Ron, Bradley, and I continued our journey to The Swains. We enjoyed some fabulous diving and snorkeling and great success with spearfishing.  We had an encounter with a hammerhead shark

For an explanation of photos, position mouse over photo. 

Wed Mar 26

Arrived at Sandshoe Reef in the Swains at 3:30pm. I got to drive while Bradley and Ron both kept a lookout and radioed instructions to me (Bradley from partway up the mast and Ron from the bow).

 Wed Mar 27

We spent the day hunting – snorkel/spearfishing trips in the morning and afternoon. The morning netted two large spotted cod and Bradley’s first lobster!

We had the lobster for lunch and planned to grill one large cod for dinner (we’re still working on filling the freezer with fish). But the afternoon hunt yielded two more large lobsters, plus another spotted cod and a small coral trout. Since the lobsters won’t keep well, we eat them for dinner and save the cod for tomorrow. Bradley pretty nearly OD’ed on lobster.

There is some excellent snorkeling here with a great variety of fish. It’s the prettiest coral we’ve ever seen. Most of what we saw was pretty shallow – we didn’t identify a great dive site and will probably move on tomorrow.

Thu Mar 28

Departed for Horseshoe Reef at 10:00am and arrived in the early afternoon. A nice sail with just the headsail. Went hunting and found a bommie we named Snapper Reef as we were able to fill the cooler with three large snapper. We came back to clean them and put them in the freezer for our next guests who will be visiting soon.

As Ron was cleaning the fish at the back of the boat and discarding bits and pieces in the water, we attracted several remoras (sucker fish) who came for a free meal. Some of them were good size – more than a foot long. We joked about them looking like sharks. Then Bradley let out an exclamation – “Holy S----! There’s a shark as big as the dinghy”. Now, Bradley can be prone to exaggeration, so Ron and I thought he mistook a large remora for a shark. Bradley insisted he had seen a large shark. And sure enough, we saw it too! It was a very large 12-14 foot Hammerhead just swimming around the stern of the boat checking us out. Yes, hammerheads are dangerous to man, and we had been in that water just 30 minutes ago.

 We cooked the large spotted cod on the grill and it was excellent!

Fri 3/29

We did a dive on the wall on the south side of the reef. We went down to 98 feet – my deepest dive yet. It was a nice wall for a dive  - we saw a very large moray eel, but fortunately no hammerhead! We had a little rain shower in the afternoon.

 Sat 3/30

Sailed in the morning to Snake Reef. A perfect sail – winds 10-12 knots but we made over 7 knots boat speed with nice flat seas – just gorgeous. Arrived in time for a snorkel/hunt – and out most productive outing yet. We bagged two spotted cod, one spangled emperor, and one yellow sweetlips. All nice size. Beautiful snorkeling – we also say lots of blue spotted rays and a few reef sharks, but no snakes.

I made bread in the afternoon. It was a little tricky as we had bought bread mix that only had instructions for bread makers. But it came out just perfect. Bradley made blueberry muffins which we had for dessert after some marvelous chicken on the grill. An absolutely beautiful moonrise (one day past a full moon). A very calm night.

Sun Mar 31

Awoke to the calmest sea you could ever imagine! Visibility is incredible. We headed out for an early dive on the west side of the reef. It was just spectacular. Colors were great – beautiful coral. Saw two HUGE gropers and also a gigantic sea snake. Had two friendly remoras keep us company for awhile. One seemed to be in love with Bradley (and he was wearing his very thin wetsuit). A short snorkel afterwards resulted in two small coral trout but Ron lost his spear after shooting a lobster that retreated into a deep hole.

Winds are picking up and are expected to reach 25-30 knots by tonight. We’re heading out towards Airlie Beach mid-afternoon.

Mon Apr 1

Sailed from 3:00pm Sun and arrived at Cid Harbor at 7:00pm Monday. What a sail! We had 25-30 knot winds most of the way with occasional stretches of more than 40 knots. Had just a triple reefed main up for a good part of the trip and made excellent time. It was mostly a comfortable downwind sail. Towards the end, the auto-pilot started acting up. Had a comfortable night at Cid Harbor.