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Free & BrEasy - We came, we saw, we snorkeled



We have arrived in Fakarava which is one of the bigger coral atolls in the Tuamotu Archipelago. The passage over from the Marquesas was a little tedious if we are honest. On the previous passages, we have been so spoilt with good sailing conditions that we forgot who is boss - the wind! We set out from Nuku Hiva confidently expecting a 3-4 day passage but light winds pushed our event horizon to an 6 day passage. Luckily we had stocked up with lots of fruit from the market so we filled the days with a fruit festival as everything ripened at once. Mangoes and Bananas featured in the menu but the large juicy grapefruit took the prize for fruit of the week. On the way we received an email from a fellow world ARC boat that was completing the leg single handed as his crew had jumped ship on an island in the Marquesas. Let that be a warning to Roger to be nicer to us, if that's possible!



The fishermen (Roger and Alejandro) were frustrated on the trip as they nearly caught a 6ft monster (a Wahoo?) which got away as it was being landed on board. A couple of nice Tuna failed to make up for the loss. Worse still they cannot fish in the coral lagoons due to the danger of eating a coral nerve toxin and developing ciguatera poisoning. As a result the lagoons are teeming with happy carefree fish jumping around the boats and posing for photographs by snorkeling and scuba diving yachties!



The first impression of Fakarava is, inevitably, its very flat. The atoll only became visible from a few miles unlike the majestic Marquesas with their cloud wrapped peaks, visible from far away. The coconut trees tower over the one storey houses! On arrival Alejandro immediately jumped over board for a snorkel. We are in a snorkeling paradise even in the anchorage. Very soon we were all in the water and heading for the nearest coral. We were rewarded with a colourful coral forest and a fish collection worthy of a scene from the film Nimo. An hour passed in a few minutes and we headed back to the boat for a beery celebration.



The atoll is a ring of habitable land which is only 50 metres wide despite surrounding a lagoon 10 miles wide. We walked from the pacific outer coast to the inner lagoon coast in 3 minutes! We next plan to scuba dive so watch this space for adventure!

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