About 1.5 hours into my watch I have to wake Mike as the wind changes and we start heading too far south. He alters course slightly but it’s not enough and he has to take the main down and put the twin genoas out more.
I wish I understood the ‘flappy bits’ but for me there’s as much chance of this as me being able to understand how planes stay up in the air. It doesn’t matter how many times Mike tries to explain it, or how many (dodgy) diagrams he draws, I give him that blank, vacant stare and an apologetic smile. Mind you, after nearly 30 years of marriage he still fails to understand how to fold any form of cloth, be it clothing, towels or sheets, although I have a sneaking suspicion that he understands perfectly just refuses to put it into practise for fear of being asked to put things away.
I manage to get a bit of sleep and when I wake up I look out of the window at my first glimpse of the Cocos Keeling Islands, a group of 22 tiny islands (only two of which are inhabited) forming a horseshoe shaped atoll in the Indian Ocean. It’s hazy and the waves hitting the reef send plumes of spray into the air.
Photo: Approaching Direction Island, Cocos Keeling
We arrive just in time to hear the morning broadcast announcing that we will be in before lunchtime and at the end of the broadcast I announce that we are just around the corner. Joe gives a series of waypoints to help us in through the reef and there in front of us is nearly the whole fleet anchored off a pristine white sandy beach with waving palm trees in the clearest and most turquoise water I have seen since the Tuamotos. Beautiful.
Photo: Port Refuge, Direction Island
The first thing we have to do is clear customs and we have to wait on board until he arrives. While we are waiting Jim and Bob come over and invite us over for drinks on Ocean Jasper tonight, then Mike gets the dinghy down to pump it up. What a sorry sight it is, deflated by 90% during the passage, and worse since Mike tried to fix the leak.
Photo: Mike in our barely inflated dinghy
Suzanna calls to announce the arrival of the customs official on the beach and we go over to make ourselves legal. Once the paperwork is finished, we go for a walk - it’s so lovely to stretch our legs after being cooped up on the boat for a week. On the horizon, we can see storm clouds gathering but the rain keeps at bay. We walk to the opposite side of the island, literally about a 100 yards away. As we walk through the palm trees we disturb loads of dragonflies, huge things nearly 4 inches long. The beach on the opposite side of the island is the one that takes the full force of the Indian Ocean, and it’s where all the flotsam and jetsam lands. Amazingly this is mainly in the form of flip-flops. Where do they all come from? The whole beach is littered with them.
Photo: Flip-flop heaven
We walk back to the anchorage side of the island and walk down the white sandy beach. White ghost crabs scuttle away from us and bright coral coloured hermit crabs quickly retreat into their shells as we approach.
Photo: Hermit crabs on the beach
At the tip of the island we stand and watch ‘the rip’, a tiny entrance in the reef where the sea literally rips through. The snorkelling here is meant to be brilliant, with live coral walls on either side. There is a rope attached so you can cling on, although being covered with slime and barnacles, this doesn’t seem very attractive to me, and the water runs too fast for my pathetic swimming. The beach at the tip is covered with huge lumps of dead coral, deposited by the sea during storms. It is mainly grey in colour, and although intricate in design, looks alarmingly like concrete.
Photo: Coral litters the beach
We walk back along the beach to the dinghy and head back to the boat for lunch then a little nap, before getting ourselves ready and going over to Ocean Jasper, where we join Jim, Maggie and Bob and the crews of Crazy Horse and Chessie.
Photo: Me, Jutta and Jochem
Photo: Me, Matt and Jutta
Photo: Maggie, Mike and me
We have a really lovely evening, but chattering away and with the wine flowing, I fail to notice quite how much of it is flowing into me, until it’s too late.
Our position is: 12 deg 07 min S, 98 deg 02 min E
Distance so far: 13898 nautical miles
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