Manon created a paradise on Agakaouitai, a small island near Taravai, one of the islands of the Gambier archipelago. He invited us and taught us all what you can do with, and eat from a cocunut. The way from the tree, through your hands, ending up in the special coconut milk that one ferments (Gambier cuisine) to cook your fish with.
Enjoy, like we did, in the next movie
We just departed from the Gambier Island and you can follow our Pacific Ocean passage to the Marqueasas here:
Map
How to ‘sell’ the enumeration of the French subsidies to the people in Gambier, French Polynesia, and to France? First, by celebratiing the Quatorze Juillet., With a French ‘defilé’ That works. The French officials came.
But the mayor’s speech consists of the enumeration itself and that doesnot attract the Polynesians, nor we visitors. But very smart, the chairs of the grandstand were facing the field. The Polynesian dogs -friendly as always, and used to public- make a sweet and loving attraction.
Manoun’s boat had to be repaired. So the crew from the Awa, the Long John Silver, Ziganka en Ya pulled up their sleeves and pulled the boat ashore and flipped it over.
Such a serious job needs serious supervising. You will see how it’s all done.
If everybody would sing every week just for an hour, the world would already be a better place.
The Polynesian Islands are such a better place. Part of the culture is to go to the church every Sunday and sing. Sing with your body and soul. It is great, contageous. So we all do.
Have a look -and an ear- on this video.
Have a good look, there is a screen showing the lyrics. OK, it is in Polynesian, but that is phonetically spelled, so easy to read and we foreigners can sing along, It doesnot matter whether you believe in the Man with the Beard or not, if you sing from the heart, you will leave the the church as a different man. In a better world.
There are many pearl farms and we went to one and saw how they ‘grow’ pearls. From all jewel industries, this is the most sustainable one, in terms of labor (honest), pollution (none, in contrary).
Have a look at the video.
Stef and Manon sail their Long John Silver, an Ovni 43. Now they make their third large voyage, a circumnavigation. They came from Chile and Peter meets them in the Gambier archipelago.
Many projects have passed to make the Long John Silver a better yacht to live aboard. Let us stick to the sustainable jobs: first, the ship is completely insulated. Stef told: “This implies that the complete boarding inside had to be taken out: all the wood work, the paneling, ceiling, the bunks. And then, after the insulation was placed, all had to get in again.” Also, all window are double glazed. Where the aluminium yachts easily have the tendency to ‘drip’ here and there because of condensed are on the cold alumnium, now the Long John Silver stayed dry. Or, nearly dry.
Main source of moisture is the gas equipment in the galley. Combusted gas consists of CO2 and a lot of H2O, water, in its worst aggregation: as damp. It condenses on all cooler parts, including your cushens,your bed, everywhere. They dedided to change all galley equipment to electric.
In the next picture you see the result.
In the book Duurzaam Varen (Sustainable Sailing, sorry, only in Dutch) already is mentioned that a complete galley equipment fed by a 12 volt battery bank, is limited. The bottle neck is the inverter (the device that converts the 12 volt into the necessary 220 Volt). For safety reasons the biggest inverter can deliver 2600 Watt to your equipment. How did Stef do this?
“First, we chose devices with smaller power”, Stef answered. To sum up the maximum powers:
Stef and Manon pointed out: “With this inverter we can just cook with two burners and the water cooker all on full power. With the microwave on, we can even use a burner or the water cooker. Only in the rare case when the oven is on full power, the inverter would beep if we switch on another device.”
They thought of going to 24 Volt, or 48 Volt, but our battery space was limited. Manon showed a picture (here under) where you can see that the space for the 12 volt batteries is just 90 cm long.
Originally, 3 AGM batteriesn could fit in this battery casing, and there is not really a good place to extend the bank. “So, there was place for 12 Lithium Ferro Phosphate cells and that was it,” Stef concluded, “so technically we were limited to 12 volt and made a 3P4S configuration.”
He continues: “Compared to AGM or any other lead acid battery, LFP has no problem at all to deliver the power you need. So with a relative small battery bank, LFP can deliver the necessary power .”
If you want your galley changed to an electric based on a battery bank of only 12 volt, then take the Long John Silvers configuration as the text book example.
The key line technically: take small users. So, the burners, the water cooker and more. Then there is no stress that your inverter can’t delver. And use LFP batteries because they are able to deliver the big currents that you need.
The key motives: your boat stays dry after cooking. The equipment is safer than a gas equipment. Also, everything is easier to clean. When you are a long distance cruiser, it saves a lot on gas and a lot of hassling with different gas bottles and bottle connections. All together, it saves money and provide more comfort.
And last but not least: your smaller CO2 footprint gives our children a better future.
Just standing on top of the mountain of Gambier and having this view. Just to see the ocean where we sailed and will sail.
That is why one sails the Earth. That is why one loves Mother Earth.
One day before the European elections, we saw the three mast bark ‘Europa’ entering the bay. She moored at the only and small quai of the Gambier Islands.
For us, Peter and Inge, the Europa has a special place in our hearts because twenty years ago we married on this ship. We sailed a day with all our friends an family, went on anchor somewhere outside the territorial waters, and our friends married us.
.In the Southern summer, the Europa sails expeditions from Ushuaia (Patagonia) to Antartica. Last March she started sailing around the world, to celebrate that Magelhaes started this circumnavigation 400 years ago. Magelhaes never made it, he died in the Philippines and from there Juan Sebastian Elcano took over. (Funny thing: Elcano and his fellows were not the first humans who have rounded the world. That was Enrique, a man who was captured in the Philippines or Molucca and brought to Spain and served Magelhaes from there, on his voyage. So when they hit Philippines, Enrique has rounded the world as the first human).
The drawing of the circumnavigation that Magelhaen and Elcano made. Essence is the passages of two capes: Cape Horn and the Cape of Good Hope. This is what the Europa also will do. (courtesy Brown University).
Peter paid a visit to the Europa and talked with Tim, the Mate, and several guests. This big square rigger could make it all the way between the coral reefs up to this little quai. First, that is excellent seamanship, and second, it is beautiful for the guests.
The guests chose to cruise on this sailing ship, rather than a motor cruiser. Main reason is that they consider the sailing itself as an essential extra value. Especially the square rig is more romantic, like in the old days. Yes it goes slower, but they dont mind, or even see it as an extra value. The guests also participate in the watches and they find that a great opportunity. No experience is required for it and you can always feel safe with the professional crew on board.
.Sustainability and planning, the paradox
Talking sustainability, we all agree that it is a pity that the Europa needs diesel, but in general she is propelled by the sails. The crew and the guests like to sail, so they are set as soon as there is space to navigate under sail. So it is a sort of 80-20 figure: 80% is sailing, 20% is motoring.
The motoring could be less if the planning would be easier. But, time is money, the clients want to see more places if possible. That requires a strict planning, and so a certain minimum speed, if not by sail, then by engines. The planning is that strict, that the Europa has only 2 days time ashore here in Gambier.
I walked up the road with some guests. They were curious about the planning of Ya, about how many days the Ya would stay here.
“Planning?” I answered, “Well, we just are here and enjoy it. It is only the weather or the hurricane season that dictates the planning. We just hiked some beautiful trails here, and visited a pearl farm. And now we just made friends with people on the island so the Ya will stay a bit longer I guess. And there are such beautiful other spots around here that we want to visit.”
-”How many days you guess you would be here? 5 days? 15? 50 days?”
-”Well, it can easily become 50 days.”
One guest responds: “Wow, our stop is about 50 hours, to do the complete Gambier Island group. That is just enough time to take some good walks on the main island and drink a beer in a local tavern.”
Another guest concluded: “It is a strange paradox. On one hand, when we book, we want to see some islands, to get the maximum out of it. But on the other hand we would enjoy more of the trip if we travel slow. Then we sail more, and see more in the places. It would also be more sustainable I guess.”
I could confirm that: “Indeed. If you travel slow, it is easy to travel fossil free. And with the current technology of regeneration and electric cooking, that is even what Magelhaes or Elcano couldnot do.”
Let the things you bought be usable for many years, let them be durable and repairable. In that case: congratulations with everything you bought. Or will it soon end up in the trash, your barn or the attic?
Please be aware, the consumption of the people here on Earth becomes larger and larger. The quantity of ‘stuff’ we have is so big, it costs too many materials. Mother Earth becomes exhausted, depleted. When?
There is a consistency. The higher the income, the bigger the footprint. The 19 richest people create 10% of the footprint. The 10% richest -that is generally where we belong- make 50% of the Earths footprint.
You see it clearly on the Overshoot Day per country.
Most of the impact is caused by the people with income, generally the Western people. (A little impact is caused by the growth of the The idea of buying all that stuff is that you would become happier. Well, since the Overshoot Day this year is nearly two months earlier, we consumed much more.
So compared to last year, would we be so much happier this year?
Or did you buy because marketing told you that you would need it? In that case, shut off the marketing machines like Whatsapp, Instagram and Google, or other commercial media. You could use Signal instead of Whatsapp, or read a book, see a movie, or, very simple see your friends.
That saves money, and you can put your money where your heart is.
)
We walked along the road on Mangareva, the main island of the Gambiers. Then we saw a great tree full of big beautiful grapefruits. They belong to Lucas, a Polynesian man of this island. He saw us and invited us to pick as much as we wanted. He showed us which ones were the best and under the tree we started to chat.
For whatever reason the subject came to the nuclear field tests on Moruroa. The French militaries started these tests in 1964. The first ones were from ships put near the island of Moruroa, and later from a balloon above it. Lucas was young then, but he remembered: “When I was about 5 years old, some french military came on the island. I remember the monings that a car with a big loudspeaker went up and down the road, ordering that all the inhabitants had to go into a shelter, it was some sort of concrete hall. We had to stay there for days.” This happened almost every time a nuclear test was about to happen.
He added: “and they said it was secret and nobody should tell anyone about it. Years later we learned it was because of some nuclear tests on an island near by.”
We asked if they noticed any changes. “Well, not directly. But later we noticed the chidren were often sick. They had go to the GP many times, as they had wounds and bruises which didnot not heal, or very slow. The doctor noted this on the ‘carenet medical’ the personal medical file of the child. But some years later the military came and they confiscated these papers, I think to hide any evidence ”
It is well known that the nucleair radiation of the first atmospheric tests were even measured in New Zealand. The distance from Moruroa is about 5000 kilometers away (compare: from Amsterdam to Abu Dhabi). After growing protests and political pressure, the French continued their tests underground.
“Sometimes they did not order to go into the shelter, but so now and then we thought there would be test going on”, Lucas continued. “As we saw a sort of extra tide going. You first could see the water receding from the beaches, the shores, then coming back. Very strange.”
The underground tests move the earth and that explains the ‘double tide’ described by Lucas.
In 1996, when the Cold War formally ended and the tests had to stop, the French military executed 193 tests.
Lucas continued his story: “ I lost my first brother when he was 26. And the second at the age of 35. They both died of cancer and they were not the only ones dying of cancer in Gambier.”
He also said: “I don’t know if it is also caused by nuclear radiation, but before we had so many sorts of fruits on the island, even lychee and mango’s. But they all disappeared. Now it is only grapefruits, bananas and cocos and that’s it.”
He concludes: “However, we told this story more often, but it is always covered up, put under the carpet.“
Wow, are these wild, crazy stories? Are there really many cancer cases here? Has it al been covered up indeed? What is true about this? We started investigating.
In 2020 the French INSERM (Institut National de la Sante et de la Recherche Medicale) executed an investigation at the request of the Ministry of Defence. They published the report “The health consequences of nuclear tests in French Polynesia”. According to this expertise, its authors felt that they could not “make a solid conclusion” to the existence of “links between the fallout from atmospheric nuclear tests and the occurrence of radiation-induced pathologies”. And the college of experts stressed the need to “refine the estimates of doses received by the local population and by civilian and military personnel”.
But no refinement of the estimates followed, nor any other investigation.
So far the French government.
From that point, in 2020 a collaboration of groups started researching. Disclose was a group of investigating journalists. The second was Interprt, a group of (nucleair and other) scientists. They worked in collaboration with the Princeton University. This big piece of research led to the description of the impact “(..) with the help of thousands of declassified military documents, hundreds of hours of calculations and computer simulations and dozens of unpublished testimonies, this investigation demonstrates for the first time the extent of the radioactive fallout that struck the inhabitants (..).”
Just to give an idea about the impact, the first paragraph tells: “Leukemia, lymphoma, cancer of the thyroid, lung, breast, stomach … In Polynesia, the experience of French nuclear tests is written in the flesh and blood of the inhabitants. Strontium has eaten into bones, cesium has eaten away at muscles and genitals, iodine has seeped into the thyroid.”
An article of this investigation is published in The Lancet (presuming you are not a member of the Lancet, you can read the abstract here.)
Here you can read the full investigation (a French and an English version): https://moruroa-files.org/en/investigation/moruroa-files .
The book -in French only- is called “TOXIQUE, enquete sur les essais nucleaires francais en Polynesie”.
The investigators were confronted with a remarkable high cancer rate in Gambier, called the ‘Cancer Cluster in Gambier Islands’. A relation with the nuclear tests? The scientists worked the dispersion models of the nuclear particles in the air and ran various simulations. Here under, you find the most probable one. It explains the high rate of cancer cases in the Gambier Islands.
It looks like Lucas’ story is closer to reality then the story of the French government.
