Short Stories

Going to a PNG village is something truly special. An experience that you will remember for the rest of your life. You’ll come out of it both exuberated and exhausted. But going to a PNG village in a boat is a bit different than over land. Now you are not only visiting their home, but […]

Coming to PNG has been such a contrast from Indonesia and Philippines. There we were left alone most of the time, but in PNG everyone wants to know who you are. They are full of kindness and joy to see you, and it is quite an honor to be received like that from complete strangers, […]

We have finally arrived in PNG and it feels like a monumental milestone. One last country to traverse before we arrive in the Solomon Islands. We checked in to Vanimo and the process was surprisingly smooth. The officials came to visit us on the boat, and even though they are not used to sailboats coming […]

The island of New Guinea has huge rivers going into the sea. The largest in all of Oceania. I have been warned that there are many big logs in the sea in this stretch of coast and we have seen a few gigantic logs in West Papua that we would not want to crash into. […]

We have been motoring nearly every day for the last three weeks, all the way from Raja Ampat to Papua New Guinea, crossing the width of West Papua along the north coast. We have had nearly no wind, for most of the time. Maybe a slight breeze from behind, causing no air moving across the […]

Have you ever been river rafting? I did one time long ago. We started in our rubber rafts in a wide and placid part of the river, but as we slowly drifted down, the river became narrower, the rocks on our sides taller and the rapid stronger. We were in a gully with no way […]

Going to Raja Ampat is on the top of the bucket list for many. Especially if you are into scuba diving, snorkling or spectacular landscapes and nature. Going here requires a lot of planning and arranging since it is so far remote from the society and you may want to be planning far in advance […]

It was in the middle of the night (again) and I was trying my best to sleep in my cabin. So far I had been unsuccessful and gone up on deck several times to help out with the sails. The wind has been picking up more than expected and we had to put a reef […]

Both our rudders broke on our crossing from Sulawesi to Halamahera and we had to navigate in through a reef on a remote island in the middle of the Moluccan Sea. If you haven’t read that crazy story, you should. Check it out here: We lost both rudders. My plan was to build some emergency […]

It was in the middle of the night. We were on our way from Bitung to Tifure Island, crossing the Moluccan Sea, around 70 nautical miles. Darkness pressed in around us, with thunderclouds in the horizon, but above us we could see the stars clearly. So far we had great conditions for our crossing. A […]