Soon after dawn I could see Alphones Island just edging up over the horizon which surprised me. It was still 14 miles away and it is a coral atoll island with no significant hills or mountains. I was not expecting to see such a low lying island that far away. At that time we were still motor sailing and were making 5.5 knots with 12 knots of wind from the beam. It was enough wind to keep the main sail full but I did not wish to raise it because we would then be making 6.5 knots or more. We did not wish to enter the lagoon at Alphones until around 1430 when the tide would be a plus 4.5 feet. Thus, the earlier we get to Alphones, the longer we would just have to wait.

Instead, I killed the engine and we just sailed with only the head sail. We still made 4.5 knots. If I was thinking straight, I would have put in a reef or two or three in the head sail to slow us down more but being so early in the morning, I was still shaking the cobwebs from my head as I had just come on watch.

The seas were still a bit bumpy enough though the Trades had mellowed and the grib file indicates that they will lessen even more over the next few days. It will be a good time to sit out this period of light winds while we are at Alphones Island.

We arrived off Alphones around 1030 and at first did a partial heave to. I was too lazy to raise the main so we just backwind the head sail and I turned the wheel as far over toward the wind as possible and locked it there. We could not point into the wind without the main acting as it wind vane but we were able to keep our speed to under 0.5 knots. We did this for about an hour and but then had moved far enough from the island that it was no longer protecting us from the seas. Thus, Steve and I just spent the next few hours sailing up and down the atoll with a head sail which had head three reefs in it. We made between 1.5 and 2 knots that way.

During one of our legs we sailed up to the mouth of the channel that leads into the lagoon to check it out. Since it was just past low tide we could see the channel well and the sharp edges of the cut through the reef. The seas were breaking over the reef in many places giving the channel a daunting perspective.

Finally 1430 arrived and we turned Leu Cat toward the channel. All four of us were now outside with Mary Margaret and Portia up on the bows looking for bommies and the edge of the channel. It was hard to see since the tide was much higher now and the reefs were well covered. We slowly entered the channel and saw that there were two buoys clumped together halfway through the channel which were marking its starboard edge. We eased passed them as the depth raised to just 5.5 feet below our keels. We draw 4.5 feet of water so this lowest spot had a depth of 10 feet when the tide was + 4.5 feet.

Once in the lagoon we made a beeline from the island on a heading of 350 degrees True. We saw a few other buoys which we believe were marking other bommies but we did not come close to them. As we got close to the island we did have to swerve a bit to avoid a bommie so we will have to keep an eye out for that one when we leave. We anchored in 28 feet of water at 07.00.848'E 52 43.817'S with a sandy bottom.

We rested and talked and read the late afternoon and evening away. At dusk, we heard the loudest ruckus of noise coming from the jungle that is in front of us. The noise was thousands upon thousands of birds that were swarming in to nest. It was amazing to listen to. We had never heard anything like it before.

We hope to take the dinghy over there tomorrow to inspect that area a bit. However, we understand that we are not allow to go to shore and since there is another resort and Island Manager here, we may have to just observe from the dinghy.