A Walk on the Wild Side

North Minerva with friends

On its way north just 25 miles south of Minerva a yacht yesterday reported volcanic activity. Their boat stopped in the water, unable to make forward progress even at 2000rpm and amidst the sulphuric smell of rotten eggs they turned right angles to the left to escape the highly aerated water.

We also smelled sulphur on board and just hoped it had travelled with the wind and not that we were sitting on a cauldron about to boil over.

The ‘joint departure’ was postponed for two days due to the arrival of another front in the direction we planned to sail and as Hannes worries about a fouled prop were happily proved to be unfounded by Rob’s exploratory dive we decided to relax with a walk on the reef.

We went in Hannes aluminium bottomed rib because the coral would be a lot less kind to our soft hulled dinghy and we wore thick soled sandals to protect from the razor sharp coral.

Such a flat scene surrounded us as gobies dashed out of our gaze more quickly than I could photograph them. The reef is strewn with mussel shells, various colours and shapes of coral, skittering camouflaged crabs and little pools with tiny caves each with its own sea urchin partly revealed and part hidden. Perhaps most spectacular were the turquoise lipped clams, their soft lips reflecting the colour of the water over white sand.

Taking photos was a challenge in such a flat plane of interest. I decided to try creating my own ‘height’ or ‘elevation’ with a subject in the foreground, then the reef and then the water and sky beyond. I think a portrait vertical shop gives the best impression. The presence of a human helps too and a yacht in the distance. The mistake I made in some of the shots was to get too close to the object in the foreground so the whole picture was slightly our of focus.

The red yacht you see is Muktuk (Inuit for whale blubber) with Andreas and Birgit aboard. We had afternoon tea with them and Hannes and Sabine on Muktuk and in the conversation discovered they were indeed the couple we had met at the yacht club in Akaroa near Christchurch when they were there on Muktuk and we were camping with Vicky.

Back on the reef. Rob wandered to the far side about a quarter mile across and paddled in the Pacific where the waves break in white foam. He could see the bottom where he was walking but then came to a deep blue fissure in the reef that went down into the depths to around 638 metres. There he saw a big 60cm oval fish with a yellow chin surrounded by a dozen or so smaller fish keeping it company.

Sabine had been hoping to catch some crayfish but we think it is the wrong season for them and they were possibly on a migration route somewhere. At least I hope it is not that they have been fished out by hungry cruisers.

On the far side of the reef two yachts and what looked like a motor fishing boat with a short communication mast were anchored. The next morning over some of Sabine’s delicious coffee and buns on Cayenne Hannes told us there was a drone hovering over Zoonie for quite some time the night before. It came, disappeared to the other side of the reef and then came back again. I became suspicious that it was from the motor yacht as the two others had left. The name of the vessel is Waipawa and we were to come across her again later.

On our last day in Minerva the sun and wind kept our batteries at 100% so we did not have to run the engine.

I busied myself cooking food ready for what promised to be a lively 400 miles to Fiji. A big curry, boiled potatoes and hard boiled eggs, the last two cooked together were soon loaded into the fridge. Always in the back of a cruiser’s mind is the fact these countries officers will often take away any fresh produce left on board. Well we didn’t want that did we!