Heaven on Earth

We are in Apataki, Tuamotu. After 2.5 days from Nuku Hiva, we arrived at what we thought should be slack water in the north pass, Tehere. But it was ebbing pretty strongly as we made our way into the atoll, probably about 4 knots, so we will have to re-evaluate how the tide/current calculations work out here. We broke through a small rain shower to see the atoll and as we made our way through the pas, which is nice and wide and accurately charted on Nobeltec, we looked back to find a rainbow arching over the entrance. The water inside was like a lake (it was on the outside too - that morning) and the early morning sunshine lighting the lush vegetation and highlighting the turquoise water with white coral beaches made the word "Paradise" pop into my head. Actually the song with "I've got two tickets to Paradise, won't you pack your bags and fly tonight" kept running through my mind as we chose our anchorage. It is difficult to find a sandy spot to drop anchor, that doesn't have coral heads close by that the anchor chain would wrap on. We couldn't wait to jump into the water and snorkel to shore. Which Glen and I did as soon as we turned the engines off. Russell decided that he would just relax on the boat and soak up the view. Close to shore, there is lots of coral heads with multitudes of little fishes, in the sandy valleys between, the larger fishes hang out. All of the corals look very healthy, probably because of the minimal human impact on the reefs here. No rocky and rolling in the anchorage, so nice after where we have been. Glen and I dove in the deeper water in the afternoon and enjoyed more abundant life forms as the creatures change from the shallows to the depths. The next day, we headed south inside the atoll to the village site, Niutahi. There are many bouys in the water, we suppose marking pearl farm locations, so it is a bit of a dodge game. There are about 500 people here and we only found one person so far that speaks any amount of English, so our French is really getting a dusting off. There is one store that we have found with some supplies, but we will have to ask around a bit more to find out about fresh vegis and fruit. So far as we understand, the fresh stuff comes in on the supply boats and we weren't able to determine a day for that yet. Our afternoon snorkel taught us a new lesson, the sandy parts on the outside of the atoll that have breaks in them are tidal flow areas, so don't swim in them during high flow times. We certainly got a workout though. This morning, the winds seems to be from the north and we have a small chop on the water, so it would be difficult to move at this point. We are taking the small boat into town though as we have made arrangements to meet a fellow to see pearls. We'll see how that goes, yesterday when we set the time up, he wanted to trade for Glen's sunglasses, not sure if Glen wants to part with them. We'll try trading for money instead.

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