Since they finally found paradise, the guys were not really looking forward to sailing out again to meet me in Tahiti on the 4^th. Fortunately Manihi has an airport with a daily connection to Tahiti. So Rolf got himself a plane ticket and was at Papeete airport when I arrived there at four in the morning, after a 26 hour trip. I was so happy to see him standing there, complete with leis (flower necklaces) to welcome me in true island style. Read the rest of this entry »

We said goodbye today to our dear crewmember Marie-Andree. She flew out from Hiva Oa to join her friends on Tahiti and Bora-Bora. Now it’s just the guys and without a woman on board we’re on our own way to Tahiti… No woman on board, that means we have to do our own sailtrim, navigation, cooking, dinghy driving, reading, movies, teeth brushing, bedtime stories and so on from now on. Read the rest of this entry »

We met Matty through an internet dating service for sailors called Sailing Networks. Matty desperately wanted to share his life with us on Helena (the sailing obviously had nothing to do with this) and is currently sharing a nice lovenest with Arent in the front of the ship.

Vybrashun is the guy that has been looking after us on St Kitts. He is the greatest engineer I have ever met in the Caribbean. We picked him up on the way back to St Maarten and he stayed with us for 2 weeks after that, helping out with anything that needed to be done on board. We are all very thankful for his help on board!

Marie was coming along for an overnight trip to Guadeloupe. What she didn’t know was that Arent and Rolf had sabotaged the driveshaft and in that way tricked her into a long stay on Helena while being stuck on St Kitts. Seriously, who wants to lose another great cook? She never left the ship since and now she is coming all the way to Tahiti. Yes, we did chain her to the ship.

Arent is Rolf’s cousin who has lived on St Maarten since puberty. This obviously has spoiled him and has given him the impressive ability to talk the shirt of any woman. He has sailed most of the world’s oceans himself with his catamaran Airee, so he invited himself on board Helena to join on the trip to Tahiti. Since St Maarten has the old tradition of blackmailing, he blackmailed me into accepting him with some none-compromising pictures. Since I always appreciate traditional approaches, I decided to forget about the pictures and let him come on board anyway. (Don’t ask about the pics, I’ll never tell!)

Baziel joined from the departure in Holland all the way until St Maarten. He is Rolf’s best friend and he has helped getting the ship all the way. However, sailing was not really his piece of cake so he is now looking for new challenges.

Peter is one of Rolf’s regular sailing buddies. He had the dream of crossing the Atlantic and made it come true (just like Markus). He made the best impressions by managing to make anything in the kitchen. He made us bitterballen (dutch thing…), stroop (dutch sugar sirup) and applepie. Oh yeah, he also likes to make pictures of himself, so here you go.

Markus is one of Rolf’s regular sailing buddies. Like Peter he had the dream of crossing the Atlantic and made it come true. His sail trimming made us cross the atlantic in 22 days without wind!!! One day I woke up when I thought there was a storm, only to find 10 knots of wind and the ship going 6 knots. I went nuts. Oh, you can see him peeling potatoes… Apparently this is a rare sight so I decided to use this picture.

Nele was supposed to join us for a cruise around the Canary Islands. Sadly the furling system broke so she settled for diving lessons instead. She managed to get her open water certification with flying colors! Her sailing skills didn’t get much development though, so she’ll have to get back on board to brush it up…