoll called Funafuti, in the Tuvalu Island group, about 500 miles north of Fiji, so they headed there for a breather.  One can only pound to weather for so long before one needs a break.    Funafuti has a small airstrip, a fuel dock, and a beautiful bay.  There were not very many people, and not a lot of fresh food, but it was a nice and necessary rest stop.  It’s good that they were able to get fuel, because there might be a lot of motoring involved on the way to Hawaii. 

One crew member, who felt like he was running out of time, got off and flew to Fiji, then back home.  Jim and Dave are bravely forging ahead, determined to see the trip through to Hawaii.  Last I heard, they had about 15 days to go, the winds were about 12 knots out of the east, and they were trying to catch some fish.  They are hoping for some south wind, but if they don’t get it, they will be able to motor the last 600 miles or so to Hawaii.  We think Jim has crew lined up for the last leg of the trip.

 Molly, Jessie and I are guiltily having fun with family. Summer has finally come to the northwest.  The sky is a Delphinium blue, and Mt. Rainier is snow-white and sits up proud and noble, as if it knows that it is the most beautiful sight in the northwest.  Molly and Jessie have been spending time with their best friends.  It’s been hard for me to be away from them; we have been joined at the hip for a long time now. I’m told I better get used to it, and quick! 

Jim misses his girls a lot, and his e-mails are full of emotion.  He’s a better man than I am, that’s for sure.  I admire the way he wants to see this through to the end.  I’ll keep you posted as I hear from him.  ~  Jeanna

I am writing to you from the United States of America!

 Home!  Well, 3 of us are home – we girls flew out of Vanuatu on the same day that two able-bodied crew members flew in.  Now, Jim, Rick and Dave are pitting themselves against the elements en route to Hawaii, then home to Seattle.  Evidently, the winds are a little more out of the south, blowing about 20, and they are making 7-8 knots.  That sounds pretty good.  Jim said it has been a bit bumpy – they are getting a lot of water over the deck, but the inside is dry.  It has been hot and muggy as they get closer to the equator.  They are hoping to stop at Palmyra Atoll, but if the winds turn more east, they will miss it.  I think they are all pretty goal-oriented to get Ruby Slippers safely home.

Molly, Jessie and I are comfortably anchored in my sister’s house in Enumclaw.  I have 4 sisters and a mom here, so it has been all family, all the time.  We miss the boat and Jim, but have been busy getting used to solid land.  I love going to the grocery store and just staring at the produce section.  It is such a beautiful sight! 

I will keep you posted on Jim’s progress as he moves toward Hawaii.  There’s no place like home!  ~  Jeanna

When Jim was a young boy,

he read in a National Geographic magazine about the land divers of Vanuatu.  These natives, as a rite of passage into manhood, would climb to the top of a tall structure, tie vines to their ankles, and fling themselves to the ground, hoping that they measured the vine length correctly.  This was long before bungee jumping was conceived, and it intrigued Jim so much that he never forgot it.

Yesterday, on the small island of Pentecost in the Vanuatu Island group, we saw the land divers perform.  They had built a wooden structure, about 70 feet high, of trees and pieces of wood, and supported it with yam vines.  There were small platforms built at different levels up the front of the tower, starting from about 25 feet up, all the way to the top.  The first boy who jumped must have been about 7 years old, and he started from the lowest level.  If the boys were scared or hesitated too long, they were pushed off the platform by their fathers.  The vines were too long for one of the boys, and he landed with a loud thwack on his head in the dirt below.  The trick is to get the vines long enough so that you land barely on the ground, to take the weight off your hips and back when you get to the end of the vine, but not so long that you thud head first into the dirt.  The village has a highly-respected “doctor” who supposedly can eyeball the length of the drop, the height of the young man, and tell the support crew exactly where to cut the vine. 

There was a chorus line of dancers and singers standing behind the structure, chanting and urging the jumpers to glory.  Oh, did I mention that all these men were naked, except for a little tiny palm frond wrapped around their privates, and held in place by a vine around their waist?  This accessory is called a Namba, and is all the rage this year in Vanuatu.  It added to the whole traditional feel of the ceremony.  We decided Molly and Jessie could now write an in-depth school report on gravity, velocity, psychology or anatomy, just from their education on Pentecost Island.

Evidently, a man is not even worthy of getting a wife if he is too afraid to jump.  There was the mother of one of the boys standing near the tower, who was dancing and chanting and obviously very proud of her young man.  She was holding an umbrella in her arms, symbolic of her carrying that boy when he was a baby.  Her boy was the last to jump, and he jumped from the very top of the structure.  He was about 15 years old.  There were 11 jumpers in all, and they all walked away from their jump – heroes in the eyes of their family and neighbors. 

This is the only village in all of Vanuatu that performs this feat.  It has been going on for hundreds of years, but in the early eighties, an enterprising man from this village started marketing the skill to tourists and cruise ships.  Their jumping season is April and May, but they extended it this year to accommodate a few more tourists.  This must be a very rich island; they charge 80 bucks a piece for the privilege of watching young men fling themselves to the ground.  There was also a string band, dancers, and postcard sales for our enjoyment. It’s not something we will likely ever see again, so I guess it was worth it. 

The people are very proud of their village, and it is a beautiful sight.  There are palms and flowers everywhere, and the yards are tidy.  The children have black skin, shining brown eyes and very white teeth.  There are signs up everywhere, in English, telling about how they are raising money for their school, or for their church, or for the children.  They have definitely learned the value of the tourist dollar.  I kept wondering where they kept all the money they collected – they must have gathered in over $10,000 yesterday, but each house was made of palms and sticks; there were no banks or fortresses of any kind.  Does it all go to the Chief?  Is it distributed evenly among all the villagers?  Surely, the jumpers must receive something for their efforts.  Do they send it to a bank account in Port Villa, the largest city in Vanuatu?  It’s a puzzle to me. 

We left Pentecost and sailed to another island named Epi.  This bay is supposed to be the home of a very friendly Dugong, or sea cow.  There are a lot of Dugongs around these islands, but we have yet to see one, and it is on the “must see” list.

You might be wondering about our desperate struggle to get to Fiji at our appointed time.  Well, I kind of feel like Scarlett O’Hara – I’ll worry about it tomorrow.  Except, we are definitely not “gone with the wind”.  We still can’t go directly east because of the strong east winds, so we are pretending that heading south will accomplish the same results.  I just can’t worry about it anymore – what will happen will happen.  As they say, “Make plans, and God laughs”.

There are a couple of sets of new pictures in the media gallery.  Talk to you soon!  ~  Jeanna

We left our “shelter in the time of storm”

with high hopes of a wind switch, allowing us to get to Vanuatu in relative calm. ‘Twas not to be.  I’m tired of whining about passages, so I’m just not going to do it.  Suffice it to say, after the first 24 hours of going 2 knots into huge, confused seas and 30-35 knots of wind, we altered our course and headed to Espiritu Santo, one of the northern islands of Vanuatu, instead of the southern one we intended to go to. 

 

We are happy to be here!  It has that “back to the islands” feeling here.  The water is clear and warm – we can jump in and snorkel without even a thought of donning wetsuits.  We are anchored next to a beautiful resort, where they have laundry service, a restaurant, a book exchange and a pool.  The resort caters mostly to families from New Caledonia, Australia, and Fiji.  It is a very friendly place, and they seem to like having yachties moored in front of their property.  

 

There is no fuel dock on this island, so today we spent the day lugging 240 liters of fuel onto the boat and into the tanks, in 20-liter jugs.  That’s a few trips back and forth in the dinghy!  The fuel station is close to town, so I scoured the town for supplies.  There were many stores, but they all carried the same things.  There was an outdoor market, but it didn’t have much variety.  Poor Jim was left to handle the fuel situation pretty much by himself.  After that job, we brought our boat over to the resort’s dock and filled the water tanks.  It was a busy day, but we accomplished what we needed to.  It rained off and on all day, so I don’t suppose my laundry will be ready by tomorrow; it has to hang outside to dry. 

 

No matter how small a village is, there are a few items that you can always find:   vegetable oil, onions, garlic, rice, and some sort of greens – Bok choy, cabbage, beet tops or taro leaves. Throw in a little meat or pineapple, some soy sauce, and there’s dinner.  It is what many people in this part of the world eat every day.

 

The winds going to Fiji are directly out of the east – the direction we need to go.  So, we pretty much have the same dilemma as we had getting to Vanuatu.  We will watch the weather for the next couple of days and see if it is going to cooperate.  If not, I guess we will just have to go for it.  How bad can it be, for a mere 600 miles?  Yeah, big talker, Jeanna. It’s easy to think that when you are anchored in a calm little piece of heaven, with stars twinkling from horizon to horizon…

 

That’s the problem with deadlines.  When you really need to be at a certain destination, by a certain date, the wind or the weather will always have the last laugh.  It has happened to us every time we have told someone we would be somewhere by a specific date.  Maybe this time, though, the seas will be calm and the weather will behave.  We’ll keep you posted!  ~  Jeanna   

We made it!

 

We are finally in Vanuatu!  Except we haven’t seen any of it yet, because we came in here really late at night, and spent an hour or two motoring up a channel by radar and starlight, since the moon wasn’t up.  We anchored by radar, too, but we also shone a flashlight around to make sure there weren’t any other boats.  When we were safely anchored, we were extremely glad not to hear the wind howling, but we did hear cows.  I wasn’t sure what in the world it was at first, but once the idea of cows came into my head, I figured that was it.  

 

We opened almost every single hatch on the boat, since one reason the passage was so uncomfortable was that we were stuck inside nearly all the time, we couldn’t open any hatches unless we wanted saltwater to come in, and it was hot and sticky and plain miserable down below.  Thank goodness that’s over!  I woke up when the rain started and helped Dad close all the hatches, but when we got done with that, the rain stopped.  It has been raining sporadically though, so we kept the hatches closed.  

 

Well, when the rain woke me up, I didn’t feel all that tired anymore, so here I am, writing an update, at four in the morning.  Oops, five in the morning by Vanuatu time.  For some reason this reminds me of the Shel Silverstein poem that goes, ‘I’m writing this from inside a lion, and it’s rather dark in here.’  It is rather dark right now, too.  But it must be time to get up, because there’s a bunch of roosters crowing their little hearts out somewhere.  I haven’t heard a rooster in a while, so at first I thought it was some dog that needed lots of practice at howling; but no, it’s roosters.  

 

Now that it’s morning, at least according to the roosters, I’m ready to go back to bed.  In a couple of hours, I’ll have to get up and go explore!  Merry passage-end to all, and to all a good night!  ~Molly