Bon Jur Marquesas Islands

As first light broke on Wednesday we pulled anchor and headed southwest for 483 mile crossing to the Tuamotu Islands. Three days and nights of light trade winds and sunny weather later we entered the channel at Manihi. The scenery has now done a dramatic change as the atolls much different than the mountainous islands we just left. Atolls are formed by coral reefs that grow on the tops of old volcanoes. The usually form a circumference around a tropical lagoon. This unique formation makes for excellent diving and that is why we are here.

Timing is everything and you must enter at slack tide and in good light to see the unmarked coral heads that make navigation treacherous. The good news is that Nobeltec charts are spot on here not like the miles of error we found in Mexico, the French are good at charts and bread. As our destination lies 100 miles farther and the entrance must be done early the next morning we leave Manihi late afternoon. We are joined by two sailing vessels, one we know and one we will soon in the moonlit passage. We enter the wide lagoon entrance and head to the village anchorage.

I have made this leg to join my Danish friends for diving and I hail Naveren on the VHF. We anchor just off the village. That night I have a party on board Furthur with what we now call “The usual suspects” a group of cruisers I have grown to really enjoy. Again it is an international group, Danish, German, English, Canadian, Swiss and a couple of Yanks. The next day we arrange for a group dive charter, the best diving is the entrance pass at slack tide. We do a great drift dive seeing schools of fish and beautiful coral formations. This is so great that we book dives the next day.

My Dannish friend Rikke gets the Gold Medal for diving off of Furthur.

The buzz in the anchorage is that Infinity, a large charter motorsailor is having a party and all are welcome. They dispatched dinghies to spread the word, I am asked to bring my guitar. I arrive and tie up my tender along with 15 others all strung off the stern. Party laser lights, abundant food and drink and girls in party dresses make the event grand. They have commandeered the local band to play and they have a repertoire of Polynesian songs that soon fill the dance floor—the aft deck. I enjoy dancing with many of the crew including a young Slovakian girl who knows how to Tango! We Tangoed around the entire deck, stem to stern then she does some moves that has the whole crowd cheering. After that I was asked to sit in with the band. I plugged in the SG and took a quick lesson in Polynesian rhythms. What a night, good food, special people, tango dancing and playing in the band. Hard to beat!

The next day I drag myself out of the berth to be ready for the 0800 dive call, only to find I am an half hour early as I did not make the adjustment from Marquesas time to Tuamotu time—only place in the world where there is a half hour time change. Today we do the dive on the entrance to the channel on the outside wall. Crystal clear emerald water covers the coral reef as we skirt the thousand foot drop off. The dive guide motions to look and there is a pair of large rays coming right at me, I drop to the bottom and stay quiet as they come nose to nose before turning slowly away, wow! Then we get the grand prize, an eight foot tiger shark makes an entrance and glides 30 feet away from us.

The afternoon dive takes us back to the channel but our timing is better and we hang again at the edge of the drop off outside the entrance. Soon we are amongst hundreds of sharks. The silver bodies of the black tipped reef sharks glide past us only feet away. We just hang out for a long time watching the show, barracuda, sharks, tuna, and the most amazing Napoleon fish that look like something out of the Beattle’s Yellow Submarine movie. We turn down the canyon and slowly drift with the current across the entrance bar. This is truly one of the best dives I have ever done.

Today I took it easy, did some chores—been playing too much, hahaha. I walked the length of the village. I stopped at a small stand to buy a CE of a local Polynesian group. One of the coolest things I have started to do is carry a few balloons in my pocket to give to small kids, what fun! In the “six degrees of separation” mode I blew up a balloon for a little boy, the mom turned out to be the girlfriend of our dive guide, and her mom owned a road side crepe stand so delicious crepes for lunch—the balloons are great!

Tomorrow we are all moving the 30 miles to the south entrance of the Fakahava Attol where even better diving is reported if that is possible.