by Judy Handley | Sep 5, 2010 | Madagascar, Sailing Logs Year 5 |
Day 314, Year 5 Nosy Ankarea Revisit
Date: Sunday, September 5, 2010
Weather: Another Beautiful Day; AM Winds NE, PM Winds W
Location: Nosy Mitsio, NW Madagascar
At 8 am Bruce and Tristen of Pioneer picked us up in their dinghy and delivered us to Pioneer. Mark and Nadine brought the anchor up and off we went. It is only three miles to Nosy Ankarea so we were there and anchored by 9 am. The water was so incredibly clear and beckoned us to jump in. As fast as we could, we all got suited up and in the water. Pioneer is a catamaran and it is so easy to just walk down the steps and slide into the water. We must have been in the water for at least two hours. It was just a great place to snorkel. It is the very first time I have snorkeled anywhere and seen the ‘Big 3’ angelfish all in one place. Today we saw the Emperor with its horizontal yellow and purple stripes, the Regal with its vertical white, orange, and blue stripes, and the Semicircle with its black, blue, green, and yellow spots on a blue and yellow background. We simply saw a smattering of most of the fish we have seen in Madagascar all in one place. As I was swimming back to Pioneer, I spotted an octopus that put on an unbelievable show. Nadine was most of the way back to Pioneer and Mark, Bruce, and Tristen were in the dinghy, so I put my head up long enough to let them know to get back in the water to see the octopus show. When I first spotted this creature I had no idea what it was. I could not see the tentacles. I could just see a spotted blob that was creeping across the sandy bottom and over any coral or rocks in its path. The blob then turned a brownish-maroon color and extended all its tentacles to propel itself forward. Just as quickly, it became a spotted blob again. Eventually everyone else headed back to Pioneer but I stayed behind to watch just a little longer. Usually when you see an octopus it finds cracks and crevices to hide in and you don’t get the opportunity to watch their movements for such a long period of time. I just couldn’t pass up the opportunity, but eventually I moved on and found that I had to struggle to swim against a strong current all the way back to the boat. It was hard, but it was worth it.
Back on Pioneer we put our land clothes over our bathing suits, had a banana bread feast, and then headed to the beach before the tide got too high. Bruce and Nadine’s daughter, Tristen, is such a polite and beautiful little girl. She had wanted to go to the beach to do shelling since our arrival, so she was delighted when we got to shore and found shell heaven. She has been collecting shells for her classmates back in Cape Town and in thirty minutes had a bucket full of cowries, cones, and nerites. I once again forgot to bring a bag for the shelling and ended up with my pockets so full of shells that my pants were hard to hold up. But despite the heavy shell load, we took Bruce, Nadine, and Tristen on a tour of the island. Almost immediately Nadine decided that she needs to move to this island. It is just so idyllic. The resort that once existed there planted all the right kinds tropical plants and trees, the sand is white, the water is crystal clear, there are papaya and banana trees, and even a wetland where mud crabs abound. We had such a wonderful time today and thank Bruce, Nadine, and Tristen on Pioneer for providing the transportation. Tomorrow they are going to a long, long, long beach on Mitsio to do more shelling and snorkeling and Mark and I will return to Nosy Ankarea on Windbird for one more snorkel and one more shelling session.
The winds are not doing their normal thing. We are getting a morning land breeze but it is from the NE not the SE, so traveling further north is a bit difficult. The afternoon sea breeze is coming from the NW as it should but it seems to set in later in the day than normal. So we are questioning whether or not we will beat into the NE winds to head further north. We’ll think about that while snorkeling off Nosy Ankarea tomorrow and let you know the decision in tomorrow evening’s log.
by Judy Handley | Sep 4, 2010 | Madagascar, Sailing Logs Year 5 |
Day 313, Year 5 Nosy Sakatia to Nosy Mitsio
Date: Saturday, September 4, 2010
Weather: Beautiful Day with No Wind
Latitude: 12 54.412 S
Longitude: 048 34.663 E
Location: Nosy Mitsio, NW Madagascar
It was a lovely day with calm seas, but we had to motor the full thirty-eight miles from Nosy Sakatia to Nosy Mitsio as there was absolutely no wind. We followed Pioneer out of the Sakatia anchorage at 6 am and arrived here just before 3 pm. Bruce, Nadine, and Tristen on Pioneer saw whales on the way, but we did not. We were so thankful that we didn’t have to motor into twenty knot headwinds as predicted, so I’d say it was a good day. When we arrived here in Mitsio, Peppe and Bob of Far Niente were here. They are a US boat that we met in Chagos and they have been in Mayotte waiting for replacement parts for the last seven weeks. They had to motor all the way from Mayotte and arrived at 7 am this morning. We had Far Niente and Pioneer over for sundowners and then Bruce, Nadine, and Tristen of Pioneer stayed for a chicken masala dinner. I used the spices from India and it was HOT, but nothing a little yogurt couldn’t calm a bit.
Tomorrow morning Pioneer will pick us up around 8 am and we will go with them to Nosy Ankarea. This is the charming little uninhabited island that we visited when we were here two months ago. We didn’t snorkel when we there in June, so this time we plan to do a bit snorkel exploring. We have heard from Barry on Dream Catcher that the coral is deep but the water is crystal clear and that we should see large game fish. So we’ll give that a try and do some exploring on the island as well.
We have heard from my sister in North Carolina and from our daughter on Cape Cod and the news about Earl was good. It seems the hurricane lost speed and moved far enough away from land to be no threat. So all my worrying was for naught and for this I am very thankful.
by Judy Handley | Sep 3, 2010 | Madagascar, Sailing Logs Year 5 |
Day 312, Year 5 Cleaning and Computer Repair
Date: Friday, September 3, 2010
Weather: Beautiful Day
Location: Nosy Sakatia, NW Madagascar
Mark left at 7:15 am this morning and returned at 5 pm. The computer shop in Hell-ville worked all day to solve our problems and they downloaded and installed every possible fix and anti-virus program that many of you have sent to us as suggestions. But we won’t know for at least 24 hours whether or not everything they have done has really gotten to the root of the problem. And since we are leaving here tomorrow morning and heading north where we will not have cell service, we might not know until we return to this area in a week or so whether or not the problem is solved. But we think we are making progress and we thank our son Justin, our friend Alan Kanegsberg in New Hampshire, and our friends Neil and Ley on Crystal Blues currently in Singapore for all their advice and suggestions. Hopefully something will work!
I spent my day getting into storage areas and reorganizing and cleaning out any food that looked suspicious. I also went through my clothes and took out anything that I want to give away. It was not exciting, but it is a good feeling to clean out and get rid of those things that are no longer good or useful. This evening we went up to Sakatia Towers and had a great evening on the deck with Constance, Dream Catcher, Muneera, Irene, and John’s special guests, Dr. John and Pam. John and Pam were good friends of John’s parents in South Africa and this was their last night in Madagascar. So a good time was had by all.
Tomorrow morning we leave at 6 am headed north to Nosy Mitsio with Bruce, Nadine, and their daughter Tristen on Pioneer. We are not sure what the winds will be like as we head north, so we will just start our trek and see how things go. Every day is an adventure here, so tomorrow will be no exception. And while on the subject of winds, we are certainly thinking of daughter Heather and her family on Cape Cod. This morning I heard from my sister that lives on the border between North Carolina and South Carolina and she felt like they were being skirted by Earl and would have no serious effects. Our daughter Heather on Cape Cod also wrote and said they were expecting to feel the effects of Earl tonight (Friday). So we will wait and see what happens. We surely hope this hurricane decides to head out to sea before reaching Cape Cod.
by Judy Handley | Sep 2, 2010 | Madagascar, Sailing Logs Year 5 |
Day 311, Year 5 Quiet Sakatia Day
Date: Thursday, September 2, 2010
Weather: Partly Cloudy Morning, Clear & Windy Afternoon
Location: Nosy Sakatia, NW Madagascar
Finally, a quiet day. We have been having too much fun the past few days and it was time for a rest. I re-wrote all of the emails I lost yesterday and that took all morning. Mark went up to Sakatia Towers to see John and to make arrangements to go to town with him tomorrow. John called the Hell-ville computer guru for Mark and made an appointment for 8 am. Mark spent much of the remainder of the day trying to find out what is infecting the files on his computer, but he was unsuccessful. This computer virus is quite tricky, but hopefully tomorrow’s trip to town will finally solve the problem. But even with all the problems, we were able to get online this morning, albeit briefly, and get an update on Hurricane Earl. What we read this morning indicated that it is picking up steam and heading north along the east coast of the US. Our daughter wrote and said they are expecting Earl to hit Cape Cod on Friday night. I sure hope something happens to send this guy out to sea before it gets that far north.
We spent much of our afternoon underwater. Low tide was mid-afternoon and it wasn’t as clear as usual, but we still enjoyed the sights. I saw a new wrasse today with the most beautiful turquoise and pink coloring. And I was able to finally get a photo of the juvenile phase of the Blunthead Platax. The adult Blunthead is commonly called a batfish, a type of spadefish, that loves to live around anchored yachts in Chagos and eat all the garbage thrown overboard. They are a flat fish as big as a dinner plate. The juvenile is all head with a very long fin going up and a another very long fin going down and then two smaller fins extending downward from just under its mouth. I had the underwater camera today and was practicing, so my photos of this fish are not as good as they would have been had Mark been doing the photography, but at least I now have a picture of it. We also saw the beautiful juvenile phase of the Imperor Angelfish today, so it was a successful snorkel. And just as we got in the dinghy to return to Windbird, we saw hump-backed dolphins in the anchorage. So it was a good day.
by Judy Handley | Sep 1, 2010 | Madagascar, Sailing Logs Year 5 |
Day 310, Year 5 One Fish, Two Fish, Big Fish, Little Fish
Date: Wednesday, September 1, 2010
Weather: Partly Cloudy, Clearing in the Afternoon
Location: Nosy Sakatia, NW Madagascar
At 6:15 am Mark, Ed from Constance, and Nick from Muneera left on Dream Catcher with Barry and his two eldest sons, Michael and Bradley for a day of fishing. While the fishermen were out and about, Tina and her daughter Candice and son Devon of Dream Catcher, and Andrea and her daughters Millie and Ella of Muneera hung out on the beach. I spent the four morning hours writing long overdue emails, and when I put them on a memory stick and put that in Mark’s computer to send them, they somehow lost their formatting and became digital gibberish. I do this every day and just can’t figure out how this could have happened. I could have cried, but instead I went to the beach and joined the crew there and just enjoyed the afternoon.
Mid-afternoon the fishermen returned with one huge Trevally, two big Spanish Mackerels. They caught a few small fish, and one huge Sailfin (like a Marlin) that was so big that it got away after making a show by skipping over the water on it’s tail. The fishermen also saw at least seven whales, three pairs and a single. So it was a good day out on the water.
We went to Pioneer to have dinner with Bruce, Nadine, and their seven year-old daughter Tristen. Bruce put some of the fish from the marathon fishing event on the grill and we ate and made plans for our trip north in the next couple of days. Tomorrow we will either stay here and prepare to leave on Friday or Saturday or we will head to Hell-ville in the boat to have the computer scanned for problems one more time and then we will head north. In either case, we should be in Nosy Mitsio by Saturday or Sunday.
by Judy Handley | Aug 31, 2010 | Madagascar, Sailing Logs Year 5 |
Day 309, Year 5 Baksheesh!
Date: Tuesday, August 31, 2010
Weather: Overcast with Occasional Drizzle
Location: Nosy Sakatia, NW Madagascar
The September edition of Cruising World has an article in it by Fatty Goodlander. It is called “Baksheesh!” and is all about our good friends Robert and Tina of Shirena. Baksheesh is the term for the under the table “gifts” you have to give officials in Egypt and other parts of that part of the world. If you can get a copy of the September Cruising World you can read the article to find out how the whole experience got to be just a little too much for Fatty. If you have been following this log, you probably remember that Robert had a heart attack in Egypt. Robert is Zbyszek Wasilewicz but always introduces himself as Robert. His reasoning is that Zbyszek is just too difficult for people to remember. We spent Christmas and New Year’s with Robert and Tina in Thailand this year and when we had a farewell dinner on New Year’s Day I gave Robert a bottle of wine called Robert’s Rock. I told him if he made it through the Gulf of Aden he was to drink the wine and that we would start calling him by his real name. Shirena made it, so we now call him Zbyszek. But in the article Fatty calls him Robert so I will continue to call him that here. On January 2, Shirena sailed out of Patong Beach and headed for Uligan in the Maldives and then for Salalah in Oman. At that time, none of us would ever have dreamed that Robert would have a serious heart attack in just a few months. As Fatty describes the situation in Egypt in the Cruising World article we relived the whole horrible time again. Fatty and Carolyn Goodlander on Wildcard and Tom and Nicolette Samson on Katanne were ahead of Robert and Tina and were already in Israel. After Robert’s heart attack Fatty and Tom flew back to Egypt to sail Shirena to Israel, but the trouble they had with officials in Egypt is what the article is all about. At this time, Shirena is still in Israel and Robert and Tina are back home in Australia. They do hope to be back cruising next season, but I know they won’t be returning to Egypt. The picture Fatty paints of Egypt’s officials is not a pretty one. Reading the article made me even happier about our decision to come south.
Here on Windbird, the oven has been on nonstop since 10 am and because of the drizzle we have had to keep the all the hatches closed. So its about 89 degrees F in here-not as hot as it was the whole time we were in India, but hotter than we have been used to recently. I baked two loaves of banana bread, two loaves of wheat bread, baked two chickens we bought in town yesterday, and then baked the potatoes, onions, and carrots to go with the chicken. Unfortunately the largest baking pan I have will hold two chickens but nothing else, so the chickens have to bake and then the veggies go in. This makes the cooking a long, drawn out process but the smells are scrumptious. Mark has spent the day working on this computer. It is not fixed so it is another long, drawn out process. We have been able to get mail and get online, sort of, but with online searches we get text only and no pictures, and sometimes we get nothing. Also, his Excel Spreadsheet program will not open. So he will continue to try and figure out what is going on. At some point, we will have to return to Hell-ville and stay there until the problem is fixed. In the meantime, our connection to the internet is tenuous at best, and needless to say, Mark is a bit frustrated.
This afternoon Bruce and Nadine of Pioneer returned to the anchorage and a boat we haven’t met before, Muneera, arrived. Nick and Andrea are the young couple on Muneera and they have two little girls. We talked to Bruce and Nadine on Pioneer briefly and they proposed that we head north with them in the next couple of days. We will talk to them again tomorrow about this but are seriously considering the proposal. We went to Dream Catcher for sundowners tonight with Barry and Tina and Nick and Andrea of Muneera. We had a fabulous evening sharing sailing experiences. Tomorrow Barry is taking the ‘boys’ out for a fishing expedition. At 6 am I will take our dinghy and Mark and pick up Ed on Constance and Nick on Muneera and deliver them to Dream Catcher. Since Tina and her daughter Candice will not be going on Dream Catcher, they are headed to Constance for early morning coffee. Then we will decide if the ‘girls’ will have an organized day of play as well. I like Tina’s idea of taking a book, a beach umbrella, and snorkeling gear to the beach. We can then read and snorkel our way through the day.
