About as soon as we crawled out of bed, it seemed that things moderated from the previous night's rocking and rolling. But really it hadn't. We had just got a little wind and lined up into the swell instead of sideways to it. We looked at the forecast for the next few days, and it looked like little would change.
So we decided we go take a look back at Chatham Bay, where we had anchored originally. Our dives for the day were supposed to be at Manuelita Island, the little island we'd snorkeled from the dinghy the first day. So we radio'd in to Wafer Bay and talked to Jody about going on around to Chatham in the big boat. He said OK, that they'd pick us up from our boat in Chatham.
Dave thought that Chatham Bay might be better. Even though the winds were out of the NE (totally exposed to the NE in Chatham), the swell was the thing that was killing us, and that seemed to be out of the NNW.
Well, needless to say, Chatham was no better... quite a different place than 3 days ago when we arrived. But we hooked to the mooring... it was rocking and rolling, but safe enough for the boat. And we went with Jody and Eduardo and did the dive at Manuelita.
It gets really dangerous getting in and out of the dinghy in conditions like that, with the boat and the dinghy bucking up and down 6 feet. We had left most of the dive gear in the dinghy, and just had to climb in with our wetsuits and BC's. But it was still hairy.
Today Jody and Eduardo had the bigger skiff, so we decided to take everything in their boat. (with the conditions the way they were, it would have been terrible for Eduardo to try to maneuver with 2 dinghies tied to together).
It was wild out by Manuelita, huge waves crashing into the wall and ricocheting back. We got fully geared up and rolled in over the side, while Eduardo maneuvered the skiff away from us. It wasn't bad down below... except visibilty was less than it should be. We started out at 90' and gradually traversed the island and rose to about 45'.
At the N end of Manuelita, we were finally rewarded with a sighting of about 10 hammerhead sharks, lazily swimming in circles (waiting for lunch!!). They ranged in size from about 7-10 feet... and they sure look menacing with their eyes in the side of their heads. Scared the heck out of me!!
We saw lots of other cool things... a turtle, and marbled rays, and fish who weren't afraid of us at all. Jody saw a yellow-bellied sea snake, but couldn't point it out to us before it disappeared.
After the dive, our plan was to move around to Iglesias Bay, on the South side of the island. Jody said he'd check when he got back, to see what the reported conditions were. A half hour later, we got a call that said that Iglesias was the same as Wafer and Chatham, and we should come back around to Wafer Bay.
Well, Dave and I both felt that Iglesias HAD to be better, being on the south side. We had heard the Okeanos Agressor (another liveaboard dive boat) call and request to stay there another day. So we told them we were going to go around the island and take a look at Iglesias for ourselves.
It was a nice motorsail... but boy were those waves big 'outside'. We hugged the island as much as possible. Though it was a little scary being in so close. We do have a chart (bought at the flea market in Golfito for $2), and I scanned it in to the computer, and though it's positioning was off on the GPS, we'd been able to more or less correctly geo-reference it with Sea Clear.
We could tell once we got around the back side of the island that things WERE much better. We could see the Okeanos with the binocs and they seemed to be anchored calmly. It turned out to be a little harder to find an anchorage than we thought. We didn't have any waypoints for this spot, and its DEEP here. We finally snuck really close in and dropped in 25 feet. But after snorkeling the anchor, we were in some coral, so while I stayed in the water to 'spot' the anchor, Dave re-anchored. We finally got a good spot in sand in about 30', with almost enough swinging room.
A few days, we would have called the conditions here 'lousy'. It is rolly and a little risky anchorage, but after 3 nights elsewhere in much worse conditions, it was positively lovely here.
And the scenery is fantastic. There is a rocky beach ashore (with waves crashing on it), some palm trees, and up the valley is a big waterfall. I'm sure Dave will want to swim in and try to hike to the waterfall on our own today.
We do plan to go back around to Wafer Bay early tomorrow morning, to go on a hike with the park volunteers, up to Cerro Iglesia. Hopefully conditions will have moderated some by then. (the forecast in the Gulfs of Tehantepec, Papagayo, and Panama all show easing conditions in the next 12-24 hours).
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