[p]beale12.4
[s]
pos: 19 17.5s 174 13.8w
Date: 06/06/2017 11:00 gmt+1300
Updated entry with corrected date. Sorry about the confusion.
We have departed the Ha'Apai group and we are heading for Vava'u.
My wonderful crew flew out Friday and Saturday after a fantastic couple of weeks together getting Manutaki safely across the ocean to Tonga. My very big thanks to Baz, Jeff and Kim for being so wonderful, helping so much and being s incredibly easy to get along with. And putting up with me, the gnarly skipper.
2 weeks for 4 strangers in a tiny boat on a big ocean is a challenge, but we all done real good!
After jo arrived Friday we pottered about Ha'Apai a bit more. Uvoleva was my favourite anchorage.
We had an awesome adventure on Caprice, one of the cats in the fleet, on Sunday. 9 of us went out to a tiny island called Nukupule in the middle of a coral lagoon, about 10 miles or so offshore. On the way the lads had out the game rods and lures, and in the middle of a narrow channel there was a flurry of excitement as 5 lines were all hit at once, by BIG things. We had gone through some kind of school of billfish. All was chaos with the skipper abandoning the helm to play with his fish, which had four goes at the lure before escaping to fight another day.
Eventually after the pandemonium subsided, there was one big fish on a line, the others all gone, and Ant from Mahia settled in to play his fish for 30 minutes.
3 or 4 dramatic leaps from the water, and it became clear we had a Sailfish, reportedly one of the fastest fish in the ocean.
To cut a long story short, we ended up with a 65kg 2.5m long sailfish across the back of Caprice as we motored in through a narrow little pass to our snorkelling and lunch zone.
Very exciting for a non-fisherman like me, but apparently a big thrill even for the seasoned game fishermen on the boat.
Mal showed his filleting skills and we had sailfish sashimi as an extra treat for the day. Our canned tuna pitas seemed a little mundane by comparison.
And then the snorkelling.
A coral reef about 1.5 m deep in azure water, pelagic fish of every colour and size surrounding us. Floating trough clouds of curious Nemo wannabes, warmed by gentle tropical sun and seas. A splendid excursion.
Back to the "resort" at uvoleva that evening to a shared BBQ of sailfish grilled over a beach fire, washed down with Tongan beer and mojitos.
Quite a day!
Monday we had a little rain, and we did the formalities to clear out of Ha'Apai and head to Vava'u. Then we explored a little further north, taking a few risks anchoring near coral Bonnies. We had fingers crossed that we wouldn't be tied to the sea floor with chain this morning as we departed at 6:30 for the 70 mile crossing to Vava'u.
And we are now in the middle of a deep blu sea, gentle 1m swells rolling in from the east, full main and genoa but not quite enough wind, motor-sailing through Jo's first deep water crossing. Aiming to be in the heart of Vava'u by 4pm for easy safe anchoring.
The journey continues...[END]