Before moving onto the boat, I fancied myself a bit of a runner. Not a very fast one, but I did enjoy running on a regular basis. I tried to keep that up on the boat. Be it Fort Lauderdale, Miami, the Bahamas, the DR, or Panama, I would scope out a decent route, put a couple miles in, and write a personal journal post about my run.
Then came the Pacific Ocean.
An interesting thing happens when you stop using muscles - your body decides you don't need them. Doctors and astronauts refer to this as 'atrophy.' During our crossing to the Marquesas, I probably walked no further than 80 feet in a day (at least one promenade to the bow and back). Upon arrival on Fatu Hiva, my running muscles were gone. We pulled an eight hour hike the next day, but certainly not without significant aches and pains. Walking a mile had become my new marathon.
In terms of physical activity, I did have one saving grace: rowing. We didn't have an outboard for our dinghy, so for almost every trip to shore, I got an upper body workout. It wasn't much, but it was something.
However, Nhulunbuy marks a new milestone in our journey. The yacht club here contains one of the finest boat graveyards we've seen. Not much in terms of large boats, but if you need a dinghy, this is the place to wash ashore. In the corner of the workshop, we found several 3.3 hp outboard engines. Jacques, an old man who seems to pass the time sleeping on an old minivan bench-seat, told us that if we could get any of them running, they were ours.
I don't know much about outboards, but I have a friend named Will Phillippe from my old college sailing team that does. Back in college, I observed Will bring many outboards back to life, and if I learned anything, it's that engines don't work unless the cover's off. Sure enough, with the cover removed, some broken looking parts replaced, and a few liters of fresh petrol, the engine mostly ran!
If this means anything, it's that my last bastion of physical activity has come to an end.