Great town, but less than great anchorage. Academy bay is a large
bay with the opening pointing towards the south east, right about
where the swell comes from, so it's not the flattest anchorage. You
need to put a stern anchor out to keep the boat pointed into the
swell otherwise you will go nuts as the boat will roll from side to
side.
So why come here? The town Santa Cruz / Puerto Ayora is awesome!,
oddly enough it's a little like Byron Bay on the east coast of
Australia. Lots of bars, restaurants, surf / dive shops, internet
cafe's everywhere, lots of tour operators. It's also the home to the
Darwin Institute where they continue work looking into evolution
following Charles Darwin's theory's.
There are a couple of surf breaks just on the outside of Academy bay
so when the swell and tide is right the local and any visitors are
out having fun with the seals.
There is lots to do here, but we decided to just chill and enjoy the
town. Eating out is a great deal, very inexpensive and you get
enough to turn you into a sumo wrestler. So we spent a far bit of
time in the local eateries. After 6 days at sea, eating out tastes
extra good!
While we were here we also met up with the guys on the Australian
boat (Perth) "Sabalo" they arrived the same time we did. We first
met them in Colon Panama so it was good to see some friendly faces.
There are three on board and are all keen surfers so the surf break
outside the bay was going to get a visit from them.
While in Santa Cruz we stocked up on lots of fresh vege's ( the
supply ship arrived while we were there) filled up with fuel, wow
cheap fuel US$0.28 a liter!! wish we had bigger tanks! We also
found that our engine start battery was close to dead so we had to
get a new one. Outside of this it was just enjoy the town and some
of the local sights.
One night whilst talking with the guys on Sabalo they told us they
read in their cruising guide that with our clearance into Academy
bay we were able to stop in "Post office bay" on Santa Maria
island - about 30 miles south of us. This sounded great! As most of
the Galapagos is a "national park" boats are very restricted on
where they can go, so this sounded like a great idea and we set up a
plan to sail there and have a dinner and movie night.
The night before we were to leave we heard a call on the radio from
another Australian boat that we met in Panama, "Polly". Colin had
just arrived ( 8pm) after a horrible trip down from Panama, it took
him 20 days! Poor guy, he had engine troubles and a few other
problems, being by himself on the boat there was little he could do
but wait for the wind and unfortunately go slow.
He was coming into Academy bay somewhat disabled, very tired and by
himself, with that it was quite rolly and dark. After a while on the
radio and using Reverie's radar we were able to guide him into the
bay and get his anchor down. He did an awesome job sailing into the
bay, getting the anchor down and dealing with the sails. Not sure
how long "Polly" will be in the Galapagos for but we guess as soon
as he sorts out his engine problems he will be off.
After doing our final preps and clearing out of the Galapagos for
passage to French Polynesia we were off. Reverie left at about
midday, Sabalo left about 7am!! Madness! On the way out we passed
a massive fish feeding area, the water was boiling with activity,
little fish jumping out the way of the bigger fish. We were excited
and we had two lines out, this was our chance. But nothing, not
even a little bite on the lines!!
BUT!!! about 30 min later BANG!! off went one of the lines, we
were both excited, pulling in the line we had hooked a nice Yellow
Fin Tuna about 2.5 ft long. After chopping and filleting and packing
him up we put the lines out again to try our luck some more. This
time BOTH lines jumped !!, the fish on the port side line
unfortunately got off but we managed to keep the other one - Another
Yellow fin, same size as the first! As we were cleaning up the mess
off the back of the boat the line still in the water went off
again!, in it comes and another Yellow Fin, what a day three good
size fish all in the space of 2 hours!
We had the lines out for the rest of the trip but it all went quiet.
Luckily as Jason was getting over chopping up fish, and tuna bleed a
lot so the back of the boat was a bit of a mess and needed a clean.
Arriving into Post office bay was great, there were a few other
boats there (all tour boats) and Sabalo but best of all it was dead
flat! We got the hook down at about 5:30 pm, spoke to Sabalo and
decided to move the dinner movie night to the following night. That
night we had some fresh tuna on the BBQ, and a long sleep without
the boat moving around like we were in Academy Bay. The next day was
not what we expected!.
Around 9am we (and Sabalo) were visited by the National Parks Patrol
folks, they were not happy that we were in Post Office bay - We
weren't sure what the issue was, the cruising guide said it was ok
and it was published in 2006!, either way they were not happy and
took our clearance papers from us ( we need these to arrive into
French Polynesia). We were then told that we both must follow them
around the corner to the islands main Port! ( didn't even know there
was one!). Now we were getting concerned and also felt like
criminals being escorted into Port by a patrol boat!
We arrived put the anchor down (another rolly bay) why do they put
the towns where the anchorage sucks!. Aside from this we were all
feeling a little nervous. What were they going to do? It was an
innocent mistake made by incorrect information ( they change their
rules in the Galapagos quite often, so it is impossible for a
publication to stay accurate). They could have said that we were
not allowed to be there and we should leave, which we would have
done. But no, we were escorted into town.
We managed to get a water taxi to pick us all up and take us into
the dock, from there we went to see the "Parks" people.
The office was a run down little building - more like a shed in your
back yard. It was full of about 6 guy's all giving us the bad looks,
there was also the Navy guy dressed in his uniform. He was young,
and appeared to be looking for someone to try and enforce his
authority upon. In his top pocket he had our Zarpe's our clearance
papers, he
was holding onto these like they were the keys to our lives.
After talking with the guy in charge ( via Caleb, one of the crew on
the other boat "Sabalo" who luckily spoke a little Spanish) we were
told that the matter had to be referred to the "boss" back in Santa
Cruz. We would find out the following morning!. The result was to be
either a smack and they would let it fly or they would fine us, if
they were to fine us the amount could be quite high and it would
require us all sailing back to Santa Cruz - and they would have to
escort us!
We left the office all feeling quite like the hardened criminals
that we were and all quite nervous. All we wanted to do was pick up
the anchor and leave!
The anchorage we had here was not too bad, a little rolly but lots
of sea life around, huge turtles swimming around the boat, and lots
of seals taking a lot of interest on the swim step on the boat.
While we were ashore Jo looked back out to Reverie and saw something
on the dinghy ( we store our dinghy upside down on the deck when we
are sailing). Jason looked out and could see something also, we
decided that it was most likely a pelican. When we got out to
Reverie what we saw was not a "pelican" it was a bloody big seal!
This thing was huge, he climbed up on the swim step, then made it
into the cockpit, up onto the seats, along the side decks then up on
the dinghy! Once we got on the boat we chased him off, thank god he
didn't want to take a look down stairs, we have no idea how we would
get him out!
The following morning (Friday) at 10am we jumped into the water taxi
and went back into town ( well it's not really a town more like a
camp site with houses - only 106 people live there so there isn't
much) . Off we went to the office to find out our fate.
This time there was a different guy in the office behind the desk
and none of the others were there. This guy was really nice, he
thought that since we didn't get off the boats and we only put the
anchor down there was no big deal. Unfortunately the matter was
taken to Santa Cruz and now had to be resolved there. He was on the
phone for quite a while trying to find out the outcome, but found
out nothing. We ended up waiting for a few hours and left with no
mor information on the outcome. He did say that he would call us on
the radio at 12:30pm and let us know what's going on as he thought
he would know by then.
Right on 12:30pm the radio jumped to life, we were told that we ALL
were to come into the office at 2:30pm! - Sounded quite ominous!
When we got in the office it was full again, including the navy guy
with our Zarpes in his top pocket! They had some papers for us to
look at and sign. It was in Spanish so we were not sure of the
complete
details but it was a statement of the events. We were then told that
we needed to document down in our own words why we were there. We
did this and felt that all would be good. Our friendly Parks guy
went out for a while and came back with the town doctor who speaks
excellent English. The doctor gave us a full explanation of what
was going on. It looks like we will not be fined BUT they highly
recommended that we leave that night ( after dark!) not why we had
to leave after dark but she said that if we are still there in the
morning we will probably have to be escorted to Santa Cruz and pay a
fine!.
So it looks like we were being kicked out that night! Leaving in
the morning would be nice but we were glad that we were able to
leave!
We had a few quiet beers and decided that we'd pull up the anchor
around 10pm.
More to come.....
Cheers!
J&J
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