We left Herald Bay hoping to anchor down near the southern end of the island in order to have easier access to dive/snorkel/spearfish the southern pass, called Ningali pass on Open CPN. We couldn’t find a suitable spot to anchor, because it was deep right up to the coral shelf, so we would have had to anchor in 60 ft of water without the swing room to avoid the reef should the wind shift to an unfavorable direction. So, we ended up just plopping down on a shoal right at the southern pass. The weather was pretty benign, so we figured it would make an OK day anchorage. We spent the day playing and snorkeling in the pass, but then concerned over the conditions if we stayed anchored in such an exposed spot, we moved over near the village of Waikama for the night with Lumbaz. We thought it would be better protected, but it was pretty rolly itself, so the next day we went back out to the pass and just ended up staying out there the next night.
The general consensus was the the pass diving and snorkeling was pretty amazing. I only snorkeled once, and I have to say that I didn’t think it was anything special, except for the huge school of circling barracudas and the giant grouper. We’ve certainly seen much, much better coral.
Our next stop was just a short overnight downwind passage away, so we decided to depart after dark, through the Ningali pass. Yikes! Tim had dove it several times, and he also took the iPad out in the dinghy to record a GPS track to use but exiting a narrow pass like that at night: Yikes. Nautilus was coming with us, but they were having none of this nighttime pass exiting stuff, in fact they didn’t even want to go through Ningali pass in the daytime, and they left early and went back up to the pass we had come in through. Everyone said we were “brave” which really meant “crazy” or even “stupid.” Needless to say, Tim was at the helm, and I think this is one of the very few times I’d ever seen him get rattled. He didn’t actually show it at the time, but he talked about it after. Right about the time he thought we were just clear of the pass he got disoriented by some lights and somehow thought we had gotten turned around and were heading back towards the other boats still at anchor. Luckily, he kept his cool and trusted his instruments and didn’t hastily turn around or anything. That nighttime departure through that pass is one of the few things we’ve done that Tim says he probably wouldn’t do again.
Gresham Family Exodus 