We have left the atoll
27 March 2015 | 05 26.330N:073 36.105E
Bill/hazy and hot
We set off today for the next atoll south of the first one we entered two weeks ago. Last nights anchorage was quiet which was just fine by us. We relaxed most of the afternoon watching small fishing boat pass our stern. It's been quite hazy for the last week or so so the skies aren't their normal shade of beautiful blue. Other than when we pass over coral heads, the water is absolutely beautiful. The deepness of the blue is amazing.
Having just left the atoll,we are back out in the open ocean again with winds of from 2 to maybe 6 knots. We have the Genoa sail all rolled out to help move us along with the engine purring in the background. The tide was against us as we moved south so we slowed to under 4 knots. Now that we have exited the atoll, our speed has picked up to just shy of 5 knots. Not that fast but we are saving a ton on fuel doing this speed. We will be navigating through a pass at the northern edge of the next atoll in a couple of hours. We will have to see what the tidal flow is when we get there. We should have had exiting current pushing us out of the last atoll as we were on an out going tide but instead, we seemed to be SL owed down by it. The depths as we exited the last atoll went from a steady 110 feet for quite a long time to off the charts for our depth gauge and it stops reading at 300 feet! Our charts tell us the bottom is close to a mile down where we are now.
We hard boiled some eggs last night and Tracy is down below making "Deviled Eggs" for lunch. Yum!
We pulled into our new anchorage-Mey Yyafushi about 1500 and dropped in 20 some odd feet. We were a bit to close to a coral reef(pretty much all dead) so up came the anchor and we propped again in a big sandy patch where the Rocna dug in nicely. By 1900, we had gone from a nice 6 know wind to being in one of the most violent thunder storms we have ever been in. We could see it coming but it looked like it was going to hit the next island and a good deal of it did. Watching the storm coming, we took down our tarp and hauled everything below decks and literally battened down the hatches. When it broke, it broke hard with winds over 40 knots and a rain that would have hurt if you were out in it. I know ALL the salt has been washed off our boat. By 1915, it had passed and the winds dropped back down to 6 knots or less and it continued to sprinkle, yet lightening and thunder still crashed but at least it was behind us. It looks like we will be spending this evening inside as the cockpit is soaked. With the maldives being in drought conditions this should help a good bit.