WAYA – North harbor – Nalawaki
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| Nalawaki |
The wind was up again and we needed a better shelter than Navadra. On the chart, the bay north of Waya Island looked like good protection.
Off we were, dropped the hook in what looked like a sand patch between grass beds, hoping for some shelter from the tall mountains around. But all is not as it seems and a few hours later, our sense of security was shaken.
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| The most helpful crew! |
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| The elementary schoolchildren gave us a little concert! |
Another Sevu-Sevu ceremony. This time, the whole village was involved since it was Monday and the tourists from Octopus Resort had walked the trail to participate ($15/person…) – Of course, we had to visit the school where all of the 6 kids sang for all of us and (again) a donation was encouraged. We were getting a bit tired of being nickeled-and-dimed at every corner, especially when at the end of the Sevu Sevu ceremony, all the women set up their craft stands and we were once more cornered into donations and craft-buying. This was getting old!
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| And the Village welcomed the visitors |
Back to the boat, the girls and I got into one of our favorite activities, messing up the galley! We were laughing so much that we hardly noticed the 30-35kts screaming down the hill, until Tehane-li hailed us on the VHF. “DOMINO! You’re dragging anchor!” JP, always sure of his anchor, was quick to reply: “I don’t think so… I haven’t dragged in over 4 years!” -“Well, you were ahead of us and now you’re behind us,” continued our friend Karel… it was pitch-black out-there, but i-Sailor confirmed: we had dragged 200 yards, quickly losing ground on the down-sloping grass bed! It took us 30 minutes in screaming winds and rain but we finally re-anchored, carefully re-set in the dark, patiently worked together, and set the Drag Queen alarm.
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| Wind can scream down this hill! |
By the time we were secured, the girls had finished cooking dinner, set the table and were ready to serve us… I call that a darn good crew!
The next day was blowing 25 kts again but sunny. Since Maddie had a shooting assignment from her swimsuit sponsor, we decided to hoof it over the hill to Octopus resort on the west coast of Waya.
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| Q & Zo... best friends since Kindergarten |
The resort is very welcoming to cruisers and we started to take pix of this little 16 year-old in tiny bikinis while Zo and Q enjoyed the pool.
How windy and nasty was the weather? Nasty enough for one of the resort’s panga to have it the reef and needing a haul out, and the other panga riding rough at anchor.
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| Hitting the reef and having to repair is never fun |
We were really getting tired of all this wind and nasty weather, so we decided to continue North and find the most sheltered possible anchorage: Blue Lagoon.
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| Maddie ... our little swimsuit model! |
Until then…
dominomarie