Plan A of the Trip South was to ultimately sail to New Zealand. We left the boat in Papeete in June 2019 after sailing there from Mexico and expected to be back later that year to continue the voyage. A slight wrinkle emerged that delayed our planned return to Papeete until April 2020 and we had tickets booked for April 29, 2020. Of course that was not possible, particularly because the tickets were with Air New Zealand through Auckland which was shut tighter than a drum, as was French Polynesia.

So we waited and regularly revisited our plan. A bit earlier this year we devised a new plan – Plan B. The new plan was adopted after much consideration of options and pandemic realities, the most important of which is the near impossibility of planning anything much beyond a few weeks into the future. Plan B had two priority components: return to Papeete and sail to Bora Bora and back; and ship Marathon back to Mexico in late 2021 with DYT.

Tickets were bought and detailed plans were made. A slight timing modification was made to accommodate the “no interisland travel” restriction that was in place until sometime in September so we delayed our arrival to early October. The travel restriction was lifted a few days before our arrival. We expected to take seven to ten days to clean the boat up, refresh the supplies and then head off to Bora Bora for a couple of weeks. The boat was being “watched” by a highly competent marine technician but the extent of “watching” included starting the engine, checking the bilges and flushing the head every two weeks. A deck wash was performed every month or so along with a bottom cleaning. All of those things were in great shape when we boarded the boat on the evening of 5 October.

We had not however considered some other issues that might constrain our plans. Most notably, mold inside the boat and the deterioration of many things made of plastic. Leaking batteries were a huge problem despite having removed batteries prior our departure as per our normal boat departure list. Most of these problems can be attributed to heat and humidity prevalent in a tropical environment. The next post will provide some details on “best before dates” that can be show stoppers.

Unfortunately, many of the problems that rendered the boat unseaworthy for the multi-day sail to Bora Bora revealed themselves sequentially rather than in parallel. We would fix one thing and during the process discover something else that needed attention. At the end of the day, we ran out of time to sail to Bora Bora but we did manage to get there. We took the easiest and fastest mode of travel possible and very much enjoyed being on Bora Bora and being off the boat in Papeete where endless work was becoming quite unpleasant. Technically we did arrive by sea because the airport is on a motu and travel onto the island is by boat.