Pangea and her crew...

The story : While on Hanse, an afternoon in Antarctica I was talking about my sailing dreams to Martin and we had a similar one which was to sail across the Pacific. I was kind of planning on doing it at the end of my world trip. We started dreaming together about it, and buying a good size sailboat together with some of Hanse's crew would be nice. The idea already went around during some conversation in the past but never came true. In Ushuaia, Martin found several boats online. He contacted few of the owners and had a long chat with Pangea's owner... Two weeks later, everything fell into places perfectly and it was just our faith to get her sailing. We finally ended up buying it together with Martin as the other crew didn't really felt like following the crazy project.
The crew : Martin, 38, from Germany, lives in South of France, works as a captain on Hanse Explorer. He sailed a lot since he is a kid, help his dad building sailboats and owned several smaller sailboats, loves epoxy and sopalin. Patrick, an editor from Paris, in his 50s, just published a book about and for the Elysée.. loves Clint Eastwood and is always surprised to see the size of the american cars. He is the bosun on Pangea. Thibault, in his early 30s, first time in USA like Patrick. He sailed alot with his dad in the Mediterranée but he has strong sea sickness. He can't beleive how jeans and shoes can be so cheap in USA. He is the deck hand and my shopping assistant. Then myself... never owned a sailboat but always dreamed to....

The route : Pangea was parked for years in Ventura, went out couple of time to the island with her previous owner, Mickeal. The idea came from Martin to sail up to Vancouver island, one of his dream, with Pangea. It would have been  a trip against the wind but we could figured out what needed to be fixed before the big Pacific trip to French Polynesia. To me it would have been the opportunity to learn how to sail and get use to her. Canada sounded like a sweet destination too... and I have a very old friend I'll be happy to see in Vancouver, Camille. I met him when I was 13, on a beach in Moorea. He sailed with his parents in French Polynesia and promised me he would come back... he never did so it would be cool to show up there on my sailboat... My sister lives in Seattle, another good reason for me to go there...

And there we went...

Wednesday 11th of may
After alsmost a month of hard word and uneasy human adaptation living on a boat for me, meeting great people that became our friends, several departure parties, we finally left Ventura around 3pm towards the north. Sails out, waving to our friend Damien, there we went leaded by dolphins... Night watch for Martin and I, Thibault and Patrick didn't handle the PAcific swell.... I loved the feeling and remember my time on Fetia Ura, a 33m schooner I worked on in Moorea, my first job.
On thursday 12th after a quiet morning, the north wind came up and we tried to go against it to head Moro bay but seeing that the crew were feeling too bad, Martin decided to anchor at San Luis Obispo Bay. We stayed here for two nights and tried to fix some leakage and watertight the boat better.

Tonight, 11.20pm, we are leaving San Luis Obispo trying to reach San Francisco in two days with the south wind...

POema