This is what sailors geek out over. It is quite intangible but it can say a lot — kind of like capturing the excitement of a moon landing with a chalkboard full of math formulas.

This is our “track” as we entered Rikitea, in Gambier islands, under sail with a fresh NNE wind. As we got closer the zig zags had to get tighter, as we navigated the narrow channel… with slight course corrections to avoid the pearl farm buoys.

After a 3000 mile long broad reach – sailing in trade winds across the Pacific – where we never even turned the boat once, we had to do more than 10 turns to get through the final mile.

Of course, we could have motored in a straight line, and would probably do that in the future! But the stubborn romantics within us rejoiced at “earning” that last mile, after a month at sea.