Hawaii - Japan Day 5: Burger Night

Tonight we start our 5th night of watches, and we’re having something tasty for dinner. Hence the title of this little piece.

But first, let’s rewind to Honolulu. You of course deserve to know how it all ended there. We had a busy time with Maarten on board, did more shopping and visited two nice museums.

If you’re ever in Honolulu, whatever you do, don’t skip the Bishop Museum. It’s a much nicer museum (we think) than the commercial Polynesian Cultural Center that Arnold and I had visited together. Arnold was quite keen on that one, but it later turned out it had been set up by the Mormon church to give their followers something to do. The Bishop Museum is in Honolulu itself and was created at the end of the 19th century by the local “Carnegie”, a wealthy white man called Bishop. So it has nothing to do with the Catholic faith. He was married to the heir to the throne of the Hawaiian dynasty. Her uncle or something was the last king, who was deposed thanks to the efforts of American sugar barons. Let’s just say that the Americans haven’t exactly distinguished themselves by decent behaviour in Hawaiian history. Anyway, this museum clearly doesn’t depend on the state for its funding: it looks beautiful and is packed with original artefacts. There’s also a small “NEMO”-style science museum. Fun for old engineers like us too.

We also went to the original palace of those 19th-century kings, who only sat on the throne for a scant century. This ‘Oliani Palace isn’t very big, and since it served for a while as offices for the new Americans, I got the impression that new furnishings had been put in later. Nice, but nothing special, and we’d already heard the history of the kings (better) in the other museum.

On the last afternoon we went to the Japanese supermarket, which confusingly is called Don Quijote. Highly recommended: good prices and a wide range. We bought some lovely fruit that will hopefully keep for a long time. In the evening, as a farewell to the USA, we went to Texas de Brazil, an all-you-can-eat steakhouse where a friendly Argentinian (!) waiter spoiled us rotten. Maarten does enjoy a bit of meat, so that worked out perfectly.

The next day, Sunday, we were due to sail. To arrange that, I’d popped in at the harbour master’s on Friday morning, and after exchanging ten words and waiting twenty minutes with the unfriendly lady, I was handed a sort of mini receipt to pay. I thought, I won’t let it show, and handed over my credit card without looking. Once outside I took a proper look: $310 for 12 days. Ha, and they make such a fuss about it there. I think she forgot half the bill, but that’s not my problem.

Next I emailed my friend Joey, with all his colleagues at the CBP Maritime Office in CC, that we wanted to leave this weekend. Oops, an immediate reply saying I really did have to come in with all the passports. The address was a bit vague; when I entered the street, I got a port area with a gate. Into the Uber with Maarten: yes, just drop us off here. We asked at the gate: so where’s this CBP, then? Well, right here on the premises, sir, just register your passports and follow this white line. Around the corner was a low building with a door. Surely not? In we went: a counter with an open door next to it. “You are the guys from Merrimac?” We quickly figured out that they’re not exactly rushed off their feet here. He had a whole form, pretty much the same as the one I’d already filled in and sent, but now to be filled in by pen, plus a list of field numbers we had to go through together. Super nice guys, but it was clear the number of sailors coming through here has dropped considerably. We also double-checked that it was fine for Maarten to have arrived on an ESTA by plane and now to leave by boat.

So on Sunday we still wanted to refuel, which meant a trip to the next marina. On the way out it turned out that the reports of a “king tide” and “high surf” were indeed true: there were rollers breaking in the harbour entrance. Oops. See the video. So we waited a bit. After a quarter of an hour it suddenly eased and we could still leave the harbour safely. At the other marina there was another super friendly young lady who helped with the pump. No, they couldn’t take any visitors here, everything was full. Well, no wonder nobody comes anymore. Very odd for such a commercially minded country. After loading 120 gallons the tank was more or less full and we could set off.

The first few hours there was no wind, of course, but once past the last mountain ridge it picked up nicely to about 18 knots. It was a bit lumpy as well, sea-wise. The next morning when I got up, it turned out Maarten wasn’t entirely immune to seasickness after all. Quickly stuck a Scopoderm patch behind his ear and after a couple of hours he was completely fine again. One turned out to be enough; after five days he’s now fully adjusted and feeling great.

Since Arnold and I were both not that happy with the watch schedule on the previous leg (20-24, 24-04, 04-08, and then shifting one slot earlier each day), we’re now doing a three-hour watch system. Watch 1 does 20-23 and 05-08, watch 2 just 23-02 and watch 3 just 02-05. A three-hour watch feels a lot shorter and we all sleep better with it. We also rotate forwards now, so after watch 1 comes watch 2, etc. And watch 1 also does the cooking and the washing up. That way you clean up your own mess and then you’re free of chores for two days. Great system. I started with watch 1, since I suffer least from initial seasickness: pasta with a meaty tomato sauce. Then Arnold with burgers, Maarten with rendang and rice, me again with burritos, and now today burgers again. We’ve got fresh burger buns, so they need to be eaten within two weeks.

Besides that, the bread baking keeps getting better. Today’s loaf was really good, with even bubbles throughout and no sagging. Less water seems to be the trick, but I’ll report back on whether that was just a one-off fluke.

Sailing-wise, days 2 to 4 weren’t brilliant, with just too little wind: 8-9 knots from the quarter to dead astern. We’re sailing a huge arc to the south to try and pick up the trade winds. Since this morning we’ve had 11-14 knots and the boat is suddenly running like a dream. We’re hoping to arrive around 10-11 July, but we’re not allowed to enter on the 11th and 12th because that’s the weekend. Fortunately the agent is arranging all of that, so no headaches on that front.