Boat projects in tropical place

"Cruising is repairing your boat in exotic places" is a well worn cruiser joke. It's so well worn because it's quite true. Brian has rigged a tarp on the top deck, has the mainsail down and is replacing the grommets that are used to attach the sail to the mast. We have a more than 10 year old sail so it needs constant attention.

Yesterday was our 9 year anniversary! It needs constant attention, also :) We spent the day doing a variety of things. we cleaned the boat, we each ran around the island twice (took me 20 minutes per lap), and we took Eloise boogie boarding before her swim lesson. Since the only waves were the 3 inch wake from the fishing boats that motored past, the fun thing to do was to position Eloise on the board and give it little pushes back and forth between Mommy and Daddy in one foot of water. Her happy smile and attentive pose showed she was enjoying her new experience. She needs all the distractions she can get right now, as she is working on pushing out two of her molars.

We are working on a couple of projects and waiting for the weather to switch around before heading up to the Haapai group of islands to the north. (it is still part of Tonga, they just break up their country into groups).

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reunited.

Ane had Eloise in her arms within 60 seconds of my arrival at seat 26F. Seated in 26D, a Tongan living in New Zealand, Ane was on her way to Tonga to visit her husband for a week. She played peek-a-boo with Eloise in her lap, she let her play with her necklace, dug in her purse to pull out a wad of keys for Eloise, and offered her lollies.
Half way to Tonga, Ane told me that if there was room in the car when her husband picked her up, they would give me a ride to the wharf where I was hoping to see Nomad moored.

Eloise was fascinated by the busy ants crawling around the base of the gear shift on Henry's car. She also was fascinated by the trees and houses and people flying past the open window as she sat in my lap en route into Nuku Alofa. After visiting the 4 different customs and immigration and port authority offices to determine if Nomad had arrived and cleared customs, I thought we should try to located a VHF radio to attempt a call to see if they were close to port. By this time, Eloise was in the back seat with Ane and Ofa who were tickling her and playing with her. It was a great adventure and she was still smiling and squeaking and playing peak a boo despite having been awakened at 3:30am that morning with only an hour nap on the plane.

I spotted a sailboat tied up right next to the main road and had them pull over. I approached the boat and told the crew my situation and asked if they could hail Nomad on the radio for me. They had to dinghy to another cruiser's boat to do so because their VHF was not functioning properly. Meanwhile, Ane had pulled out two boxes of cold KFC chicken she'd brought from New Zealand. The fuel shop guy next to where we were had pulled out a card table and two plastic chairs and put them under a shady awning for us, and then brought out a quarter of a watermelon for us to share.

When Greg returned 10 minutes later, he had good news. Nomad was within a mile of the wharf. I should see them coming any minute!

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Position Report from Nomad

Here's a link to see where in the Pacific Brian, Tracy, Nomad and Uli are. We talked this afternoon on the Single Side Band radio (SSB). It was a poor connection but still wonderful to hear Brian's voice saying, "All's well" and to give us tidbits of news.

http://www.pangolin.co.nz/yotreps/tracker.php?ident=wdd9776

They're off

Nomad is currently carrying Brian and Tracy Hollister on a heading of NNE en route to Tonga. Eloise and I will fly up next week, hopefully my arrival date and theirs are close.
The last month has been busy. Eloise is busy climbing, crawling, laughing, waving, crowing, clapping, teething, pushing, and exploring. At the same time, Brian spearheaded many upgrades aboard Nomad. Cooling system flushed, wind generator repaired, stanchions rebedded, combings painted, dinghy repaired, brand new anchor chain purchased and installed, hawse pipes fabricated and installed, cutlass bearing replaced, whisker pole repaired and retrofitted, mainsail repaired, and many more things that I might not even know about. My main job has been to purchase food and keep Eloise out of the way of tools and small boat parts. Our good friends, John and Annette have helped us in countless ways, painting, driving us to Auckland, feeding us innumerable meals, doing laundry, and providing us always a spare bed for when the boat was full of fumes or too noisy for Eloise to nap.

Here are some recent photos of our cheerful child and our cheerful helper, John.

Spring Cleaning

April should be the time for Spring Cleaning, except for one small detail...we're in the southern hemisphere. It is cold, rainy full-fledged fall weather. Nevertheless, Nomad is being fussed over. I'm going through cupboards, evaluating my organization (or lack of) for a range of items as varied as cooking dishes and medical supplies.

Brian has, in between rain showers, removed the stanchions and the caulking behind them. Sanding, Filling and paint prep have him checking the rain forecast for a prediction of 4 days of fine weather. None in sight. Once the combings are painted, the stanchions can be rebedded and decked out in their new lifelines and safety netting. This is just one of the many projects Brian is juggling as we prepare Nomad for the upcoming passage to Tonga. Please pray for a good weather window some time between May 10 and May 30. That's when Tracy Hollister from the Gorge will be here and available as crew on the passage.

Eloise has projects as well. Her number one project is consuming large amounts of food at frequent intervals throughout the day. Just two days ago she figured out how to use a footstool as a walker and spent the next 45 minutes walking around Grandma Shiela's living room with me jumping in every few moments to steer her away from tables chock full of glass figurines. Yesterday, she figured out how to climb down steps using her feet first. We've been modeling and helping her do this since we got back to Nomad, in the hopes of avoiding any major nose landings. We are very proud of our daughter who at this very moment is making banshee impressions.

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Seasons changing

When we left New Zealand in late February, the humid hot days ended around 9pm. Now, cool winds, intermittent blue skies with showers and early sunsets remind us that winter is acoming.

Other things have changed. Eloise now feeds herself with a great deal of success, will have almost nothing to do with pureed foods, and crawls anywhere she pleases. In just two quick months her bursts of developments remind us that she is other than us and wonderful and unique. We watch her as we have watched sunsets in the past, oohing and ahing about subtle and rapid changing details - colorful and irreversible. Except that she is the opposite of a sunset, she is a sunrise.

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Hokey Pokey Biscuits

125 g butter (approx. one cube)
1/2 cup sugar
1 Tbsp golden syrup
1 Tbsp milk
1 1/2 cups Edmonds standard plain flour
1 tsp Edmonds baking soda

combine butter, sugar, golden syrup and milk in a saucepan. Heat until butter is melted and mixture nearly boiling, stirring constantly. Remove from heat and allow mixture to cool to lukewarm. Sift flour and soda together. Add to the cooled mixture. Stir well. Roll tablespoonsful of mixture into balls and place on ungreased oven trays. Flatten with a fork. Bake at 180 degrees C for 15-20 minutes.

From: Edmonds Cookery Book, "part of New Zealand's Heritage since 1879"

I made these yesterday and they were soft and butterscotchy when baked to pale and not golden brown. YUM.

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