Anchored in Baie Maa! Tuesday, October 16, 2018
16 October 2018 | Baie Maa
Helen/Mark
Watched more of Season 4 Homeland last night. Headed to bed after 10 pm. The wind was gusty overnight. We were nicely protected in our Dock C marina slip. Woke up around 5:30 am but could not fall back asleep. Got out of bed by 6. Had breakfast and readied Charabia for leaving. Walked up to the grocery store and also stopped by the fresh market to do some last minute shopping. Mark checked us out of the marina. I walked down the dock to deposit one last bag of trash and to let Mark onto the dock, as he had to surrender his fob. It was a challenge to get off the dock as the wind was gusting and pushing us away. We were successful. Motored out the channel. I drove as Mark collected our fenders and stored them in the anchor locker on deck. Then we hoisted the jib sail as the wind was behind us. Our speeds reached over 7 knots. We had a short sail of 10 miles or so to Baie Maa. There were five boats already anchored here, but the bay is huge. The sandy colored beach is walkable for almost the whole bay. We anchored in 19 feet of water. It was overcast at times, but no rain today. Just a lot of gusts over 20 knots. We are totally protected by the hills on shore. Not sure I could have gotten into the water to snorkel as the breeze was cold to me. It was just after lunch when we anchored. Mark did some research on getting us boat insurance for Australia. The marina requires a high liability amount ($10M) which our boat insurance does not include. He filled out forms and searched the boat for our survey. He didn't find it, so maybe it's packed away in our storage unit back in Jacksonville. By mid afternoon, Mark launched the dinghy and we headed to the beach. We met the Vela crew at the beach. They were setting up a camp fire to grill dinner. Lots of good information as they are staying here for cyclone season. We walked to the end of the beach on the left side. It ended at a rocky mountain. Beautiful beach and loved all the big rocks at the end. We walked towards the other side, but did not go too far as it was getting late. Back at the boat in time for our 5pm Happy Hour. It's nice to be on flat water! The breeze is moving us back and forth, but it's very calm. Thanks for your emails and messages. Depending on the weather, we may stay another night, or head to another anchorage. Our goal is to be back in Noumea on Friday to collect our mail. The sun is just setting behind the clouds to our left. Not much in the way of color. The many mountains surrounding us are beautiful greens and browns. It actually looked like mangrove trees at the beach further around us. Too shallow to get close to them with our dinghy. Definitely another day in Paradise!