It is certainly paradise here as you can see from the picture of Salacia anchored off the village.
We have moved to another anchorage which is even better. We now have our own island ... We circumnavigated “Salacia Island” on foot and there were lots of coconut crabs and also any hermit crabs. The island is a coral atoll and on the seaward side you can see the storm damage with many very large pieces of coral washed up. On the lagoon side the beach is much smaller pieces of coral and casuarinas and other salt tolerant plants and trees have made their home. The lagoon is teeming with marine life. Lots of schools of fish of all sizes swimming past the yacht and a good collection of sting rays.
Photo 1: Stephen examining some flotsam on "Salacia Island"
Photo 2: Salacia in the lagoon of "Salacia Island"
Photo 3: Sunset at "Salacia Island"
Photo 4: Hermit Crab
Cyndy made some delicious bread on route to Fakarava and had it warm with salad for lunch. The bread just gets better and better. Favorites are Rye and Caraway and Crusty White. We also made water, did the laundry and had showers. The water maker makes 200 litres of water per hour so there is never a shortage and we don't have to ration it.
Fakarava is the second largest Tuamotu atoll and it is 32 mile long by 15 mile wide rectangular shape lying roughly NW-SE. The pretty (and pristine) village of Rotoava in the WNW corner of the atoll. There is a cement block at the village that we used for our dinghy landing.
Photo 5: This ray was at the dinghy dock under our zodiac
There are 3 very small grocery stores, a post office, a dive store, several pensions and an airport with weekly flights to Papeete.
Photo 6: Beautiful church at Rotoava, Fakarava
We are anchored off the village in crystal clear water in company with a number of other yachts. We entered the lagoon after slack water and we were doing 10.2 knots over the ground because of the amount of water entering the lagoon.
Photo 7: Anchorage off the Village
1 comment:
Dear Ross
I hope you get this before you get to Tahiti! I have had a lovely holiday on Norfolk Island and while there was reading a book about personal names in Tahiti (where the Bounty mutineers found wives). The mutiny descendants moved from Pitcairn Island to Norfolk Island in 1856. Anyway, our great grandmother whose European name was Caroline Aull and she was a Samoan taupo or princess whose Samoan name was Ta’ase. Her mother was also a Samoan princess - only way to be royal there was to have a royal MOTHER and her father was written down as 'Mohea - a Samoan' but our chiefly Samoan family told me when I met them that "Mohea" is not a Samoan name. it is not Tongan either but I found it in the Tahitian names book - it means "beautiful princess". As I understand it male/female names can be interchangeable in the Pacific so maybe it could also mean "handsome prince".
Anyway, you are about to sail into "our ancestral area" so you can do some homework about the name 'Mohea'. Caroline was born in Samoa in about 1873.
Happy sailing! Off to celebrate Mum's 88th birthday with her today.
Love Lesley
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