Ocean Watch

When I was planning my voyage to Palmyra last fall, people often asked me when I was leaving and when I was coming home. I'd shrug, knowing that once I declared a departure date I would then have to actually go.

And coming home? How could I say? I could barely imagine leaving.

Eventually I got tired of being wishy-washy and picked a day in early December to shove off. It forced me to swallow my fear, untie those lines and head out the Ala Wai channel.

Living on my sailboat in Palmyra's lagoon and working on her islands as a U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service volunteer has been the adventure of a lifetime.

But now my ant study is nearly finished, the boat's fixed and I'm feeling restless. It's time to go.

Choosing a departure date this time was easier. Weather permitting, I'm leaving here Tuesday.

The hard part was deciding where to go. I figure that after spending the good part of a year and a potful of money refitting this boat, then mustering up the courage to skipper it offshore and managing, minus a headstay, to get it to an atoll in the Equatorial Pacific, it would be a shame to go straight home. So I've decided to sail to Tahiti.

Oh, how I love writing those words. When the hurdles of that 1,500-mile passage get me down, I'll remember the joy I felt announcing to the world that I'm sailing my boat to French Polynesia.

Fletcher Christian himself couldn't have been more thrilled.

After our hard trip to Palmyra from Honolulu, Alex and I decided we would like one more crew member. So we invited Wren, a Nature Conservancy volunteer here, to go with us. Wren hasn't sailed much before, but what he lacks in experience, he makes up for in good humor.

Wren prefers the rank of cabin boy, which is fine with me. Every captain needs a cabin boy. More sugar in my coffee, please, Wren.

Besides being halfway there, I had another driving force behind my decision to forge on: e-mail.

Some days, the responsibilities that come with captaining this boat became so overwhelming, I just wanted to go home, lie on the couch and watch TV.

But then an encouraging e-mail would arrive and I'd perk up. The frequent rallying cry, "You go, girl!" gave me the confidence to keep going.

Thank you, friends, family and readers, for those great letters. They mean the world to me.

Another reason I'm sailing south is I've found a safe place to leave the boat in Raiatea. That way, I can come home for a worry-free break. I love this boat, but I'm looking forward to sleeping in a bedroom that can't sink and stays put in southerly winds.

I fly home from Papeete on April 3. Then sometime this summer, when I've forgotten all the discomfort, anxiety and trials of sailing, I'll fly back to explore the Societies.

I couldn't live with myself if I got that close to Bora Bora and didn't anchor in her picture-postcard lagoon.

After that? I don't know. How far is New Zealand?