Along with Glamorous Galah, we decided not to leave in a hurry with the other Group 1 boats. The next weather information advised us to stay in Suwarrow until the weather system developed and passed, as it could cross our path to Niue with some challenging wind speeds. So we HAD to overstay our three days in Suwarrow, oh tragedy - we are now rapidly in danger of turning this place into a holiday camp.
The rest of the Group 2 boats arrived shortly after the Group 1 boats left and it has been barbecues on the beach every night (that's five nights in a row so far...). A non-ARC boat arrived a few days ago full of lads from Byron Bay who had caught a massive Marlin on the way over. This has fed the entire fleet for 2 nights in succession, aided wonderfully by some amazing marinade put together by the Galah boys. You can't teach the Aussies much about BBQs.
On Tuesday night Zoe decided to put on a drive-in (or dinghy-in) surfing movie by projecting it onto their sail and afterwards we were serenaded by the musicians on Royal Leopard. Peat Smoke put on a whisky tasting (now that they were out of French Polynesian waters and they could break the seals on their whisky stash) that led to a few sore heads the following day - the hospitality here is amazing.
Not that the days have been boring. Wind Dancer very kindly let us come with them and Ensemble to Bird Island - a series of small motos absolutely teeming with birds (mainly Frigates on the Island we got to). What a day. It was so still and the water went from emerald to sapphire to aquamarine with clarity so good we could easily see 20m+ down. We had packed a picnic and sat on the beach watching the comings and goings - particularly endearing were the baby Frigates, all fluff and attitude but with faces only a mother could love. Afterwards we decided to walk to an old wreck further along the reef. This turned out to be much further than anticipated and walking got quite hard work as we were wading along a coral shelf, albeit in very shallow water. This attracted baby black tip reef sharks and moray eels who thought we were fish in trouble. Very funny watching them come in to attack, then realising their mistake and fleeing even quicker. On the way back we motored through gin clear water among the most beautiful coral bommies, so agreed we must come back the next day to snorkel. So yesterday, along with the Sapphire crew we snorkeled back there and then did some drift snorkels along the entrance pass (whilst Glam Galah, the younger members of Zoe and Beatoo surfed in the distance). Today we are going out to snorkel a reef where two manta rays were seen yesterday. If this keeps up we will be developing webbed feet.
The skippers are having a meeting this morning to discuss the weather situation and it seems likely we will get away either tomorrow or Saturday. However I will never resent the extra time spent in Suwarrow; a very very special place.