March 16, 2009

Crewing to Ailuk
It's been quite a while since we sent a group email. I've been taking it a little easier than I used to, and getting therapeutic massage for my back. The nerve still gets pinched if I'm up very long, but I'm fairly functional, and have been doing some repair jobs to boost the bank account for the trip back to NZ. Karen has had a lot of sewing jobs, to the extent that it's been hard to make time for the trips out to Enemanet that we'd promised ourselves, for "down time". Now another opportunity has come up for us to get in some more out island time. You may recall from earlier emails that we greatly enjoyed our stay in Ailuk, and did a lot with Dave and Linda from Irish Melody after they brought the Worldteach volunteer, Kevin, up to the atoll. Kevin is doing his second year there, and his parents wanted to visit and see what he's up to. They booked airline tickets to Majuro, and bought tickets on Air Marshall Islands from here to Ailuk. You may also recall that we mentioned how the new terminal at Ailuk has never seen an airplane, as AMI no longer owns one that can land on that runway. Linda heard that Kevin's folks were planning to fly there, and red flagged the plan. Then she did a survey among the yachts here, and found that Spike was willing to take the parents up on his boat, Holokai. That is absolutely the only way they can get there. Karen and I wanted to see the Ailuk villagers again, and I have always wanted to do a sail on Holokai to see how the catamaran feels on a passage. Spike agreed to let us crew for the trip, so we're cooks and deck hands for the next 10 days or so. We may have fair email access through Spike’s sailmail hardware, we'll see how that works out. May have to just write up the whole adventure and send it when we get back, but either way it should be a pretty good story. We'll be away from the hotmail until March 31, but will probably be able to check the sailmail. Ted