And Awayyy We Go May 31 2006

Hello everyone.Can you tell from our subject line that we've been watching theHoneymooners? Well, believe it or not, we just left Raiatea--should arrivein Rarotonga, Cook Islands sometime Tuesday. Barely a breath of wind sowe're motoring. Very glad to be leaving French Polynesia--just way tooexpensive and all we've been doing for the last three weeks is waitingaround for the yard to finish up some critical odds and ends. As it is, ourcharging system is sort of patched together and the watermaker is limping.however, we don't care; we're ecstatic to be on the move again. We'll makedo until New Zealand. The new engines are fabulous.The plan is to spend 5-7 days in Rarotonga, go north up to Aitutaki, thenswing west past Palmerston Atoll and on to American Samoa where we'll fullyprovision at US duty free prices. After that, it's Western Samoa, Tonga anddown to New Zealand for the southern hemisphere summer (hurricane season).Don't ask--look at an atlas or chart of the Pacific.We'll fill in more details on the Cooks when we get there. Additional goodnews is that, after a serious relapse by all three of us on smoking, we haveall quit for good. Rose has been off the butts for a month, Tim for 2 plusweeks and Joey about 5 days. How, you may ask, were three weaklings able todo it this time, and how are we so sure we will not relapse. Well, theanswer lies in a book my dear nephew, Chris, put us on to. Many thanks andkudos to him!!! It's called "The Easy Way To Stop Smoking" by Allen Carr,and we all endorse it to any of you still struggling with the evil weed.You are actually supposed to smoke while reading it, and IT REALLY WORKS!!!!We're all cold turkey with minimal cravings and withdrawal symptoms.Doesn't even bother you when someone else is smoking around you. Can'tbelieve this is the first we've heard of it.On the way to Rarotonga, we've had to motor due to light winds and had amorning of showers our second day out. However, the rain seems to havebrought out the fish. In the space of about 2 hours we caught a Mahi, aWahoo and two Albacore tunas (one of which we lost).Tuesday May 30. Well happy campers, we're still in Rarotonga--it's been twodrama filled weeks or we would have moved on by now. But first, the goodnews. THIS PLACE IS GREAT!!! We arrived about noon 2 weeks ago with a bitof north wind. The harbor here is cut out of the reef as there is nolagoon--it's sort of like a small Moorea, and has an undeservedly bad rapwhen the wind is north as being dangerous and uncomfortable. Well, not thistime of year anyway, and it has been very nice; the northerlies only lastedone day. Raro is about 1/3 the cost of Fr. poly. and the people areunbelievably friendly. One guy we met has even let us use his car any timewe like. Wait staffs are attentive and good as is the food. there are amillion great pubs and restaurants, and young Joe has had a smorgasbord oflocal and Kiwi lovelies. There are a couple of other boats here and we'vebeen doing quite a bit of socializing. The captain ended his 2 year longsearch for dry sherry--yes, I drink something besides Jack Daniels, and thestores are well stocked and very reasonably priced. We fueled up at not toobad duty free prices. So we should be in hog heaven, right? Wrong.On the way here, part of the brand new exhaust system cracked and startedspraying exhaust filled seawater into both engine rooms. We were able tostop the spraying, but couldn't get a patch to hold. Reason number one forbeing here so long--wait for replacement waterlocks. Then the watermakerwasn't working properly. No problem, I have a spare high pressure head andrebuild kit. Okay, we did get it working right away, but the seats in thetitanium head wouldn't fit. That part's on the way to Samoa. Okay ready togo. Nope. The starboard engine started hemorrhaging oil--brand new!!!turns out after a few panic ridden emails to the yard in Raiatea thatreplaced the engine that the oil pump was leaking. Seems when we changedout the watermaker, it is bolted on through the pump and the back plate cameoff which unbeknownst to us requires a change in the gasket. We're pumped,we're outta here. Whoops. At 4:45 PM last Friday, one of the alternatorsshorted out precipitating a complete loss of power on the boat. Great, wehave about $1,500 of new provisions in the fridge and freezers!!!! Okay welimped by over the weekend with the generator providing some power---oops,we turned it off for a while to check out the electrics and, since thegenerator fuel pump was out have been running it off a supplemental 12Vpump. Except--no generator, no 12V, no 12V, no generator. Ran a 50 footspeaker wire forward to get the pump running, and yesterday, the electricianfound that the alternator short had blown the main fuse in the boat--a fuseyou can't tell is blown unless you know what you're doing. Anyway, we'vejury rigged something across the fuse bar and have the new one onorder--should arrive Friday, then, for real, we're out of here. Stopping ina couple more of the Cooks and then on to Samoa.So, I'm running on, and I'll end this now, assured that we have everyone'sundying sympathy for our problems.Tim, Rose & JoeP.S. Now one of my hot water heaters has crapped out. Fortunately, we havetwo. Should have a brand new boat except the hull by the end to theseason!!