Made it to Dover
We spent a day in Dover dodging intense thunder on the English Channel. We walked up the white cliffs to see Dover Castle, dating back to the 1100s, a Roman lighthouse, and WWII tunnels from where they controlled Operation Dynamo, saving hundreds of thousands of soldiers from Dunkirk.
More thunder is on its way. When departing Dover today at noon, we had a 24-hour weather window in which we would try to make some headway. Our next port of call is Weymouth. Going to Guernsey was sadly not an option anymore due to the angry weather systems on approach.
I am very thankful for meeting all my new friends onboard Falken. We have become our own small family, and I am so happy to see them every day. The days are running away from us, and we are making the most of the time we still have together.
Love,
David the apprentice
59ºNorthApprentice
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”For some things, we will never be ready.” - Moana 2
After 852 miles of open ocean sailing, the crew of Falken dropped anchor in Moorea's Cook's Bay—not with a quiet glide in, but surfing down waves in a squall, breaking speed records and cheering each other on through the rain. What started as a plan to "just dip a toe" into offshore sailing turned into something harder to explain: the worse the conditions got, the more alive everyone felt. Turns out the question was never whether the crew was ready—it was whether they even needed to be.
Kauehi conundrum
Kauehi atoll was always on the itinerary—until the forecast made it a gamble not worth taking. Squalls, bommies, a tidal pass, and no clean escape route: sometimes the hardest call in sailing is the one that keeps you out of a place, not in it. The Tuamotus will have to wait.
Hove-to!
Falken is too fast—a problem most sailors would kill for, yet here we are, tacking back and forth across the Pacific just to kill time. A rogue low pressure system south of Tahiti has stolen the trades and scrambled our timing for the tidal window into Kauehi's pass, leaving us hove-to 45 miles short of our target in the Tuamotus. Salt licorice, dream sandwich debates, and a philosophical question about mermaid reproduction are helping pass the night.