02:27 UTC | 00°43.4’N 089°37.0’W
Sailing.
You’d think this crew bonding is borne on the back of shared mild discomfort - life’s steadfast instructor. But we have all of the mod cons - showers 2 - 3 times a day*, ice in our drinks **, great food (without fail!).
Maybe it’s steering by the stars, the southern cross your target between the mast and stay during your 0300 - 0600 watch. There is something about that line in the Eagle’s song, regardless of you’re a fan or not.
It certainly could be the 59º Degrees North team, who are so skilled at not just sailing, but people. They are meeting every one of us crew exactly where we are and what we want out of this experience.
In the end, this has simply been a life-changing experience for all of our crew. At some point early in the morning, we will sail cross the equator, and this lowly group of pollywogs, having pledged our allegiance to Neptune ( who, perhaps due to funding restrictions, is operating only during regular business hours), will become shell backs. And a few hours later, we make landfall in the Galápagos Islands. And I imagine a few tears will be shed.
*results will vary, but shaking out reefs at 2 am increase averages.
**it can happen.
Johnny
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A Day in Huahine
Hitchhiking with Mormons, hunting for Pareos, and saying goodbye to crew — all before most people finish their morning coffee. A pina colada hangover is no match for a full agenda on a small island where the only taxi has already left with your friends. The question is whether you can pull it all off and still make the tide.
Going Coconuts!
From a muddy anchor bow to a heeling, wind-charged run past Taha'a's reefs, Falken's crew earned every knot of the passage to Huahine-Iti. Scooters, a near-miss dog, a mosquito ambush, and a crocodile lurking at the dock rounded out a day that had no business being as good as it was. The coconut nut is, in fact, a really big nut—and somehow that tracks perfectly.
Tantalizing Taha’a
Turns out you can fit eleven people, a treasure hunt, and two manta rays into a single day — if you're willing to putt across a lagoon in an electric dinghy at dawn. Taha'a delivered one of the trip's top snorkeling spots: a floating coral garden where stingrays, reef octopuses, and parrotfish crunching on coral competed for attention. The only casualty? Mary, stuck aboard wrestling the watermaker — though she still managed to produce poke bowls for eleven by dinner.