Wreck Bay Heaven

I´ve now been anchored in Wreck Bay for going on 17 days and am in no hurry to move on. The anchorage is among the most beautiful I have come across with sapphire water and unobstructed views to the sea floor 30 feet beneath "Avventura´s" hull. The water is so clear that on one moonlit night while returning from dinner ashore you could see the entire hull six feet underwater in the dim moonlight shining through a thin layer of clouds. The cruisers I´ve met here are as nice as any I´ve come across and as varied a lot as you´ll find (boats from South Africa, New Zealand, Canada, France, Germany, to name a few)--most in transit to the Marquesas and points further west.

The bulk of my time has been spent surfing, reading, writing, and relaxing with some boat work thrown in for good measure. The surf here has been a pleasant surprise with its consistency, size and shape all exceeding what I had been expecting. Just yesterday I surfed 4 different spots for a total of 7 hours. The surf was 6 foot, a mix of southwest and north swell that turned on every spot on the island. After a morning session with the Kiwi Nick off "Pina Colada" at Canons Mike and I took the dinghy up the coast with the South African trio of surfers off "Robyn´s Nest" to the Manglacito where we surfed six foot perfect, fast lefts without another soul in sight. The wave broke off a desolate stretch of coast covered in green vegetation climbing the barren hillsides towards the blue skies above. The wind was slightly offshore and there was a hook in the reef where you were guaranteed a chance at a tube. One of the South Africans, Dave, a sixteen year old, is a good surfer and was pulling into impossible tubes and somehow coming out, though he did take a couple hard wipeouts. When the "Wavehunters" boat arrived with a dozen surfers we started making our way back to Wreck Bay, stopping at Isla Lobos where I had previously snorkeled with Sea Lions. This time we surfed a little hollow lefthander breaking directly off an islet of jagged rocks. If you fell on the takeoff you´d become ground-up seal bait, but we all made the drops and got a dozen fun and fast waves before calling it an afternoon and returning to Wreck Bay. Once back at the Bay I said good-bye to Nick and Patti on "Pina Colada" (we had become pretty good friends and they were sailed for the Marquesas yesterday afternoon) and I capped off a day of surfing with a stop at the hollow, shallow left of Tongo Reef where I surfed for an hour by myself and another 30 minutes with one local on consitent and fun overhead surf.

The Galapagos has lived up to an exceeded all my expectations thus far and I´ve yet to sail past the first island (San Cristobal). I am taking my time here because I have been warned that this both will probably be my favorite anchorage and that it is very difficult to fight the wind and current to return here. Thus the plan is for another couple weeks here before moving on to the other 3 or 4 anchorages I am allowed to visit in the islands. Tentative date for departure for the Marquesas is April 15, wind, weather and fun permitting. I am uploading pictures to my site (www.flickr.com/photos/avventura) as I type, but it is a slow connection so I don´t know how many of the 75 will make it on there, but it should be enough to give you a flavor of my last month of travels. Sorry for the lack of updates but internet here is slow and unreliable...More when I can.

Pura Vida!