Are we there yet? .....Yes we are! Tuamotos

This appeared overnight

Four years and five months of cruising.  Restoring the boat with backbreaking labour, ultimately rewarding but mostly monotonous and body wearying.  Four years and five months of eking out an existence on the water.  Endless shopping trips to buy whatever provisions are available, searching for hard to find items to replace breakages – both household and yacht parts.  The general drudge of cleaning to keep the salt and mould and general corrosion at bay.  Then we crossed the ocean for four days to arrive at the ‘Dangerous’ Archipelago of the Tuamotus – an area the size of Europe with 80 huge sunken coral atolls. 

 

Perfect picnic spot

 

It had been a boisterous trip across in strong winds and short interval waves which make for a bumpy ride.  We negotiated our first reef pass successfully and after directions from a local pearl farmer, anchored on the far side of the atoll in shocking turquoise water.  The lagoon was totally flat.  The first flat water we had had since leaving Las Perlas Islands in Panama in April five months ago.  The water was dazzling and we were surrounded by tour-brochure perfect palm-fringed islands (motus).  We sat on the deck in disbelief.  Could we really be here? This was what we had had in mind when we set off all those years ago.

 

Pearl farm jetty - only other people for miles around

If you pull up the colour palette on a computer it just doesn’t have the same range of blues and greens we are surrounded by.   Sitting in one of the most remote places on the planet we were overwhelmed by the urge to call people on the sat phone just to describe what we could see.  This was quickly discounted as we could hear the derision at the other end of the phone not to mention how pale our description could only be.  I was reminded of the joke where a guy is stranded on a desert island with Kim Bassinger and to pass the time they role played.  One day he suggested she be a man and that they meet in a bar that evening.  Kim is puzzled but plays along.  When she gets to the bar the guy spends the evening telling her about the fact he’s stranded on the island with her.  It’s in the sharing that the enjoyment is complete.

 

 

Coconut family - mum, dad and the kids

But to be honest, the Tuamotus are paradise, with or without the telling.  We have spent the last two months doing very little but collect coconuts on the islands, fish for our supper and hunt crabs, lobsters and shells.  We haven’t been shopping in over 2 months apart from a tiny store on the atoll of Raroia where we bought some potatoes, carrots, cabbage, sliced ham and a pack of Frosties!  Instead we are using up all our Panama supplies.  Tins of meat and stews - some better than others, fruit and veg - all pretty ordinary, that we try to mix with what’s left of our fresh produce.  I’ve finally cracked making bread.  Even developed my own sourdough last week which produced a surprisingly good loaf. 

 

Paradise apart, we have been thrown the odd curved ball.  As we sat in our first anchorage in the gin clear water, we decided we should practice putting out our hurricane anchors which Mark had bought in Panama.  It’s basically 3 anchors on 3 lengths of chain that attach to the boat’s main chain.  The idea being that whatever direction the wind blows from you are well bedded in.  It takes a bit to set up which involves Mark diving with our scuba tank to set the anchors in place.  We had been to the pearl farm earlier so were a bit late getting started but Mark got two anchors down when dusk started to fall.  We decided the rest could wait until morning.

 

We awoke to strong winds blowing us onto the shore of the nearest island.  The wind had gone around and instead of blowing us off the island was now blowing us on.  Putting us unnervingly close to some coral heads only 1 meter below Zenna.  Mark started the engine to pull us away.  Normally we would have got up the anchor but with two down we couldn’t without Mark diving again.  With the wind at 30kts and the sea in the lagoon now a very choppy one meter swell we decided it would be best to both stay on the boat.  We spent the next 8 hours with the engine on trying to keep off the coral heads behind us.  At one point the rope we have on the bow to stop the chain rolling out broke and we moved even further back towards the coral before Mark had a chance to get a new one on and pull in the chain again.

 

We later heard that we had just experienced a very unusual storm.  Several boats were lost on one atoll and others had dragged or experienced 60kt winds at sea.  So our experience, one of the worst we’ve had on Zenna, wasn’t as bad as some.  We were very glad to get the anchors up again at the first opportunity and spent the next few days swotting up on weather in the South Pacific.  We’ve got a much better handle now, but we’ve still had a few surprises with the wind backing us into a corner and onto shallow, coral strewn reefs on more occasions than we would have wished. 

Off the back of the boat

 

We have also been doing some amazing snorkelling.  The coral in the lagoon passes is awesome.  It goes on forever and attracts hundreds of different fish species.  From the prettiest to the most fearsome.  Sharks are everywhere.  Around the boat, at your feet on the beach, lurking deep in the passes.  We’ve both been pretty circumspect about being in the water with them. 

 

 

The shadow in the water is another shark

But we heard the pass at Fakarava South was world class and we decided we ought to dive it.  I just wanted to get it over and done with.  The dive resort had a restaurant over the water surrounded by sharks which wasn’t exactly calming my nerves.  Until – after lunch the chef appeared and dived into the lagoon with all the sharks.  Closely followed by a small 5 year old boy on holiday who thought it looked like fun.  So after that, being surrounded by hundreds of sharks when we did our dive didn’t seem so bad.  Although you do hold your breath when one comes swimming directly for you!

Mele into which the chef dived

Now our supplies are running low.  Down to 5 beers left – but 12 bottles of wine - so not such a big problem!  But we are out of black pepper and crisps and down to the last of our parmesan (from the nine packs we set off  from Panama with), butter, cheese, onions, milk, yeast and chocolate.  We started with 350 tins and jars of food and 300 packs of pasta/rice/flour/crackers/biscuits/cereal and 350 cans/bottles of juice and soft drink and are down to 50 tins, 30 ambient packs and 50 soft drinks.  Sounds a lot but surprising how quickly you get through them when there is nothing else.  So we will probably head to the north of Fakarava, the atoll we are currently in, where they are meant to have shops stocked by a weekly supply ship.  I suspect the beers will be the deciding factor...

Herb garden - saviour once fresh supplies ran out

Stock take