E komo mai, which is Hawaiian for Welcome.

The Big Island has been quite a revelation. From the appreciative CBP officer Ray and the friendly Harbormaster Scott to our new friend Kiko and our Hawaiian ohana (=family), all of them have treated us like royalty. The first couple of days, heavy rains swiped our deck clean of all the sea salt. Hilo is the rainiest city in all the USA and there are 50 different Hawaiian words to name the different kinds of rain. But when the skies clear you find yourself in emerald heaven. 

How we loved the smell of the freshly cut grass in the many parks that are filled with bird song. Birds in bright yellow, white, and red carelessly hopping around as you leisurely stroll across the lands. A veritable Garden-of- Eden-like experience.

At first, we lay anchored in Reeds Bay. But our brand-new friend Kiko helped us secure the safest slip ever, at the mouth of the Wailoa river. We first met Kiko as we were clambering on shore from our dinghy with our empty jerry cans. He simply said aloha and offered to drive us and our jerry cans to a fuel station and back to the dinghy. We couldn’t believe our luck. 

Then we met up with our extended family who immediately made us feel part of the ohana. They enthusiastically showed us around while feeding us with the most amazing views, food, and stories. 

And then friends came flying in from Belgium. Next to Belgian Cote D’Or chocolate, they also brought a 23-kilo weighing suitcase filled with the crucial boat parts we so badly needed after our Pacific Challenge Crossing. With some help from the same friends, My Captain immediately installed the new steering cable as well as the new autopilot. O2 was up and ready to brave the waves again. And after having stared in awe at the lava bubbling up from the Kilauea crater, that’s exactly what we did.

And then: WOW! Really WOW. Our Belgian visitors grew some huge “cojones” (google it, if needed) during their sailing trip with us from rainy Hilo on The Big Island all the way to windy Lahaina on Maui. They had come for some smooth balmy weather sailing, but they were presented with white capped waves, howling winds, rugged landscapes, and general madness instead. We are humbled by the fact that they still have not defriended us.

It all started with the rough northern passage from Hilo to Kona under a dark sky. The cliffs rose stark and unrelenting above the choppy ocean, the trade winds blew with sudden gusts that made already wide eyes widen some more and the waves were chaotic enough to cause upset stomachs. Although our friends were not living the dream, really, they did remain good sports under all circumstances. 

They kept their cool even when we told one of them to pick up the mooring ball in Honokohau harbor by aiming for its pick-up line with the boat hook which we had shoved in her hands. Only, the mooring balls in Honokohau are of the clip-on variety, which means that we nearly had a woman-over-board situation. Our brave friend held on to the mooring ball for dear life as she was forcefully being pulled down by the thing, which she had hooked very expertly at the very first try. For the remaining part of our trip together, we felt piercing pangs of deep guilt every time we got a glimpse of the bruises all over her arm, which kept changing color in a most alarming way. After that fiasco, we tried to attach our lines to the mooring ball by means of our dinghy, which nearly caused the dinghy and myself to be run over by O2 with a frantic Captain at the helm and amused onlookers at the docks. In the end, we did manage to get moored properly. And the next morning, after our awesome manta ray snorkel experience, we departed like a pro in total style and with a lot of swag to Kealakekua Bay for a rendezvous with the yellow tangs. We were feeling like Hawaiians now.

The Alenuihaha channel between The Big Island and Maui is not “haha” at all. “It is considered one of the most treacherous channels in the world due to the strong winds and high seas that funnel between the two islands’ pass.”  It was rough, but totally doable thanks to a favorable weather window. With a 25 to 35 knot wind speed, we didn’t use the main sail. The smaller headsail pulled us across all the way to our Oneloia Anchorage, aka Big Beach, aka Makena State Park.

Let me quote our travel book regarding Big Beach: “ An endless expanse of gleaming sands, no development in sight and unbelievably blue water.” All of which was true. What wasn’t true is that you can land a dinghy. First of all, if the killer surf is not stopping you, the authorities will. They were waiting for us on the beach as we were jumping out of the dinghy to brave the surf by swimming on shore. They congratulated us for our behavior. We were not so sure about that. Swimming back to the boat, one of our friends gulped down enough of salty Pacific for his throat to go into a cramp, impeding him to breathe properly. As he was feebly stammering that he “took a drink” , I yelled for My Captain to come to the rescue with the dinghy. Which he did, just in time.

The next day, when we had reached our next anchoring spot at Olowalu, My Captain himself “took a drink”. He was snorkeling around the patch where we had dropped the anchor in 40 knots of wind – with gusts up to 45- to verify whether it had properly set in the sandy bottom, avoiding the coral. It hadn’t. We had to redo it 4 times and then we had to refasten the bridle which holds up the anchor chain as well. Needless to say that our friends had a hell of a time, using ear plugs to keep the dream intact.

When we finally reached Lahaina, the surf entered the small boat harbor in such a way that our friends already started to say goodbye to their luggage. But then, Captain Michael of the commercial sailing catamaran Trilogy came to the rescue. He jumped in his sturdy motorized tender (=little boat to get people off and on the big catamaran), elegantly pulled up at our stern, with a gentlemanly smile, he helped our friends with their luggage on board and off they went through the surf to safety at last. 

Hawaii is NOT Baja California, and it certainly isn’t a comfortable cruising destination.  Only now do we understand why only few sailing boats visit the Hawaiian Islands as “aliens” on “transient” vessels. But we are glad we did. We won’t do it again. 

Aloha and Mahalo to Ruby, Grace and the kids. To Kiko and to our dear Belgian friends. Natascha, Maaike and Peter, you are regular champs!