Tahanea

We have been in Tahanea, a (now) uninhabited atoll for the last week. Crystal clear water, but unfortunately rather cloudy skies, and now strong winds and rain too. Spent a few days in a beautiful spot between several small motus or islets (position 16 57 458 S and 144 35 032 W) where there was actually a bit of sand rather than the rough coral rubble that most of the islands have. Very quiet and wild, and we spent our time collecting and identifying shells, and snorkelling around the reefs. Enjoyed the company of a couple of American marine biologists from Alaska and their 20 month old son.

Now it is time to make a move. We came back to the pass yesterday - badly timed as there was a complete white-out rainstorm en route. Not a hope of seeing the coral heads in the lagoon. Luckily we had already worked out that the computer charts are very accurate here, and the shallow spots marked were spot on - but you never know if there are more than are marked! We explored the abandoned village near the pass which has a very smart little church, a graveyard with quite recent graves, and a few tumbledown shacks. There is hardly any soil on the motu, just coral rubble, so apart from a few coconut palms they must have found it very difficult to grow any food. No wonder the very small population moved elsewhere.

It looks very rough outside the pass so we have decided to postpone our trip to Fakarava, where there is a larger village and a couple of shops. Our fresh food supplies are now extremely low - and we have run out of white flour, thought I had another bag somewhere. Made bread just with wholewheat flour but it tastes like sawdust - normally I use a mixture. Only onions and potatoes left so we are having to be very inventive with tinned things. Plenty of stores though, packets of juice, dried fruit, UHT milk. We are not on the way to malnutrition!

G spied one cockroach the other day, so we've had a big drive to put a special gel round all the through holes between lockers. No sign of it again or of any others, so hopefully it was a one-off. As I think I told you we had a few weevils in the rice so put it all in the oven at a low temp for a while which certainly killed them off and doesn't seem to have affected the rice. The joys of being in the tropics!

G is busy today making a new rain catcher from a reinforced plastic tarpaulin we have on board. We will tie it over the front deck, attached to the rails, and have an attachment for a hose fitted to the middle. The sun awning that we have used for the purpose up to now has never been very efficient and leaks like a sieve. Of course once finished we probably won't see any more rain for a while. He has also been making candles. We found a large chunk of wax washed up on the beach, and he melted it down in a tin and poured it into jam jars with a birthday candle as a wick. Pretty good - he's a beach comber par excellence!