Misto - Days 44-51 Isabela and Santa Cruz

The small anchorage at Puerto Villamil was soon crowded with World ARC boats as well as two other catamarans. After investigating the options ashore we settled on a trip to Los Tunelles (The Tunnels). We went together with the crews of Owl and North and were not disappointed. A 45 minute boat ride took us to tortured lava-scapes that formed huge rock pools teeming with turtles, sharks, rays and other fish. On land we watched blue footed boobies performing their stiff legged dance. Two snorkeling opportunities enabled us to get close to the marine life as well as seeing a single seahorse. All in all it was a great day. We decided to opt out of a trip to the volcano - it was reported to be a long uphill walk and very hot.

On February 23 we proceeded to Santa Cruz. We managed a little sailing but the trip was mainly a motor-sailing opportunity. The anchorage here is rolly and very busy. For the first couple of nights we anchored close to the pier with a stern anchor but the multitudinous passing water taxis and boats ferrying passengers to cruise ships caused a huge amount of wake and additionally we think passing boats caught our stern anchor at night as each morning it was close to Misto. So we upped anchor and moved to a position in the center of the anchorage where we dispensed with a stern anchor and it is more pleasant.

We have been active preparing for the next long passage to the Marquesas. Unfortunately this has included identifying a house battery that has failed and we had to take it out of the house battery bank. Naturally this has happened in a place where obtaining new marine batteries is impossible! We are managing on the reduced house battery bank but we are intending to buy a car battery to use as the engine starter battery and then we can add the two engine starter batteries to the house bank. It's amazing what you can do when you have to make do! The weather for the next leg is not turning out to be ideal. Strong adverse currents and almost no wind look like they are going to make it a very slow leg. We are delighted that Carl has arrived, although he is staying ashore for a few more days before moving onto Misto.
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At 2/19/2017 1:08 PM (utc) our position was 00°55.84'S 090°07.04'W