AIRMAIL YOTREPS
IDENT: N6ABC
TIME: 2016/03/30 13:28
LATITUDE: 03-58.24N
LONGITUDE: 081-41.16W
COURSE: 239T
SPEED: 6.6
MARINE: YES
WIND_SPEED: 5
WIND_DIR: NE
WAVE_HT: 0.0M
WAVE_PER: 0
SWELL_DIR: NNW
SWELL_HT: 1.0M
SWELL_PER: 6
CLOUDS: 50%
VISIBILITY: 12
COMMENT: Beach House – ABEAM – Malpelo Island; Day 2 – 126 nm
A note to our Facebook followers….So you know, we cannot receive Facebook \”at sea\”, but know lots of comments are being left our notification system – thanks. We now have over 450 email subscribers and over 250 Facebook followers.
The best way to contact us directly is:
Nikki is at: nicolaw(AT)sailmail.com
Scott is at: WDB5638(AT)sailmail.com
We have satellite email, but NO internet. We remote post via satellite. Our \”on board\” emails cannot take any attachments.
We arrived at 0630 local time and the first thing I thought is that King Kong must live here. No jungle, just a stark barren (but beautiful in it\’s own way) rock. It\’s about 3000 (1Km) feet long and just under 1000 feet high (300 meters). The top looks like (but I don\’t think is) a volcano like looking dome. There are roughly 10 nearby pinnacles sticking out of the water like needles to a height of about 40-80 feet.
We hailed and received three different radio voices. One female and they were merely acknowledging our presence and intended route. Eventually, they told us we could not stop without a permit, but we suspect the real reason was that their supply vessel was here on the one and only mooring on the east side of the island. Going ashore would be most daunting! There is a gantry about 40 feet above the water that extends out about 80 feet and I suspect either a gangway is temporarily lowered or a bucket seat is deployed or maybe even a rope ladder! The cliffs are absolutely sheer.
As such, we said hello and thanks and did a circumnavigation of the island which took about 45 minutes. You could easily see the appeal here for the dive crowd as they would use the mooring and do large dinghy diving off the pinnacles. Apparently, the shark action here is world class.
This was a lark anyway and only added a total of 30 miles to the entire trip. I\’ve just topped up the fuel tanks and we\’ve plenty left. If the wind doesn\’t appear, we can motor the entire way with fuel left over. We\’ve 535 miles to go which should take at this speed about 3 days. We should arrive at San Cristobal Island, Galapagos on Saturday morning. For those who have followed us a long time, that will be where \”Beach House\” crosses her own wake and completes her world circumnavigation. Bitter sweet and I\’ll have a blog on it soon after our arrival.
Motoring along,
KIT,
Scott and Nikki