Arrived at Kauai

We left Kane'ohe Bay in the late afternoon yesterday again with dramatic light and just safely arrived at Nawiliwili Harbor at beautiful Kauai, the forth largest and the oldest of the Hawaian Islands. Kauai is known for its beauty and I can't wait to explore it. We are anchored out in the harbor and have a rental car as of monday morning for a week.
Today, after checking out the town here, I am gonna pull my piano out and see if I get something going.

Footage shooting

We're having a blast shooting footage for our Alita movies to come. We are working through all my material and will start making videos on a regular basis about our life on board, our dreams, personality as well as repairs, cooking and much more. Today we shot some footage for the introductory video and we really enjoyed it. Stay tuned.

North Shore Surfing

Here my favourite shots: 

Wave at the beach - you need a bit nerves for that. Oh how I love being in that water.

Surfing way out

Molokai, Lanai and Honolulu

Time flies by when you live to the fullest in nature. When you can't get enough of that view, when you listen to the birds sing for hours or enjoy a beautiful sail with 8-9 knots through the waters of Hawaii. This last week was just amazing. All that relaxing time in Long horror at Molokai. Then finally we sailed on to Lahaina on Maui. During that sail we finally managed to get great videos from Alita under full sail and with a nice speed making a decent wake. Of course the wind picked up once I was flying Charly (the drone) and started healing more and more while I was standing on deck at the stern (back) not being able to hold on to anything as I was holding the remote control. That god I have such a good balance that I was able to withstand all the rolling and healing. Finally when the side of the deck nearly hit the water I sat down which did not make it easier as I tended to slide down. But I had to control Charly, even when Marcus drove a jibe. After about 20 min I flew him back in, just in time before even heavier winds and rain hit us. What a ride!. 

We spent a night in Maui rocking' and rolling as usual. It is just so interesting that at night, this time 10p.m. all of a sudden first the wind dies and then the waves and thus the rolling. Literally from one second to the other. I could not believe that. Having picked up seem fresh groceries we let go of the mooring again and motored against the wind up to the world famous Honolulu Bay. Famous for decent snorkling with a good chance of meeting a turtle and famous for big wave surfing. We had been there on land in January when it had 6m waves just 100m away from where we anchored this time. Hard to believe. And we did find our turtle and Marcus even got to film it really well. Oh so precious. Having spent the day at sea and swimming we went to bed early to get up at 4a.m. next morning to be at Molokai just after sunrise. My dream of many years has come true: we sailed along the step cliffs of the north shore of Molokai. The weather was not great, but the cliffs were spectacular nervertheless. I got to take two nice videos with Charly before it startet to rain again. Wen continued with a just beautiful sail back to Oahu, this time to the east side into Kaneohe Bay, where we are anchored now. Arriving here we had such a wonderful experience, but I will leave that to my next blog entry tomorrow. 

Pictures below are: 

Sunset at Lono, view over Lono harbor from cliff and back up the cliff from Alita, West side of Maui, Fish and turtle in Honolulu Bay, Alita sailing past Lanai and arriving in Honolulu the first time (in January), me doing Ballett at anchorage in Long harbor, two pictures of Lanai and me sailing towards Lahaina

Stars

No picture really and no words can really describe the beauty of a sunset and the rising stars at anchor here. Not only are the colours of the sunsets just amazing, but the incoming night totally captures you when more and more stars become visible and the sky turns from all these reddish colors to blue and black with twinkling lights. Speechless!

Molokai

Wow it feels so great to be out at the ocean, in freedom, in nature, on the water and now at a calm and peaceful anchorage in the South East of Molokai.

We left our anchorage Motua bay on Oahu's West End on friday morning at 2am since Marcus was not able to sleep that night. We loved getting out there, it was really calm in the protection of Oahu. So calm of course that we had to motor. There was not much wind expected anyways which is good for making the passage between Hawaian Islands. The channels are really bad and they warn you to sail through the channel in winds over 15kn because it will blow hard in the channel then. Anyways, we had leftover swell from two sides and were rocking and rolling, but not too bad. It just kept raining and raining- and hoping for wind. Then all of a sudden, Marcus was asleep and I was looking out the window watching the birds and felt a breeze on the nose. I set the sails and off we went to a beautiful 2hr sailing. After a wind shift we sailed at 60 -90 deg with 8-9kn which felt the smoothest ever. At 2.30pm we dropped anchor in Lono harbo.
This old harbour where we are now is a superb protection from the swells. We love this peaceful place. Other than a family living in a tent, an old guy or lady (haven't found out yet) living on a very old trashy sailing boat at anchor and some locals coming to the beach for fishing on sundays it's uninhibited. And no cel phone reception except if you walk up the hill. I hear and sea birds and dragonflies flying and the waves rolling in. I love my nature.
We'll be here another day or two and then head over to Lahaina on Maui again. Our friends that we met in Penrhyn and who stayed in Kona (Big Island) came down her a day after us and leave for Oahu tomorrow morning. Great to catch up!

Back again

Dear Blog followers,

it's been a long time since I last posted. In the meantime I had two amazing months at home with family and friends. I went skiing, went to a concert and to the theatre, did lots of dancing, had many weeks of visitors and enjoyed the time with my godchildren. We renewed the floor in two rooms and the hallway at my uncle's house and painted the walls in two rooms at my house. It was just wonderful. At the end I was ready to go back to Alita, who got already lonely in the beautiful Ko Olina Marina in Hawaii. She had neighbours to chat to, but a good part of the marina is empty. They are very strict in who is allowed into marina. Except for very few exceptions no live aboards. So we had to leave the marina 3 days after we returned. At least Alita was in a clean and safe place while we were gone. Last thursday we sailed back over to Ala Wai Small Harbour and took our "old" place next to the party boat again. At least we get to use the internet of our neighbour as a kind of a payback. And it's closer to the city from here.
Our friend Amy has been so incredibly kind this past week to drive us around to get all the shopping and errands done that we needed to do. Not only did we pick up our serviced life raft, a new toilet and gas but I also already did most of the stock up for the trip up to Alaska! That is so good to have off my back.
A week ago on sunday a new friend Paul, whom we met on the airplane and who is a tour guide, spent his free day to drive us first to the sunday flea market and then around Oahu. How wonderful and kind of him. We had a great time.
If we have not been shopping or baking bread Amy took me for Yoga classes, that was great as well. It feels really good to work out. Also we have done lots of work. Marcus on Alita and I did work on photography participating at a competition and preparing for my Getty application.
Last Sunday Amy and Pete took us on a long hike up the hill and over to a ridge. It was way harder than anticipated, but who knows me knows I loved it. We all still feel it.
Early tomorrow morning we're leaving Honolulu harbor for good- trying to anchor out as much as we can to save money. As soon as possible we'll head over to Maui and meet up with our friends on "Cheers" -Joanne and Gary.
We had a good time here, especially with our amazing friends Amy and Pete but also with all the people at the Yacht Club and also our boat neighbors who let us use their landline broadband internet.

I will write more and nicer stories soon.
So long