Yes we had a catastrophic oil loss when leaving Nuku Hiva, but that will be a cliff hanger, more about that later.

Hiva Oa

From Panama we arrived at Hiva Oa and had a day of rest. The next day we took the ca 3,5 km walk to the village Atuona to clear in. Very soon on the way we saw a Mango tree, which we come to see many of in the Marquesas and we could often pick mangos that had fallen down.

The procedure to clear in is very easy, you fill in a document online,  fill in normal stuff such as boat data, crew list passport numbers etc. You should also declare alcohol and tobacco, tobacco is no issue for us, but we do carry a lot of wine, beer and rum etc. Reading the allowance for each person, it’s normal quantity a few litres of each, but we had substantially more as prices are very expensive in French Polynesia. We have heard that if you declare the full volume they will just accept it, and we thought even if the charge us tax on what we bring the total cost will be lower than if buying locally. Luckily, they accepted our very large quantity of alcohol and everything went very smooth.

After we visited the local grocery shop, we found prices extremely expensive, Whine starts at ca 20 Euro, spirits 70-100 Euro, beer 3 Euro for a can, another example was a small bottle of olive oil 22 Euro. Potatoes and onions were just north of 6 Euro.

Outside the gendarmery, very convenient for us was the Paul Gauguin Museum, he lived in Hiva Oa between 1901 and until his death 1903.

Paul Gauguin and his studio

Almost everywhere one could see Tikis

Tkis; by ChatGTP

Tikis in French Polynesia are traditional carved figures that hold deep cultural and spiritual significance, often representing deified ancestors, gods, or protective spirits. Originating from the Marquesas Islands and other parts of Polynesia, these stone or wood carvings typically feature stylized human forms with prominent facial features and powerful postures. Tikis were commonly placed in sacred sites, such as marae (temples), and used in rituals to invoke protection, fertility, or strength. Today, they remain a vital symbol of Polynesian heritage, blending ancient beliefs with contemporary cultural identity and artistry.

Back at Kerpa it was time to attend the foil attachment to the furling unit, if you saw my last blog post you might remember that the screws attaching the foil and the furler had started to fallout and the threads was severely damaged. Lyckily I few years back I bought a HELICOIL kit which is used for repairing threads, works very well for repairing aluminium threads.

You can see the aluminium piece sticking out from the foil, there are 4 of them and they needed new threads

New threads you can see that had to drill new holes where the bolts had broken off.

It was first time for me to use the HELICOIL and it was not too difficult to use, one rather quickly get the feeling for how to drill and make new thread for the HELICOIL and insert the new thread.

I reattached the foil to the furler, and now it feels as very strong and secure attachment.

Besides that, we used a few days to clean off all the goose necks that had grown on the bottom and a bit over the waterline.

From Hiva Oa, we went to a nearby Island Tahuata

Tahuata

The Hanamoena bay is very beautiful and has one of the only few proper sand beaches in the Marquesas. It was difficult to get ashore as swell was large, we anchored the dingy and swam in and had a walk on the beach. On the way back the swell has grown and to get out to the dingy was a bit of an adventure.

Hanamoena bay

Hiva Oa seen from Tahuata

Beautifull evening.

We also saw our first Manta it swam by Kerpa at anchor

Hapatoni

Hapaton is a small village further south on Tahuata. In French Polynesia one sees a lot of churches, not uncommon that a small village has more than one, I guess competing religious communities. Hapatoni had a very cute church

In the harbour locals had just had caught a shark. Later when we got back from a walk they were butchering and distributed the meat. Did not know that they eat Shark meat.

Interesting out-rigger Polynesian style

Plain but working attachment of the outrigger. We saw many modern GRP canoes with outrigger, seams to be a popular recreation and work-out activity.

On our walk outside the village, we saw our first star-fruit tree, we picked a few but they were rather sour.

Fatu Hiva

We had a short trip back to Hiva Oa where we picked up a friend Anna-Lena, she will sail with us for a month. She had a new Echopilot forward seeing sonar with her. Some might remember that I installed a new Echopilot sonar in Shelter Bay Marina, and that it did not work, I did not know which unit that was broken, I showed that I had to replace both the transducer and the display, but after that it worked. The transducer is probably 45 mm in diameter and a bit awkward positioned, so when pulling it out a massive amount of water just flushing in a bit of shaky moment before I could put in the new one.

A few days later we sat course to the famous Fatu Hiva, we have heard from so many that it should be very beautiful. And it was, below the iconic anchorage.

Dingy dock

On both Hiva Oa and Fatu Hiva one had to pay tourist tax, it was new for this year. Not very expensive about 10-15 euro if I remember right.

The village is very cute and situated in a very beautiful surrounding.

We took a walk to a nearby waterfall and admiring the beauty.

On the way we saw wild chili

Not much water in the waterfall, but it was a nice walk.

The day after Kerstin and I took a more strenuous walk up to the top of the cliff above the anchorage ca 540 m above the sea level. It was hard work in the heat, but rewarding.

The village and anchorage.

It was rather steep walk

We could see the waterfall from yesterday in the distance.

 And the anchorage from above

Nuku Hiva

From Fatu Hiva we sat course towards Nuku Hiva, with an overnight stop at Tahuata.

The main anchorage in Nuku Hiva is the very large Taiohae Anchorage.

Here you find grocery shops, chandlery, restaurants and boat service etc. The vegetable market is just at the dingy dock, as well as small restaurant serving nice lunch for ca 15 Euro.

The veggie market

At the dingy dock they clean fishes and give the leftovers to the sharks in the water.

We rented a car and had a very nice and a bit of an adventures trip on the island.

Amazing scenery from above.

At one stop we saw this impressive and massive tree.

We had a nice walk and lunch stop at Hatiheu on the north side of the island, and from there the bit more adventures part of the trip started. We wanted to drive around the island and there should be a road leading from Hatiheu to the airport. It was but it was in a very poor state.

Anna-Lena looking at the road and says it will not work, I claim it will work, lets try we, had a 4-wheel drive so it should be possible, she said no, I was on my way to insist, when a local come by and said you can’t go that way. So I had to turn back, and it was at least 5 km back on a very poor and extremely bumpy road.

Anyhow it was a very nice trip.

Catastrophic oil loss

We wanted to visit the Anaho bay on the north side of Nuku Hiva.

So, we took up the anchor and motored out from the bay, but we did not get very far, less than one nautical mile, then the alarm went on, and I notice immediately that it was the oil alarm. Off with the engine and open the engine hatch and it was a bit of a shook, oil splashed everywhere in the engine room.

It was not much wind, so easy to sail back and set the anchor again, we were very lucky it happens there, very easy to get back to a safe anchorage, and at a place where we could get help.

When the anchor was in it was time to find out what the problem was, and start to clean up the worst mess. To be on the safe side I called Nuku Hiva Yacht Service, they could help, they called an engine mechanic who lives on a catamaran in the anchorage, and he was available immediately. He soon found the problem, it was the crankcase vent valve that had come lose, so easy to fix, but we also found that it was a chafe-hole in the oil hose from the oil cooler to the oil filter. If such hose was available in Papeete it could be there in a day or two, unfortunately it was a Friday so we would not find out before Monday.  

The went cap was easy to put back.

While waiting for information about the availability of the oil hose I cleaned the oil the best I could. It was a lot of oil absorbed in the sound insulation it was a hard job to get that reasonable cleaned, can’t say I enjoyed it very much, it was hot like a steam bath, I got oil everywhere and the sweet was pouring from me, but the job had to be done

Got oil all over my body including my hair.

Unfortunately, it was ca three weeks delivery time on the hose as it was not available in Papeete, not fun at all, especially as our friend Anna-Lena was here, not fun to spend three weeks out of four at the anchor in Nuku Hiva. What to do, well I have self-vulcanization silicon tape, that would work, so let’s try, I talked to my good friend Hans back in Sweden, he suggested to add an external hose fasten with hose clamps to support the silicon tape.

Self-vulcanization silicon tape on the hose

Supported by a hose and hose clamps

Oil hose bush craft repair. Kerstin and I pressure tested it with help of a bicycle pump with a manometer up to ca 3,5 bars pressure, and to our delight it was tight.

One problem when reattaching a coupling like that, is that one needs new aluminium washer the old get hard and do not seal properly, they were not available locally, so I had to reuse the old ones. Unfortunately, I now have a small leak at the joint, but it is not too bad. I have ordered a new hose and washers, that will arrive late June in Papeete when my son and his daughter come to sail with us for a month.

Now finally we could go to Anaho Bay.

Anaho Bay

And it was very beautiful, we could have stayed for many days.

We really enjoyed Anaho.

Again, a nice small church

Local transport

It was just beautiful

The plan was to also visit Ua Pou, but due to the break down, and that Anna-Lena had a flight home from Hao in the Tuamotus, we decided it was better for her to have a few days in the Tuamotus.

Next blogpost we arrive to Tuamotus something I have look forward to so long.