It was about eleven months ago, on the deck of a fine catamaran in Puerto Andratx, on the island of Mallorca, that the die was cast. Our intrepid sailing group would go the other way around the world to experience the South Pacific. We settled on French Polynesia because SunSail has a base there and believe it or not, as the crow flies, AA and all its hubs being the crow, it is closer to us than the Caribbean. Only an 8.5 hour plane ride will find us around 20 South.

So in this view, Los Angeles is on the top part of the globe and Tahiti is on the bottom part ! The Leeward Islands of the Society Islands will be our cruising grounds for two weeks. We will sail from Raiatea to Huahine, Tahaa and legendary Bora Bora. Our boat is a Belize 43 catamaran with 6 cabins. One of our members, is also getting a big cat for their first time and the other SailTime member Captains have a 47 and 50 foot Beneteau. All in all, there will be about 25 of us from SailTime Channel Islands and SailTime Virginia Beach who enjoy the 2nd Annual Captains Cruise.

I spent a lot of time pouring over boat logs of other people’s sailing adventures down there and talked with quite a few sailors who have already made the journey. So, I feel well prepared to lead this crew even though I’ve never been there either. We’ve got underwater cameras, HD video and more. So you can be sure we will do our best to capture a lot of the best moments which you will find posted here later in June. These flotilla vacations are great fun because you get to experience a far flung cruising ground with a bunch of friends. Much better than trying to tell them about it. At our SailTime base we offer members two trips a year. First timers get to experience the bareboat charter lifestyle in the BVI every Fall and then we do this type of thing every Spring. We’ll know where we are going next year when we all get down there and decide ! So stay tuned !

Tags: borabora, flotilla, huahine, pacific, raiatea, Sailing, SailTime, south, tahiti

Trackback URI | Comments RSS