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Deadline for Tahiti Bond Exemption

Gar Duke of Sausalito practices a little ‘old-school’ navigation on his way to the Marquesas. He and Nicole Friend are currently in Vanuatu.

© Nicole Friend

At a variety of ports along the coast of the Americas, dozens of cruising boats are poised to jump off on the 3,000-mile blue-water passage we call the Pacific Puddle Jump. A rally in only the loosest sense of the word, this annual migration of international sailors includes boats which jump off from the U.S., Mexico, Panama and the Galapagos. Eventually, however, they all converge on the isles of French Polynesia where they swap tales and celebrate their successful crossings of this, the longest patch of open water they will face while sailing around the world through the tropics.

As regular readers know, Latitude 38 is intimately involved with this annual migration, and has worked with the Tahiti Tourism Board in recent years to host a variety of Puddle Jump events. As reported earlier, one of the latest developments to come out of this relationship is that the Tahiti YC has generously offered to secure bond extensions (normally $1,700 per person) for officially registered rally boats. But the February 20 deadline for registering is fast approaching.

If you’re making the crossing this year and would like to be included, please go to the rally’s website, fill out the questionnaire and return it to us by email ASAP. Because this is the first year we’ve attempted to complete the bond exemption process, we cannot guarantee 100% that there will be no snafus, but we are hopeful all will go smoothly.

By the way, for whatever reason, the Pacific Puddle Jump fleet is expected to be bigger than ever this year. Those whose schedules allow will gather at Papeete on June 19 for a free, three-day, welcome-to-Tahiti event called the Tahiti-Moorea Sailing Rendezvous.

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