Snorkel South Fakarava

Rob and Bri had organized a dive with some other cruisers with the company Top Dive, so they were up and about really early this morning. I started to make cinnamon rolls for me and Ben, but they came back to the boat between dives with Mark so I decided to whip out pancakes since they were faster. The diving here is apparently fantastic, they were really exited about it.

After they went out for their second dive we radioed over to Osprey to see if they were up for a drift-snorkel. We decided to go a little bit earlier than slack tide since when the tide shifted it would start to pull us out of the pass, out to sea. Once we dinghied over there it was a little bit hard to get in the water. After being spoiled in the Marquesas by water temperatures of about 83, temps somewhere in the 70s (ok, high 70s) feels cold!

The colder temps were completely forgotten as soon as we saw all the reef life. The reef is shallow up near the shore (less than a foot deep), then it drops to anywhere between 5 and 20 feet, then drops again to almost 70 feet. The water is sometimes clear enough to see all the way down to 70 feet, but not quite today. Since there's so much variation in depth there's something for everyone here. I'm not comfortable free-diving at all--my ears won't pop once I get deeper than 5 feet--but Ben and Brian like to dive as deep as they can to check things out. Parts of the reef were shallow enough for me to just float along checking out the fishies and coral. I tried to count all the species of fish but lost track around 30. There were several different species of parrot fish, grouper, rock fishes, butterfly fishes, trigger fishes, etc. I need a fish guide book then I'll continue the list.

Since I was just drifting, completely mesmerized by all the colors, I got a little behind the group and Ben would come find me occasionally. Later he told me that the whole myth of "yum yum yellow" fins was true. He had teased me before that sharks like yellow swim fins more (hence the yum yum bit) but apparently it's somewhat true. There's several videos on his GoPro of blacktip sharks coming up behind me, taking a look at my fins and swimming away. This makes me feel so safe in the water. Later, Mark mentioned that he had noticed sharks checking out his fins too, which are yellow.
The sharks here are curious about humans, but it's because of spear fishing. They want to see if you'll get them a free meal. So if you have no spear, and aren't making the fish bleed you're totally fine in the water. Even if you have yellow fins.

There's a weather window tomorrow so we'll leave for Tahiti! Rob and Bri are looking for another boat that will stay a little longer in the Tuamotus and go to more islands. As a little going away shindig Ben made quinoa burgers which were fantastically delicious. Richard and Brian jo
ined us and we all ate until bursting and then ate some more. They tasted better than actual burgers! If we find avocadoes we have to make them again.

All the commotion of tasty food attracted other cruisers and Kyanos suffered a little "rum squall." A rum squall is when a couple people visit the boat, decide to stay and have enough fun that other folks start showing up. Joe and Liz on Set Me Free stopped by after their dinner; Mark came over just as we were pouring after dinner drinks. (Convenient timing). Kyanos doesn't have that big of a cockpit but we crammed almost 10 people in there. The best seats in the house were where Bri and I are sitting, any closer to the kitchen and the heat was too much. It also smelled so good from cooking the quinoa burgers that it made me hungry again.