Location: 21° 31.7 S, 39° 40 E
Monday 12:00, 10.30.2006

Well we moved today, but not far. We are on the other side of the atoll, at 21° 31.7S, 39° 40.0E. When we woke up this morning we found that the wind had picked up to about 15 knots from the NE and was kicking up a bit of a sea and pushing us uncomfortably close to the reef, where the 2-3 meter waves were breaking with much ado.

As seems to happen sometimes, we made a bit of a thrash of it. I always anchor with a float attached to the front of the anchor to mark the anchor’s position, and to aid in its retrieval if it gets stuck under coral or whatever. The tide had come in and the anchor buoy was hidden underwater. As the anchor came up, we searched for the buoy. The prop found it first, immobilizing the engine just as we needed it most to avoid going ashore. The anchor, of course, was also immobilized by the retrieval line tightly attached to the prop. Willis immediately jumped in, knife in teeth and cut the line free of the anchor. I rushed up to set the anchor before we went ashore. As I was about to drop it, I notice that Willis was attempting to reboard the Maggie B by climbing the anchor chain. I believe that I said something relatively emphatically impolite, to suggest that he use the midships ladder as I had something else to use the chain for.

We re-anchored promptly and then Willis and I took turns pulling and cutting the turns off the prop, which was accomplished with some difficulty due to Maggie’s stern working hard to bash our heads in when we came up for air.

After all that excitement, we had a peaceful motor around the island to rejoin the shark researchers in their catamaran, Aerandir, on the peaceful leeward side of the island. This is a lovely spot with the breeze off the atoll. The anchor is in 35 feet of water and we are only 200 feet of chain away in 70 feet of water. We do have the sound and fury of 3-4 meter Southerly swells lifting us up and breaking on the reef which is only about 500-600 feet away. We are going to stand anchor watches tonight because a wind shift could have us in the surf zone, which would be a bad idea.

Once we set the anchor, I jumped in to check it. I have never jumped out of the water faster as a 10-12 foot White Tip shark cruised by just beneath me. We then had a peaceful lunch (Salad Nicoise) and Hannah decided to go for a swim afterwards. She had a religious experience — Walking on Water — as three sharks showed up to check her out (Father, Son and Holy Ghost?). So no more swimming. I then decided to try out the new surf kayak “Strika.” I felt perfectly confident. Then I dumped. Then Hannah’s sharks came to see what the fuss was about. I got back in, but was pretty shaky, which I’m sure was the Malaria medicine. I decided to paddle over to the other boat, with the three sharks as escort. As I was about half way over I noticed that they were actively chumming their sharks, and it just seemed to be a better idea to go back to the Maggie B and curl up in the cabin with a good book.

Off to Nose Be tomorrow.

All is well.