In the Grip of Fatu Hiva

I don't think Mark and I expected to be in Fatu Hiva quite this long. As we are running out of food and money (both available in Hiva Oa, our next stop) and while the messages are no doubt piling up in our unreachable mailboxes, we still find ourselves in pretty Hanavave Bay. for just a little bit longer. Something is keeping us here. It might be the fact that we are in a comfortable anchorage without having to move every other day (like in the Gambier), knowing that most other Marquesan harbors are rolly, it might be the balmy weather we have missed so much, it might be the awesome scenery, the friendly people or the good company. Or, it might be the combination of it all.

While basic foodstuffs, like flour, sugar, milk, butter, canned vegetables and even chicken are readily available in the small village store, fresh produce - other than onions, garlic and potatoes - is missing. We ran out of our last carrot days ago and all we have left are some radishes. And plenty of cans. The promise of fresh baguettes, eggplants, tomatoes, lettuce and other veggies in Hiva Oa is tempting, but surely we can live off onions and potatoes for a few more days. Because we managed to trade for souvenirs, the cash we have left - all of $30 worth - can be used for more food. I do think we can last a bit longer.

One of the reasons we have survived on so little for the last two weeks is the presence of other sailboats in the bay. Some have left, others have arrived and we are all getting along quite well. The unwritten tradition of taking turns hosting dinner parties has continued, so we have been eating well and enjoying our social events. If you ever want to lose weight, sailing in the South Pacific, meeting other cruisers who all know and like to cook tasty amounts of food, inviting the neighbors to help consume it, is not the way to do it! But, we are not the ones to complain about that. And, it is not our fault that some of them have birthdays with a mandatory party to go with it.:-)

As the days go by and we are cooking and baking and hanging out and visiting the same waterfall over and over again, we are - really - planning to sail to Hiva Oa any time soon. Just not tomorrow.

Still in Fatu Hiva, Marquesas

While the first week of our stay in Hanavave, Fatu Hiva the weather was pleasant and the days were filled with fun or interesting activities like hiking, meeting locals and watching a Marquesan church service, the second week looked very different. It rained practically all day and night, so we stayed on Irie for some maintenance and relaxation indoors. The water tank filled up, but it was impossible to do laundry. On shore the road and trails were wet and muddy, so going on walks was out of the question, and the sun came and went out of view, the western horizon absent of any sunsets. We did manage to find a friendly local on shore who let us use his internet service to figure a few things out in regards to our sat phone email problem.

The bay filled up with a few people we knew. Mark and I caught up with Ursula and Michael on SV Kril, a German couple we met many years ago in St. Martin and with whom we kept in touch via email. We also got to know Giorgio, an Italian single hander, and our Gambier companions Birgit and Christian on SV Pitufa recently arrived as well. Being surrounded by good company means social evenings with yummy meals and endless conversations. For many days, there was an invitation from as many boats to enjoy the evenings together, taking turns cooking and doing dishes. It has been over a week now since Mark and I watched an episode of an older TV series ("Six Feet Under") we are following on the laptop!

On Sunday it seemed to be a better and clearer day for an outdoor activity. Our whole group walked to the waterfall (again) for lunch. The hike was pleasant and beautiful as always and a dip in the pool under the thundering water was refreshing. Once we came out and put all our sweaty clothes back on, it started to rain. Then, it started to pour. Drenched and miserable we stared at each other and at the grey sky above. After a half hour of showering with our clothes on, we decided to head back to our boats. Luckily, we were in the tropics, so the air was relatively warm. Somewhere along the road, we found a covered bench, where we ate the varied foodstuffs we brought, while mosquitoes ate us. It was a fitting reminder that this is the wettest island in the Marquesas and probably in all of French Polynesia.

San Blas Crabs

There are two kinds of crabs in Mark and my life these days, while hanging about the San Blas islands. Neither plays a very important role, but they are present around us every day. The first one is a tiny crab of the grey kind. Every time we take a shower off Irie’s back step, we see them settled near the water’s edge of the step. They scurry away and try to hide when you come too close, but they are our permanent pets. We’ve been having some for months. They start out tiny and then grow to about an inch, which is really not that big. We tolerate them down there, but get a bit creeped out when they reach all the way in the cockpit.

The other kind of crab is of a bigger kind and of the color red. The Kuna Indians selling fish, lobster and undersize conch sometimes carry them in their dugout canoes when they sail or paddle from cruising boat to cruising boat. Until recently we have not bought any, because – honestly – we didn’t really know what to do with them and they seemed a lot of work. The only time we saw one while snorkeling was when they were out of season. We always said we would try one of those crabs one day and that moment came a few days ago, when Mark noticed a biggie in one of the passing canoes. We managed to buy this “giant” male for $2; a really good deal. Somehow, we also managed to get the creature with all its appendages in our pressure cooker, which is our biggest pot and “lobster steamer”. Then, it took Mark over an hour to get all the juicy meat out of the shell, legs and massive claws. He collected about a pound of lovely fresh crab meat, which was turned into two delicious dinners. I discovered I like the taste even better than lobster. What a spoil!

The crab was slightly too big for our pressure cooker, but was a perfect fit for our sink. Unfortunately, you can't steam a crab in a sink...

Mark needed to use a tool from his toolbox to conquer the big claws...

Tools for successful San Blas crab meat picking. And, the fruit of Mark's labor; lots of crab meat!

Final result (1/2 anyway): a lovely crab pasta dish - I couldn't resist posting another picture of food!

The Perfect Pretzel

Pretzels are not really part of the Belgian culture, but they are a staple in the United States. Mark loves them and used to buy them – the small, hard ones – in bags from the grocery store. He would look at the ingredients and purchase the cheapest ones without preservatives and crap in them. They are a great snack and even though I prefer potato chips, I do like the combination of salty peanuts and pretzels; a great mix! I have seen the big, soft pretzels as well, at fairs or sports games. They come warm and are served as a yummy snack with mustard.

Why all this talk about pretzels, when they are surely not to be found in Kuna land? As a matter of fact, any decent snacks are absent on the islands here (we can’t even find the hard corn to make popcorn) and in most other parts of the Caribbean they are very expensive. We have thought about making potato chips, but that seems to be a big project and hassle and we don’t have the right burners to heat oil for such things. We did find some cheap, “healthy” chips in Curaçao, but they are long gone and… Mark misses pretzels.

Recently, he had the great idea to make soft pretzels. He found a good recipe and went to work. I helped a little bit here and there and about two hours later, twelve wonderfully browned and salted pretzels appeared out of the oven! They are the best ones we ever had and we are now proud to add tasty golden pretzels to our list of home-made food of Irie. They join the breads, pizzas, English muffins, fries, onion rings, rum cakes, banana breads, hamburgers, many spreads and flavorful, varied and interesting dishes for dinner. Maybe we should start a restaurant, a pizzeria or a bakery whenever/if ever we settle on land…

American (Italian?) Home Cooking on Irie

Since we’ve been living on Irie, Mark has been craving a very special pasta sauce from his (younger) days spent with friends in the Oakland, CA area. I have heard a lot about this wonderful sauce and, based on the descriptions, wished I could have tried it. Not that my spaghetti bolognaise isn’t any good or special, but – we ALL know – Sean’s sauce is the best. To reproduce this famed pasta sauce, however, we needed the right ingredients, a few hours to spare and … the recipe!

Words and ravings turned into deeds a little while ago and Mark contacted his friend Sean to obtain his family’s scrumptious pasta sauce recipe. I was sent to Grenada’s most extensive supermarket, the IGA in Spice Island Mall, and came home with Italian sausages (expensive!), ground beef and pork (no veal available), fresh parsley (lucked out on that one), a block of Parmesan cheese (luxury!), Italian bread crumbs and tomato-based products. The other ingredients (spices, garlic and the like) already made their way to Irie as usual provisions. A visit to the fresh meat store in Whisper Cove Marina added a 4-pack of lamb merguez to the meal idea. Other than the canned tomatoes, no vegetables took part!

When you go through a bit of effort and expense to make a special dinner, it is customary to invite some friends to participate in the extravaganza. Susanne and Jan from SV Peter Pan couldn’t make it, but Rosie and Sim from SV Alianna – being avid meat eaters and food lovers – didn’t hesitate to come over. The four of us did our best to make a serious dent (and almost finish) the big pot of extraordinary pasta sauce with ten giant meatballs and nine sausages. The salad barely got touched, the fresh bread was a success, three bottles of red wine accompanied the feast and yes, we did serve pasta with the sauce!

The cook preparing his anticipated meal

Plenty of (big) meatballs...

... and sausages for four people

I'm in charge of making drinks (and baking bread, which has a tendency to collapse)

  

Plenty of dirty dishes afterwards!