Day 117 Rarotonga at last

Avatiu harbor, Avarua
At about 0700 we sighted the island through the rain and mist. It took another 2 ½ hours of motor sailing to battle our way to the harbor of the main town on the North side of the island. At 0830 we talked to Manatee on the radio net. They had arrived on Friday and could give us a report on the harbor.
Manatee's journey had been a little bit like ours. They travelled 480 miles in the first two days and when the weather hit it took them two more days to go the last 70 miles. As Mark would say, "Bleak!".
By 1000 we were tying up to the side of the dock used for cargo ships. We were told they only come in on weekends and we could use this spot until we found a more permanent location. On advantage of this was that it was the more commercial location in the harbor and had services like an industrial strength water hose. Since Southern Star was coated with salt, the more water we could get the better. We gave "the old girl" a nice fresh water bath until she squeaked (when the hull is salty it is slippery but when it is clean, it literally squeaks) and we all felt a lot better.
We walked into town to get a bite to eat and immediately were struck by the fact that everyone was speaking English. It seemed quite startling after three months of struggling with our meager French. The second surprise was that the cars were driving on the "wrong" side of the road. This calls for special attention when crossing the street. Of course this will be the case also when we get to New Zealand but I guess I did not expect to see it until then. One last observation was that the the town was, as Mark said, "Knee deep in Kiwis". This is school holiday time in New Zealand and many families take advantage of the rather low cost airline fares to vacation here. It is a bit like West Coast Americans going to Hawaii for a winter holiday in warmer weather. The strong NZ accent takes a bit of getting used to.
Because Liahona had stopped at Aitutaki we had mostly caught up with them and because Aitutaki is West of Rarotonga, they had a more difficult time making their way to the island. This put them several hours behind us and they did not arrive until mid afternoon.
Like us, the first thing they wanted to do was to get onto solid ground. Both Mark and Jim remarked that the footing seemed to be still moving even though they were no longer on the boat. I had this feeling when we arrived in the Marquises after our 25 day passage so I knew what they were talking about even though this time I did not experience it.
After a clean up of Liahona we walked into town for pizza. During dinner the conversation was entirely about the passage that we had just been through. It was a bit like veterans re-living their time in the war. We did discover a new scale to measure such an experience. On a catamaran (like Liahona) the pontoons normally are the only thing in the water. The bridge that connects them (containing the kitchen and eating area) is normally above the water. When seas get rough the waves can hit the bridge and usually this makes an annoying noise. On this crossing, the waves were hitting with such an impact that all the kitchen appliances were thrown onto the floor. Our conclusion was that, on a scale of one to ten, it is pretty close to the top when you have to tie down your toaster.