Sailors joke that cruising is just another word for “working on your boat in exotic locations”. If so, working on the boat here in Tuamotus is the 5 star version of cruising. If you’re hot, jump overboard into the turquoise water. If you’re tired, swim 20 yards through a shallow reef into the pass, where hundreds of fish congregate day and night. If you’re fed up of tedious labor, look up at the pleasing sight of coconut trees swaying in the wind. I couldn’t pick a better place to work on a boat.

I also couldn’t pick a better crew. Kimbo and Sasha attacked their projects with mighty gusto and the sort of keenness you’d expect from people who did this kind of thing for fun. And yes, it is part of their fun — because they’ve designed their yearlong vacation around the idea of working for others, which enables them to see amazing places.

Talk about positive association! Work + enjoyment of new beautiful places = fun times no matter what is happening. A great lesson for life.

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A few of the projects we tackled on Aldebaran
– Epoxy repair the vintage wooden boarding ladder (yes, for once, before it broke!)
– Seal the wooden rails for the nets. They were dry and cracking which cause two pieces to break. We repaired them with the nets removed. – Re-caulk the hatches
– Fiberglass repair the dive locker hatch, it was all bent out of shape from being dropped and abused – Scrub the rust stains and growth off the side of the hull
– Machine sew the main sail cover (which took 4 full days to stitch every seam and repair the tears, thanks to Sasha’s perseverance!)