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Wilderness of Waves

sailing in search of an endless sunrise

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THE VOYAGE

The Voyage

Wilderness of Waves is a blog by solo sailor, filmmaker & artist Olivia O Wyatt.

She is sailing her 34 ft. boat, Juniper, to destinations guided by humpback whale migration patterns.

In August 2019, she single-handed from San Diego to Hawaii. It took her 23 days. She and Juniper are now in French Polynesia.

Follow along as she wanders the seas in search of magic.

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I love waking up and diving into a coral garden. When you breathe, thank the reefs- they are responsible for replenishing half the earths oxygen into our atmosphere. When you eat, thank the reefs- they are the habitat at the heart of the marine food web and life spirals outwards from them, feeding everything from sea slugs to

Howdy! I’m getting ready to sail solo to Fiji! Departing Bora Bora on Thursday. When I’m at sea, I write to you every day. Follow the journey on Wilderness of Waves (link in bio). ⛵️ Awesome shot of me and Juniper on our way to Bora Bora, captured by Captain Brandon on @wilderness_offshore - he is sailing the world with his wife and kids and I have been blessed to adventure through French Polynesia alongside them. The whole family is loads of wind-loving, free-diving fun. They will set sail for Fiji soon too! Follow their journey to see what it’s like to raise a family among the waves! 🌊

If I was a fish, I would be a wrasse. Most of them look like they’ve been collaged together by somebody on acid. I Mean, just look at that hot pink lightning bolt face! ❤️ love being anchored in lagoons full of them, it’s like watching a firecracker swim.

Sunset surrounding the mountain woman of Huahine as seen from the cockpit of Juniper. Tomorrow there will be whales beneath her, and the next day she will swallow several rainbows.

Owning a sailboat alone is hard and I’ve been sleeping with one eye open, like all marine mammals do. Some days it takes all of my focus and energy just to stay alive and afloat, and lately there is a devil voice inside my head that keeps wishing for bad things to happen to my beloved boat. I don’t know where the voice comes from, but it’s a damn wrecking ball. I guess it comes from a place in me that craves the easy life, a life where basic needs are met without thought. But the rest of me knows that a life without wilderness is soul-shrinking and that’s why I live on a boat. One night last week, the wind was ripping and I thought the evil voice in my head was chirping for Juniper to drag anchor, but maybe the voice was warning me? I fall asleep. The wind wakes me at 4 a.m., I look out. I can’t see any boats. Where am I? I see a green light flashing to my right and it’s flooding my eyeballs. I turn on my chart plotter. I’m in the middle of the freaking Huahine pass, 30 feet deep, reef everywhere, current pushing me out, ocean less than half a nautical mile away. I hear the splash of waves, the static of the sky, the roosters cry. It’s dark as mud and I can’t see. I’m like a blind woman in a bat cave. I wish someone else was with me. I call my boat neighbors. Nobody answers. I turn on the engine. I pray. I crank up the anchor, all by hand. I don’t even know what the boat is holding onto. I don’t pull the anchor all the way up, just enough to release it from the bottom and keep it away from the keel. I leave it dangling, run to the cockpit, throttle up fast, and steer back towards the anchorage. Most of the planets in the anchorage have burnt out stars. Juniper’s bow is about to kiss the smallest planet, a Hallberg-Rassy, when I register the outline of it. I reverse my spaceship, run back to the bow, and drop the rest of the chain in. I am a breeze, upside down. I want to throw up, I want to sleep, I want the sun. It is the second time, in less than a week, that I have dragged anchor. I have 200 feet of chain and a CQR anchor, which stands for “secure.” I can assure that there are a multitude of situations where these anchors are anything but secure.

Hailing my anchorage friends on the VHF- channel 69, cause it’s my birthday and we are eating chocolate cake for breakfast! 🎈Thank you @wilderness_offshore for the cake, and cards that made me cry, and the skurf session, and the veggie burger, and for taking me countless times to swim with sharks, and your cool kids who bring me joy and make me think about life from new perspectives, and for all the adventures on the water that we’ve shared together in French Polynesia, I hope to sail beside you always! ❤️ Thank you @greencocosailing for the coolest birthday gift I’ve ever received- a new boat hook, and the sunset party, and your good vibes, and for introducing me to stone fish, and sailing me through this blue lagoon, and helping when Juniper dragged anchor and I couldn’t see straight, and for all the sage advice, and for massages that revived my tired body, and for your precious little twins who make me smile all over.

Dive Deep

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