The night before, we made a few diesel and gasoline runs, had dinner with the Tide Roller crew, and ended up drinking by the docks with the locals before the police broke it up. There was enough shit-talking going on to instigate a race: Tide Roller vs Fishing Vessel Siren. We were way ahead on the fish count, but the run to Captain Cook would settle the score on boat speed!
They were a bit more organised in the morning and got out before the cargo ship arrived while we had to wait for him to clear the turning basin. Then off we went to catch Tide Roller. We saw them up ahead with their asym flying and cheated a bit with the engine to catch up before killing the engine and sailing neck-a-neck. We slowly pulled ahead with our 135 jib and main and as the wind backed a bit were able to pinch up at a high angle. Unfortunately for Tide Roller, they had to tack a few times giving us the advantage.
The wind wouldn’t quite get us high enough to clear the land, so we would slowly angle into shore until we could see the coral heads through the clear water, maybe 20 feet down, then tack out for another go. We had to tack twice and were pinching hard trading quite a bit of boat speed to try to clear the last point. It was soooo close, but we made it, barely clearing the fishing lines, just a biscuit toss from shore.
And then disaster struck! We noticed a strong stench coming up from the cabin and upon investigation found the toilet was overflowing brown liquid. The Y valve directing toilet contents overboard or to the holding tank didn’t make any difference. Every time the boat would heel to port the toilet would be on the high side and begin overflowing the brown water again. We suspected the previous owner’s silted shit was backing up from the holding tank. Ughh! David and I started the job of fixing the plumbing while under way. We began by tentatively unscrewing screws and using rags and a bucket of fresh salt water to keep clean but as we worked we would slowly get more drips, splashes and leaks on ourselves. We realized we had two choices. Spend a long time fixing it while staying clean or just get it done quick but get really messy. We finally just ditched the rags and water and dove right in scooping shit out of the duck bill and through ways with our fingers. It was by far the most disgusting thing I’ve ever done. Actually, David did most of the scooping. Ugh, I can’t put it into words how disgusting it was! But anyway, we finished quick and immediately dove off the boat into the ocean for a good scrubbing. It turned out the rubber duck bill was clogged with a mix of toilet paper and shit preventing the duck bill from closing. So with the duck bill unable to close, the holding tank contents were able to back flow into the toilet. Also, the Y valve partially failed allowing some holding tank contents to sneak past even when in the “overboard” position. But now it’s fixed and we learned not to flush regular toilet paper. However, my bilge still stinks.
As we were sailing, Chris decided he didn’t want to go around South Point with the belief that kite surfing would be more fun. So we motored through the tight Honokohau Harbor until we found a vacant slip, dropped Chris off to grab a taxi to the airport, bought some ice and shoved off to try and catch Tide Roller who had passed us during our stop. Next stop, Captain Cook!
