There are only three islands with anchorages where yachts can go.  If you want to visit all three you need to obtain authorisation and pay a hefty fee.  Most people anchor in one place and then do short tours and visits from there.  There are very few places you can go without being on an official tour and properly guided so the first job is to decide where you want to go.  We thought about doing one of the four day cruises on one of the small ships that take 16 people but in the end decided that we would prefer to be land based given that we live on a boat.  Brad very kindly offered to stay on the boat while we were away which made all the difference because it is always a worry leaving a boat at anchor and it would have been a significant worry leaving here where  the holding is not that great and the winds can be quite strong.  

We settled on visiting the island of Isabella which is the largest of the archipelago – the one that looks like a sea horse.  It meant an early start to join about a dozen others on this ferry which was billed as a ‘semi fast speed boat’  The trip took about 2 ½ hours and with three huge engines it seemed to be moving pretty fast to us.