reef research and humanitarian help in Vanuatu and Solomon Islands

[wakataitea]

We are back in New Zealand.
wakataitea made her first 5000 Nm. crew and boat are fine and happy.
thanks to the wharram team for the nice and safe boat design.
Wakataitea is the boat we wonted and we are very happy with it.

 please start reading form the bottom...

good bye vanuatu

Santa Cruz Islands in the Solomon
we visit a place named Utupua and the village Asubuo. here are living 100 people in a nice village. fare away from everything.

we are here to supply the community with tools, school equipment and medicine. all donations from people ready the www hippopotamus.de and oceans watch supporters.

sharpening bush knifes, repairing touches and sewing machines, and having fun with the people.

friendly people

visitor on board

singing and dancing performance

...one day in our life we are the kings... :)

chief ceremony in north west malekula (namaky ceremony) vanuatu

reef research work in Vanuatu with Oceanswatch.org together.

Vanuatu and the people

test sailing with our friends Rock and Antony. they love the boat and want us to come back next year to build a 10m cat out of local materials...

we broke the front cross beam. it is holding only the netting. now problem for the safety of the boat. we shot with 9 knot into a confuse sea (wave)... was anyway a very old piece of spruce.

... 2 days later, we are in port sandwich (malikula) Vanuatu. we make a lot of friends and Antony, the local craving master went with us into the woods and we cut a very nice "Namamao" tree.

All done and stronger then before, we changed although the bridle with is holding the front stay.

Antony and some of his work.... the traditional outrigger in Vanuatu.... still in use

a nice TAM TAM ( drum out of a solid piece of wood

isabelle is learning to make a basket

WAKATAITEA,... today a workshop... training the locals to repaire a generator.
one of my main jobs here...;)

LAP LAP....A nice local dish is our friend Rosita preparing

isabelle is working hard again....
a other canvas job for a friend but in 2 weeks, we will be in holiday in vanuatu...

party on board...
we are very happy to see all our friends again here in NC

... space enough for this on a wharram...

just launched 2 weeks ago. a new build proa. we have not seen it sailing yet.

it is build like the traditional boats here in new caledonia build this one is glue with epoxi.

on the way again...

big smile, we are in the tropics... juhu
new Caledonia is our new home for the next 4 weeks.
after a windy trip from New Zealand up to here, we are very happy to have a wharram. this are really good boats. we had all wind conditions. from 0 to 40 knots of wind. the wakataitea and the crab claw rig did a perfect job. Hans Klaar was right, it a beautiful rig. the sails are easy to work with and we had never any problems to handle them. thanks a lot to Hans Klaar the rig designer
haevy sea shaked the boat realy hard but all the lashing holed the boat strong together... the hull shape let the boat move easy thrue the sea....
nice system .... james and hanneke ... thanks a lot for this good design.

in 3-4 weeks, we will sail to vanuatu to loin the oceans watch team in port vila...

We are still waiting for the right wind to go. It looks like it will be on Sunday.
In the main time we check our stuff, complete the provision for the next month and joined the www.oceanswatch.org.
…Oceans Watch works with the world’s sailors to undertake marine conservation projects and offer humanitarian aid to coastal communities in developing countries…
Natalie Riddler, Scientist and Dive Master, and Chris Bone the Project leader visited us on WAKATAITEA to talk about projects in Vanuatu.
We are happy to join them for the whole season and work with Natalie on reef check project around Vanuatu.

it is blowing 35 knots of wind and rain on the anchorage.
we are still waiting for the weather window... grrrrrr it is getting cold and boring but if you see a satellite picture like this, you are happy to be not outside.....
even not with a wharram..... ;)
the weather gourous say that maybe the 3. of Mai is our day.