The Reef

We decided yesterday to move over to the east side of the Vava'u group and explore the anchorage off Ofu Island. All well and good except you have a bit of a tricky reef transit to get from west to east. We have a copy of a copy of an old cruising guide that described the transit in detail so off we went. The sun was not quite in the right position but we could still see water colour change pretty well. Cathy was on the bow for a awhile then she took the helm and I went up the rat lines to get a better view. You transit by heading due east, then a slight jog SSE , then back NE. There are apparently marks but they turned out to look like fishing buoys. There are actually two reef markers and one red buoy. We got through OK and never saw less than 2.5 meters under the keep but still it was a bit nerve racking. We tried to anchor off the village on Ofu Island but the wind was from the NW and it was completely exposed so we headed about a ¼ mile further north and anchored off the south shore of Mafana Island. We headed out exploring with the dinghy and snorkelled a bit and went right to the eastern reef and watched the swell crashing over the reef and against the barrier islands. It was a fantastic sight. The water was a bit cloudy, I guess from all the sea crashing over, so the snorkelling was not the best. Before heading back to the boat we decided to take a walk through the village on Ofu. We landed in front of the new school and the kids of course came over right away. I pulled out the camera and started taking their pictures and they were thrilled. They LOVE getting their pictures taken. I got them to come over and look at the pictures on the screen of the camera and all you could here were squeals of laughter. It was fun. We walked along the track parallel to the beach from one end to the other. The village is very neat, the track bordered with plants, and the houses very well kept. We headed back to Tarun and got a visit from Bill and Sue from Crazy Diamond who had come in after us. They invited us for sundowners and we of course said yes. Well about 17:30 we headed over, settled in and were having a good talk when the wind decided to swing from the north to the south and blow up to about 15 knots. I took a look at Tarun and we quickly got in the dinghy and headed back to haul up the anchor. We were blowing directly on shore. We got the anchor up before we grounded and headed back towards the village. Although we were exposed to the wind, the anchorage was NOT on a lee shore. No harm, no foul!

----------
radio email processed by SailMail
for information see: http://www.sailmail.com