(written for 10 April 09)
I thought that I'd sleep like a baby on the first night at anchor, but two
squalls kept me and my imagination awake. Earlier in the afternoon I'd
taught myself how to splice mooring rope onto chain, and a squall gusting up
to 42 knots (a new record for Aroha) wasn't the way I'd planned to test it.
The second squall come from the complete opposite direction- very strange.
Unless it was really the first one, back for seconds. The good thing about
squalls is that they last a fairly short time- very intense to start with,
but then dropping of, until after about forty minutes, the show's over.
Today (Friday) was Bernard's last day before he flies back to
'civilisation',
so we wanted to fit in a snorkel (for him) and dive (for Laith and me). I
did a quick dive to check the splice and anchor (no problems) and then we
took the tender to the opposite side of the lagoon. Unfortunately the water
inside the lagoon was bit murky, so the snorkelling wasn't too good. Laith
and I had a nice dive a little further out in viz up to about 15m. Seeing a
large sting ray made my dive.
It was a little sad to see Bernard go. He has been a reliable friend and
crew for the last two weeks. He has been a natural on the helm, including
the first night out from Fujairah, when we were close hauled for most of the
night. He was on the helm from about 10pm to 3am, logging over 6kts boat
speed of most of the time!
Tonight Laith and I will return to Uligamu for another delicious fish curry
(they snuck tuna in last night- a fact which didn't go unnoticed...).
Tomorrow hopefully we'll travel to a nearby resort island for a couple of
dives, thirty minute showers, and WiFi connection!
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