We left the friendly Hawaii Yacht Club in Honolulu Jan 4, two days later than schedule due to the electrical installations. But before departure we cleared out, fueled up and provisioned. We bought tons of foodstuff for USD 2 000 to last a long time. We were now five people including me. Tommy, was a Swede and electrician living in Oslo with Åse, a Norwegian nurse. They had booked a 4,5 month long trip through the South See more than a year in advance. Stanislaw, was a retired engineer from former Tjeckoslovakia but had lived in Sweden 30 years and worked for ABB. Nina, Swedish, was a former accountant now consultant. They had all sailed before and Tommy and Stanislaw had their own sailing boats and found me via my books. Nina and Stanislaw were to stay onboard for one month to Kiribati. The distance from Hawaii to Palmyra was 950 NM, almost due south from Honolulu. We got beam winds about 20 knots (10 meter/second) and most crew got seasick. The autopilot with its new electrical motor did not work so we had to hand steer. The day after the wind increased to gale with big waves and both Åse and Tommy were “grounded”. There was no organized food, everyone had to eat what their bodies got receive. After a few days the autopilot woke up and worked perfectly, guess it was the computer unit that realized it was time to start working. Halfway the wind shifted to a reach and we put both foresails, the jib and the genua, on a wing-on-wing, i e on two poles. When we took down the mainsail Tommy fell overboard but managed to get hold of the jib sheet. We quickly pulled him back on the boat. With the wing-on-wing set the sea became less cumbersome, the seasickness eased and the crew could relax in the sun on the big deck cushion. One day Tommy shaved his head and I did the same, strange feeling though. On the 7 day passage we only saw two other vessels. During nights we were hit by many rainsqualls, but they normally only lasted about 10 minutes. Close to Palmyra the wind changed and the main and job went up again, the mainsail reefed though. The last 24 hours I realized we were not going to arrive in Palmyra during daytime so we took down the main and sailed only on a reefed jib in order to slow down. The next morning we entered the beautiful Palmyra lagoon and were met by the research station crew who showed us our anchor place. We had arrived in the South See. Palmyra atoll consists of 50 small islets and there are rumors of hidden treasures here. When USA took Hawaii as a colony Palmyra was included and during WWII the US Navy built a naval station with an airstrip here. At the end of 1990 the owners (Palmyra was privately owned) wanted to sell Palmyra and Bill Gates was rumored to be interested but in 2000 the non-profit organization The Nature Conservancy bought the whole atoll minus two small islets and the year after the US government made Palmyra a National Wildlife Refuge. One of the firsts task was to eradicate all rats on the atoll, thousands of them threatened the birds and crabs on the atoll. In order to visit Palmyra one need a permit from US Fish and Wildlife Service. Boats have to have holding tanks, clean bottoms and a RAT- certificate showing there are no rats onboard (the certificate cost USD 365). I had applied for permission one year in advance and we were the only boat during our stay. Today Palmyra has a permanent staff of 5 people and space for about 20 scientists doing research in climate change, greenhouse effect and the like. The station crew alternates every 3 months and many also work in Antarctica during extended periods, a different and exiting lifestyle.
Palmyra is infamous for a double murder in 1974, the story is well documented in the book “And The Sea Will Tell” published 1991 by Vincent Bugliosi (also author of Helter Skelter about the murder Charles Manson) and was made into a movie. A young hippie couple Buck and Stephanie murdered a middle aged couple Mac and Muff, stole their yacht Sea Wind, sailed back to Hawaii, was caught and sentenced to prison for stealing the yacht. As no bodies were found they could not be charged with murder. A few years later, 1981, another cruising couple found the skull and bones of Muff and Buck was charged and sentenced to life in prison. He was released 2007 and died 2010, 72 years old. Stephanie, on the other hand, was acquitted due to the extremely impressive defense work by her attorney Bugliosi (he had been the prosecutor in the Manson case). She lives in California and is a successful biz woman today. Was she guilty? Most probably, while on Palmyra they were out of food, their boat was not seaworthy and there was Sea Wind, a beautiful equipped yacht with food for a year… But as Bugliosi pleaded, it had to be “beyond a reasonable doubt” which freed her. On the way to Palmyra I reread the book and was exited to arrive. The station crew received us with open arms, invited us for dinners, we could use their bikes, laundry and kayaks and, best of all, their Internet. We felt like we both had the cake and could eat it; experience an atoll and have access to the modern world at the same time. Of course we visited the bay where Sea Wind was anchored and where the hippie couple was moored with their boat. After a rewarding week on Palmyra we set sail to Kiribati, 1 525 NM further southwest. But before departure we spiked a big Swedish flag with our names on the wall of Palmyra Yacht Club. Regards Lars

We spent one month in the Hawaii Islands and visited Big Island, Maui, Molokai, Oahu with Honolulu and Kauai. The Hawaii Islands belong to Polynesia, a huge triangle where Hawaii is the northern corner, New Zeeland the southern and Easter Island the eastern. One of the islands in the group is Niihau, an island only Polynesians may visit. Hawaii islands were “discovered” by the English Captain James Cook as late as 1778, but of course the Polynesians had found and colonized them more than 1 000 years earlier. Unfortunately Cook was killed here the year after his discovery. One of his attackers was a young man Kamehameha, who later conquered all the islands and created the Hawaiian Kingdom. Soon afterwards whalers, missioners and American planters arrived and after a few decades USA ended the kingdom and took Hawaii as a colony. In 1959 Hawaii become the 50th and last state in the Union.
I spent ten days in Hilo, Big Island, where we cleared in to the USA. Here the gennaker I had ordered via mail between Mexico and Hawaii and the radar that I had left in San Francisco arrived. I had some repairs done, changed crew and toured the island on a rented car. Two of the large volcano’s on the island are more than 4 000 meter high, Mauna Kea and Mauna Loa and one was covered by snow. Actually, Mauna Loa is the world’s largest volcano if measured from the sea floor, even higher then Mt Everest. One of the national parks, Kilauea crater, is a UNESCO World Heritage Site, where one can see lava slowly enter the sea. When it is dark, you can see a glowing red light from the eruptions, very exciting. The bad thing however, about Hilo was the rain, every day it rained a few hours. The trade winds had been blowing uninterrupted for 1 000’s of miles, then hit the high mountains on the islands east sides and dropped all its humidity. The west sides of the islands are much drier.
From Hilo we sail to Maui, 100 NM. Onboard now was my sister Anne and her husband Widich, Victor and Kristine from New York, and Helene from Geneva, Switzerland. All of them had sailed with Jennifer before. We made a night sail, got a rough ride with rather big waves with the wind from behind and arrived next day in Maui’s historical and pleasant little town, Lahaina. We had anchored a few hours before during the day and then the windlass (ankarspelet) burned. When we entered Lahaina’s small marina I claimed that we had an emergency and the port captain were nice and gave us a berth, most other yachts had to anchor outside. We were now in the middle of town and had access to Lahaina Yacht Club facilities, bars and shops. Maui is Hawaii’s second largest island after Big Island with two extinct volcanoes, more than 3 000 meter high, with 7 000 inhabitants.
From Maui, which we enjoyed a lot, we sailed on to Honolulu on Oahu Island. We got a gale again and big waves, had only the jib up and danced away with seven knots. We stayed a few days in Honolulu (see more below) and then sailed on the westernmost island of Kauai, 110 NM away. There was a small craft warning (kulingvarning) again with big waves in the channel between the islands but we were flying with eight knots on our jib only. On the way we were boarded by the US Coast Guard. I had heard horror stories about their brutal and unfriendly ways, but these officials were extremely nice. On the passage one huge wave broke into the cockpit and filled it with water. Unfortunately I had my small hatch to the cockpit open and my bunk was drenched. But the sun was shining and the waves were fascinating. We moored at a concrete dock in Niwiliwili’s marina. Kauai really is “The Garden Island”, seldom have I seen views so spectacular. On the north coast is the gorgeous Hanaley Bay, a favorite among cruisers.The bay has high mountains and plenty of rain (the mounatains there is supposed to be one of the wettest places on earth), great hiking and there are plemty of surfers in the water and on the beach. On the south coast is Hanapepe village where Jurrasic Park was filmed. Here in Kauai’s “biggest little town” I met the artist Dawn Traina, a beautiful Polynesian woman in her 50’ (check the Blogg), who had sailed on the 22 meter long traditional Polynesian double canoe Hokuléa between Hawaii and Tahiti in the 1980’s. Hokuléa sailed first time 1976 with the Micronesian master navigator Mau Piailug – there was no Polynesian who knew how to navigate by the stars at that time – without compass and GPS. This was the first time in 600 years such a sailing had taken place. We celebrated Christmas on Kauai, not much of a celebration perhaps, just a good dinner. We all agreed that Kauai was the most beautiful of the Hawaii islands.
Hawaii Yacht Club is what cruising clubs should be, small, friendly, basic and with bar, restaurant and free WIFI. It’s close to the famous Waikiki Beach and a huge shopping mall. Every day large and small Polynesian canoes passed us and trained for a future race. Here my sister and her husband, Helene and Stefan left Jennifer. Stefan had joined in Honolulu and sailed with us to and from Kauai. We visited Pearl Harbor, the American naval base which became famous for the Japanese attack Dec 7, 1941, where we watched the Arizona monument over the sunken battleship Arizona and also the huge battleship Missouri, today a museum boat. we also visited the Oaho North Shore with its huge waves, up to 10 meter high, a paradise for (good) surfers.
In Honolulu I could do a lot of maintenance work and there was much work to be done. The autopilot electrical motor had to be ordered from the mainland at USD 2 200. The windlass had burnt and a new one cost USD 3 000. The two alternators charging the batteries worked, but not well. I ordered a new bigger one which can charge with 100 Amp at US 1 000 as I now had 10 batteries to charge. One of the two alternators had to be repaired. One problem with the batteries was that three of them were bad and stole power from the other seven, so three new batteries were needed at USD 800. One of the holding tanks for the toilettes had rusted, and one sailor in the marina helped me change the installation, that work took a whole day. We celebrated New Year at the Hawaii Yacht Club and the day after Stefan, Viktor and Kristine left for the USA and Sweden. The last days here have been a bit hectic, so much to do – so little time, and I have been a bit stressed.
Jennifer has now sailed 25 000 NM from the start summer 2010 in Turkey (and 165 000 NM altogether). Now we have about another 25 000 NM ahead of us as I have calculated the whole trip to be 53 000 NM before arriving in Stockholm Sept 23, 2013. That is almost two times around the world, a circumnavigation is 27 000 NM if one takes the shortest route via the Suez- and Panama canals. 2011 was a good year, we had seen South-East Asia, China, Japan, Alaska, Canada, California, Mexico and Hawaii and Jennifer was well booked most of the time. On the financial side though, I did not break even. The reason was the many large expenses, SEK 700 000 or (USD 100 000) for new mainsail, gennaker, windlass, autopilot, generator and alternator, all large items. Hopefully there will be less expenses during 2012. Now we are off to Palmyra atoll and the South Sees, leaving Jan 4.
Lars