The southern end
10 July 2013 | Fakarava, Tuamotus
We are down in the southern anchorage of Fakarava now. The mecca for diving and particularly for seeing sharks. The morning after the strong northerlies we were hailed by Carol and Jim on Somerset who were heading to North Fakarava from Kahuei where boats had had a hard time with the coral bombies and damage to bow rollers and windlasses. They were fine and due in that evening. We headed to town for a wander and collected some groceries for ourselves and Somerset then headed back to the boat. The wind was backing to South West which meant we were exposed to a 30 mile fetch of water and Iolea was bouncing around on her anchor a bit. We had planned to go cycling the next day and to have lunch at the Tiki bar with Somerset but the next morning we looked at the weather and saw that 30 knot winds from the SE-ESE were expected the next day. We decided to make a run down to the south anchorage of Fakarava for better protection and because we did not want to lose time at the south anchorage. The morning was breezy and the barometer had increased to 1021 - we should have taken more note of this - we traveled down the east channel and Somerset went for the center hoping to get more range in sailing angles. By halfway down it was getting very choppy and we decided to try the centre. This was a big mistake. The winds increased to 28-30 knots. The weather had come in early. The fetch was 1-2 meters and the waves had no backs. Iolea just went up and down up and down great gushes of sea up and over the dodger. We made an average of 2 knots. A journey we had expected to take 5-6 hrs took 8. For Somerset it was worse. Cats are not built for those seas and seawater managed to permeate every through-hull - the poor things were cleaning up for the next 2 days. The wind didn't ease until yesterday but once down here we made the most of it. Dreamweaver were already here and had us organised on a dive in the pass in the morning and pizza at a local pension (Motu Aito Paradise) that evening. The pizza (parrot fish)was excellent and the diving spectacular - schools of grey sharks enjoying the conveyor belt of current that lets them rest while still having water flow through their gills, corals and anenomes, fish of every size and colour, and giant wrasse, green and blue, with their bulborous lips and swiveling eyes. Fakarava is definitely worthy of its reputation.