A year or three ago my old pal Peter Wright met me in Bosun's at Largs Marina. "You gotta see this" says Peter, hauling out his Smart Phone which alone was quite impressive for a man of his years. Not quite the silver surfer but getting there!

A couple of fumbles later, pretending he knew what he was doing he logged into YouTube and up popped a video of one of the Volvo Ocean Race yachts screaming along somewhere in the Pacific on a close reach, in the dark, at 14 knots. Suddenly, you can see the crew feeling something is not quite right. They all are on their feet, peering into the pitch blackness straining above the sounds of the boat to work out what it is they're sensing. Then the crunch comes. What they'd sensed was the sound of breaking waves on the reef they just piled up on. The one their navigator hadn't seen on their zoomed out chart plotter. Pretty soon they are all up to their waists in water, liferaft launched only to be helicoptered off a day or so later leaving the boat to grind itself to pieces.

As previous Blog, much like the couple that did the same thing a few miles from here week before last. And the couple before them and, allegedly, the five other yachts now reef wrecks, all in the last eight weeks. Consequently our sail down here to "The Dangerous Archipelago" wasn't the relaxed passage we might have hoped for. Charts littered the saloon table along with plotters and pencils as we checked and double checked where we were and what lay ahead. Every untoward sound and we were on our feet checking things like a pair of nervous ninnies. Doing the trip on moonless nights didn't help. It was black as pitch but good winds and 500 miles in 4 days. In the end we had to out on the brakes, slowing towards the end as we approached the pass, the "chip" in the surrounding reefs on and into the atoll named Kauehi. Now, over the years we've squeezed Time Bandit into a few tight spaces. The inner loch on Jura's West Loch Tarbert, rock hopping in Norway and the aptly named Small Harbour (thanks John!) in Maine. However, the difference between these adventures and here is that if you screw it up there's no lifeboat. Just you and your insurance company. And the French Government, the environmentalists and the locals and passing impoverished cruisers who will strip your boat clean in an afternoon. To rub salt in the wound, you will probably get a spot in the global news somewhere and someone like Peter will grab you in a café and say, "You gotta see this".

Good news is, despite going into the washing machine that was the pass, we made it through in a few heart stopping moments. 20 metres, 3 metres; 4.5m; 3m; 5m; 4m�...�....and phew, finally 12m while all around breaking and standing crashing waves boiled and swirled all around. Eight miles across the old crater and we pitched up at the village of Tearavero. We haven't been ashore yet so woffle on that in next posting.

Today, its boat chores as it's cool�.....and a wee bit grey with the prospect of rain which we really need as the odd shower would be nice. Or so our friends tell us.