Final Arrival to the Tuamutos -

We arrived in Kaihea (??) on the 29th of May.  It was a push.  We'd been under only spinnaker the day prior due to the mainsail coming down with 8 cars jumping the track in a squall with winds up to nearing 40 knots.  So, it was decent moving, but not full capacity.  So on the 29th, we slowed to 4 knots of movement.  That wasn't going to be enough to get us in by dark.  You really should not enter these atolls at night due to the many, many reefs.  So, we needed to push a little.

Courage and I raised the mainsail, even with the top 8 cars out of the track.  We sped up some, but there was a constant creaking noise of chaffing ropes, so we finally decided to drop it and get the ropes laid out right.  We couldn't take another rope chaffing through and it just was too wild of a ride to have someone going up the mast.  So, we lowered the mainsail and started the re-organizing of ropes as squall 1 of many hit.  They kept coming it seemed or there was one on the horizon.  Tons of gorgeous rainbows too on the upside!  And it was washing off all the salt water we'd been taking on deck and even onto the roof!  With all these squalls and irregular winds, we decided that maybe it wasn't the best time to put up a handicap mainsail, so we started the motor to push ourselves along at a pace that we could make the island before nightfall.  During good winds, we'd kill the motor, but as we'd slow, we'd get ourselves moving along again with the motor.  We did well; we got in to the entrance channel about at the latest time we'd hoped to be hitting it.

The channel was plenty wide for us, but has standing waves about 2 feet tall.  It's intimidating at first when you know you're going over a reef and have breaking waves in front of you, but the waves are breaking because the rush of water is all coming through a narrow channel, not because of shallow water.  So, we had Cassidy up on the first spreader to keep an eye out for "boomies" (shallow coral reefs).  After the entrance it was about another hour or hour and a half to get to the anchorage.  Wow, that was longer than we expected and we were definitely coming in at dusk!  Cassidy was on the spreader looking for boomies the entire time, including during the squalls as they hit.  Atta girl!

There were 3 other boats here, 2 Swiss ones and our old friends on Alba that we went up the Darien with in Panama.  Great to see them again, very nice British couple!

We were exhausted after a long, bouncy ride.  The cabin and cockpit was a disaster from things being knocked on the ground.  We anchored, had dinner and went to bed.  It's a gorgeous anchorage!!  Flat as anything, even in 25 knots of wind!  Great sleeping.

The scenery is as amazing as any postcard.  Crystal clear light blue water with visible coral, white beaches, palm trees as far as the eye can see!!  You don't even need to snorkel; you can just look down at the fish in the crops of coral!
  
The beach is white, but not really sandy, most of it is larger bits of coral, so a bit rough on your feet!!  I gave all the kids a new pair of water shoes to wear to shore, but it turns out they never wear shoes and they really can't keep the things on their feet ("I've got sand in it"  "It's slipping off", etc.)  So, I told them it's their choice, but I wear mine and it's way nicer!  There is beautifully soft sand under the water at wading distance, so the kids spend a lot of time in the water wading since it's more comfortable for both heat and their feet.

These islands I believe used to be volcanic islands, like the Marquesas.  But they have eroded and "sunk" back down under the sea.  The surrounding coral is what keeps washing up on the edges keeping them above ground, slightly.  A tsunami would be a disaster here; it would just sweep right over the entire island.  But it makes a gorgeous ring of land around a coral reef, which is awesome for boaters!!

Shannon