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Firefly - The Dangerous Archipelago



Firefly is 'trucking' along at about 8 knots towards the Tuamotos, the 20 knot wind is just abaft of the beam and there is a swell so its quite bumpy.

These low lying atolls we are heading for are also known as the Dangerous Archipelago due to the large number of shipwrecks, which even in the GPS era continue to occur. We are therefore spending a great deal of time reading all of the information we have gathered and we keep re checking and honing our plans. However, the pilot books and charting information is not that consistent so its more difficult to plan than we had anticipated. Fortunately the wind is forecast to stay favorable for the next few days which will help.

Fakarava will be our first stop and we are intending to be off the pass on the NW side of the atoll on Sunday morning for high water and slack water, although the timing of both may not correspond exactly. We will go through the pass into the 30 mile long lagoon and should then find calmer waters and a suitable anchorage. There is a reasonable amount of habitation on Fakarava with some hotels and shops and this is known as a top scuba diving location. Aswell as tourism, pearl farming is an important activity as well as Copra production.

We have a list more atolls; Anse Amyot on the West side of Toau, Ahe, Rangiroa and Tikehau each downwind of each other that we plan to visit after we leave Fakarava. We then head off West again to Moorea and then Tahiti for the next World ARC rendezvous in late April.

Paul, Peter and David

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