Tahanea Squalls

Out here in Never Never Land, as I like to call it (because you have no contact with the outside world other than the Single Sideband Radio) one must still keep up with what the weather is doing. We get our weather info two ways. One is we have a Pactor modem that connects our SSB radio to our computer and we use a program called Airmail to receive weather faxes and grib files (shows what direction and how strong wind will be in a certain area). Second is our Inreach Messenger via Iridium satellite. With this info we decide where a safe anchorage will be and which side of an atoll to hide behind. We found out that the wind was going to clock almost all the way around the dial as a low passed near us, starting with NE winds then backing to NW, W, SW, S then SE. And all this was going to happen overnight! So that made it a bit challenging to find a safe spot. We decided to move to the #7 reef (looks like the #7 from the satellite photo). So off we go across the lagoon. As we are headed to the E from the middle Motus, we pass several Bombie Motus and other Bombies just under the surface. This means one of us is on the bow watching for light colored spots in the water, which is our main warning system, other than making note of where they can be seen from the satellite photo.

We passed this little spot sticking out of the water on our way.

We anchored at the bottom right side of the reef so we would be protected from everything except the beginning NorthEasterlies. The sky was getting darker.

We took turns standing anchor watch while we were on a lee shore. This means we staid up most of the night making sure the anchor held while the wind blew us toward the outer reef. The seas were not too bad, once the wind shifted NW because the 7 reef broke them up for us. Then next morning we got this photo of Pitufa anchored near us. Red sky in morn, sailors take warn!

Then the rain started coming down hard.

This motu will later block the SE wind for us, along with the outer reef. At least we can see it now!

The squall line finally passed us, and the rain stopped.

And the sea conditions settled down.

The weather was starting to clear and the birds were taking flight again.

The sun came out and gave us this lovely rainbow to remind us life is good.

After being stuck on the boat we were jonesing to get to shore and explore the motu. This one has nice soft sand under the palms as the dark clouds move farther away.

6 Great Capped Terns were resting on the sand bar, keeping a close eye on us.

We did not get very close, but they decided to fly away anyhow.

The baby plams sprout right out of rotting coconuts.

This motu has soft sand on the outer reef side and a dense jungle.

There were several incredibly twisted dead trees that looked like drift wood.

Mike finds a tree he can actually climb on! The jungle was too thick to walk into so we just looked at it from this perch.

Erosion is happening all the way up at the high tide mark.

There is a deep channel between us and the next motu.

We found a mooring ball tied to the bottom (for a boat??). Mike walked off the end of the sand spit to find the water just next to it was over his head deep!

The sand under the water turns it the most beautiful turquoise color!

This piece of crystal coral had washed up on to the sand and coral rubble.

I found this strange looking black rock with some shells piled on it.

It was white on the opposite side and looked like it had broken off of another piece of coral.

This small calcified sponge was interesting. Hard as a rock, it looked folded over on this side.

And hollowed out on the other side.

An old dead clam was still locked into the coral even though it is now above water.

Another beautiful and perfect Spyder Conch shell.

This broken one allowed us to see what they look like on the inside.

Mike found a very thick piece of green glass. Strangely it was the only one we saw.

We have seen several of these floating raft type contraptions washed up on the beach. We think it may be part of a pearl farm operation, but there are none on this atoll, so we are not really sure. Just more trash, sadly.

This Brown Boobie bird flew by us.

A couple more were soaring on the breeze.

The Masked Boobie has more of a light brown to white tint to his body feathers.

We found a coconut tree with a large batch of green nuts ready for the picking.

So we took our gaff thinking we could pull them out of the tree.

But that did not work so well. Crevice corrosion and sheer force broke off the rounded part. I told Mike “at least we broke it trying to gaff a coconut and not trying to bring some big fish on board!”

There is more than one way to skin a cat, I mean, dislodge a coconut! We found a two by four (funny how something like that appears when you need it!) and Mike took a swing and hit a home run.

With several whacks of a sharp machete, I got this perfect shot of slicing the nut open and the juice splerting out.

The rays of the Sunset were just perfect with our rum and coconut water cocktails!!

Tahanea Boobie Bird Motus

Next stop on the Tahanea tour was 3 Boobie Bird Motus. There are several small islands (motus) where boobie birds hang out and have their babies. Actually they do that on most of these motus, but this one supposedly has no human activity evidence (like copra coconut harvesting). Once palms have been planted for this purpose, much of the undergrowth that protects these ground nesters, is removed or dies from lack of enough sun.

When we woke there was a large cumulus cloud that looked like half of it had become water and fell from the sky.

The morning sun turned the rain in to a wide horizontal rainbow. So pretty!

It has been 10 days since we left Tahiti and we have run out of french baguettes. So I decide to make my first attempt at making bread. The first one did not come out well. I had not intended to make flat bread! Mike ate it anyway, but I did not think it was very good. So second attempt with the help of some other yeast from Birgit on Pitufa and vola' actual bread. I had just bought those yeast packets in Tahiti, so I was surprised to find out it was bad.

The next few days we had Virginia made Apple butter and Mexican Apricot jelly on home baked bread!

Mike and I walked around the largest of the 3 motus, but the third one looked the most inviting. I still think sometimes that I need to pinch myself, knowing I am really here after all these years!

We saw several trees and bushes flowering. There were orange flowers:

As well as these long lovely purple flowers.

Pitufa was very saddened to see that someone had made a copra camp on this motu, which had not been here the year before.

The very inquisitive Sandpiper was watching us closely.

Then he seemed to even follow us. These little guys are on the brink of extinction though, sadly.

Miguel is hanging loose on the motu in Tahanea!

Bird prints in the sand! Someone has been here recently.

Then just ahead of us we spot them, Curlews! These guys fly back and forth from here to Alaska! They come here also to have their babies.

As we rounded the back side of the motu, this fairy tern flew right over Mike's head.

A very inviting sand bar between motus.

The fairy terns were now everywhere.

They kept flying closer and closer, until he was right over me.

Of course the Boobie bird did the same. They are like dive bombers, soaring over the water until they spot a fish and then strait into the water after him.

Got this amazing shot of both a Blue faced Boobie and a Fairy tern with my little Fuji XP waterproof camera.

The Frigate birds are notorious robbers. They will steal a fish from another bird or torment it until it drops the fish.

Masked Boobies have mostly white feathers, black on their wings, with a yellow beak and small back feathers right around their face, which looks like a mask.

This is both a Masked Boobie and a Brown Boobie, watching us closely from their nests as we walk by. (not too close tho!)

This Masked Boobie flew past to make sure we were not getting too close.

So beautiful in flight!

Here you can see the undergrowth is quite thick with not too many palms. Perfect for building and hiding a nest!

The sun was getting low and the shadow of this palm quite long.

Yes I really am under a palm tree in the South Pacific!!

We see many things along the shoreline. First this crab tries to disappear in the rubble.

This is a spyder conch, live in the water.

And there was some gnarly driftwood with washed up blue plastic. We pick up trash when ever we can, especially plastic!!

There are three small reefs along these motus, so of course we had to snorkel down and see who was living there! Mike found a big school of fish circling in this sandy area surrounded by coral.

Here you can see the striped Redfin Bream in the sub adult phase, as well as Humpback Snappers.

This coral mound shows a Yellow tail Emperor swimming by and what I believe to be a baby Anemone fish.

He is so cute, but did not find one like him in the book.

Several Bluefin Trevally, which is a type of Jack, watched us with curiosity.

You can really see their blue fins and spots in this shot.

A coral bloom.

Looks like a giant group of small crystals how it grows.

A first for me, an orange sponge.

The blue and purple lipped clams glow with iridescence in the sunlight.

One of my favorites, the Morish Idol with a few Damisel fish swimming about.

A good sized Parrotfish, who munch on coral with those beak like mouths.

The Saddled Butterflyfish has cute markings. 

The Chevroned Butterflyfish has a black circle around his face when looking at him head on.

But from the side you can see his Chevron markings.

The Five Striped Wrasse is quite colorful with his purple body and green stripes.

These Solanders Toby fish are colored with iridescent blue spots and have an orange tail. Not seen any if any of these guys before either!

And the Coup-de-grace of our snorkel was this Leopard Wrasse with his black and white spots and yellow fins and belly.