ADVENTURE
A PACIFIC OCEAN CROSSING CAN BE SPECTACULAR, BUT ALSO DAUNTING. KATE ASHE-LEONARD HAS ADVICE ON WHAT YOU NEED TO KNOW BEFORE YOU GO
Coffee in hand, I gaze out from our cockpit across the flat lagoon of the palm-fringed coral atoll in Fakarava. We are in the Tuamotus, French Polynesia. Yesterday we swam with hundreds of sharks, this afternoon will be spent kiteboarding. It’s a destination we dreamed of long before we had a boat to bring us here.
Inspired by the many adventurers, authors and sailors who came before, we wanted to spend at least a year in French Polynesia, taking our time to explore this country’s many delights, before continuing on across the Pacific. But making the decision to enter the world’s biggest ocean was not taken lightly.
For many cruisers on the Atlantic side, deciding to transit the Panama Canal and enter the Pacific seems like a point of no return. The Canal’s imposing gates closing behind you are symbolic: the end of one journey leading to the beginning of another. Entering the Pacific is a huge milestone in a global circumnavigation.
We spent some time soul searching to determine if we were ready to take on some of the longest ocean passages in the world together. Our planned route from Panama to the Marquesas was 4,000 miles, with an optional stop at Galapagos, 1,000 miles in. That meant many days and nights at sea – for us, sailing double-handed – and a lot of potential wear and tear on our Catana 47. We also had to consider the sheer distance from home: French Polynesia is some 15,000 miles from Europe, making it more complicated and expensive to get back, or to have guests.
Planning the Pacific leg made us re-examine our longer-term goals too. Were we really doing a full global circumnavigation, or entering the Pacific to explore one last ocean before eventually selling up in New Zealand or Australia? With 12,000 miles under our belt so far, we felt ready, and still wanted to complete a circumnavigation. After our year in French Polynesia we will cruise the Cook Islands, Tonga, Fiji, New Caledonia and then Australia.
PACIFIC READY
When making the decision of whether to take on a Pacific crossing, the significant practical challenges and costs had to be weighed up too. At a minimum we needed to factor in a haul-out in Panama, arrange a long stay visa in Panama, transit the Panama Canal, with all the agent service fees that incurs, and organise a three-week stop at the Galapagos islands. We needed to ensure that both we and Polaris were set up for remote cruising so as to reduce our dependence on the people and places we’d encounter. We’d need plenty of spares and be certain that we’d acquired the experience, knowledge and confidence to be capable of fixing breakages. We had to l
