Day 58, Year 4: Fantastic Sailing and Snorkeling Day
Weather: Beautiful Day, Great Wind
Latitude: 07 degrees 12.944 minutes N
Longitude: 099 degrees 03.723 minutes E
Location: Anchored Between Ko Rok Nai and Ko Rok Nok, Thailand
What a magical day! We had one of the best sails today that we have had during our entire three years of world cruising. We had 17-18 knots of wind from the ENE and were headed NNW which put the wind just slightly ahead of the beam. We were able to use all three sails and fly north. We traveled at 6 to 7 knots all day which got us to our destination by three in the afternoon. As we sailed up the west coast of Ko Rok Nok we saw many caves that look like they need to be explored, and then we entered
the pass between the northerly island of Ko Rok Nai and the southerly island of Ko Rok Nok. Just after anchoring, we headed to the north shore of Ko Rok Nok to start our explorations. Actually our first exploration was cutting Mark’s hair, so Kevin and Claire walked the beach looking for shells while I cut Mark’s hair. Kevin and Claire returned with a potpourri of hermit crabs, but I was still cutting Mark’s hair. Claire continued on up the beach to look for shells. When I finished cutting Mark’s
hair, he stood up and looked around to see a huge monitor lizard walking toward us. He stopped and stayed quite a while exploring us. He or she was quite a beautiful specimen and while watching her, a bird that looks very much like a huge crow landed on the beach to play with a coconut. I was amazed at this bird’s dexterity. She used her wings to roll the coconut and then try to peck a hole in it with her beak. She did this over and over. So we had a quite a show watching the hermit crabs,
the bird and the coconut, and the monitor lizard. Then Claire went in the water and soon yelled for us to join her as she has found a couple of zebra lionfish. This led to a further underwater exploration where we found the beginning of the coral fringing reef with hundreds of fish swimming around us in crystal clear water. This is always a very special experience and combined with the wonderful sail and other wildlife sightings, we can definitely log today as magical.
Back on Windbird we had a great taco meal prepared by Mark, Kevin, and Claire. We will stay here tomorrow and continue to explore these two islands. There is supposed to be a great walk on Ko Rok Nai and we know there is more snorkeling to be done on the fringing reefs around Ko Rok Nok. Claire’s wish for tomorrow is to go back to our same spot for snorkeling but with bright sunshine. Today was overcast, so although the water was clear, the lighting was not perfect. You can’t have it all, but we can wish for sunshine.
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| 081219 Day 58 Thailand–Ko Adang to Ko Rok Nok |
