Fakarava Atoll, North and South - June 6

Fakarava has been named an UNESCO Biosphere Reserve and is the second largest atoll in the Tuamotus. It is one of the most visited atolls in the South Pacific.  Fakarava is most known for its underwater beauty, and SCUBA divers come from all over the world to dive its pristine and life-filled waters  Fakarava’s most famous dive is in the South Pass with the “Wall of Sharks” with literally hundreds of sharks swimming lazily along the coral blanketed walls.  The pass is a small opening in the atoll where the outside ocean rushes in after low tide, or the water inside the atoll rushes out after high tide.  Fakarava has two passes.  Sharks and fish love to hang out in the currents of the pass as lots of food comes floating by.

I had the chance to SCUBA dive South Pass and experience the “Wall of Sharks” for myself.  Sorry I don’t have photos because my GoPro would not work at the depths we were at! But the views were amazing, with thousands of fish ranging from large groupers and tuna, to small clownfish (Nemo) swimming among the florescent yellow arms of the anemones.   The types of coral were as varied and colorful as any I have seen.  And it literally goes on for over a mile.

The dive starts at the opening of the pass, and you float with the current taking you in the pass.  It makes for awesome viewing, but you can’t really stop and hang out at the beautiful spots because the current is carrying you along, and you need to stay with the group.

The “Wall of Sharks” is perfectly safe.  The sharks were mostly black tip and grey reef sharks. They swim in the current to increase their oxygen supply for hunting later.  They paid no attention to all the humans drifting by!

One of the most interesting parts of the dive was towards the end when we came back to the small pier where the dive shop is located. The pier provided a shady area where large groups of color fish congregated with sharks nonchalantly cruising by. Often the shallow part of the dive is the best because the bright colors of the fish and coral show up better.  As you dive deep you lose colors due to different light wavelengths getting absorbed by the water.  But the deeper you go you tend to get larger fish, so its always a tradeoff.

In the afternoon we took a quick dinghy ride over to a nearby motu. Motus are small islands that line the perimeter of the atoll. Some are small, only a hundred feet across and others can be quite large. The motu we visited provided Danielle with some excellent shell hunting. She is planning to do some crafts with all the amazing shells she has collected.

After our dive in the South Pass we got up the next morning and set sail for the north side of the island where the main village was located.  This required us to sail straight up the middle of the atoll.  The channel is well marked on the charts with reefs, rocks and large coral heads (aka bommies) all noted.  BUT is still makes me nervous thinking about the one bommie that they may have missed!

It turned out to be one of the loveliest sails of our trip!  We had about 12 knots of wind right on our beam making for a perfect reach.  The water in the atoll was smooth so the boat trucked along at 7 and 8 knots under sunny skies.  Perfect!

As I approached the north end of the marked channel, the channel came to an end and opened up into a bay that we were going to anchor in.  I cut a diagonal across the bay, and soon noticed a few small buoys.  I got nervous thinking they were marking reefs or hidden bommies, but none were on the charts.  I then saw buoy after buoy, and some strung together with lines in-between them.  We tried dodging all the buoys, but there were just too many!  It was literally like a mine field.  A small power boat rushed out and pointed us in the right direction to sail to get out of the mess. We made it safely, but it was definitely tense for a bit with Danielle on the bow trying to direct me through the maze!  We later found out this was a pearl farm, and it was marked on the chart, but written in French so I did not know what it was!  ARRRGGGHHH!

We have spent a couple of days here in the north at the village.  Its packed full of cruisers, at least 35 boats, mostly large catamarans.  The supply ship had just come in so we got some fresh fruit like apples and oranges and some veggies.  This stuff is like gold out here!  We even splurged and had a nice dinner out with our cruiser friends on Grateful and Wind River.  The food out the outdoor café was good and even reasonably priced.

We will hang out here for a couple of days and then will head off to our next atoll.  Not sure which one yet…