This morning when we woke up there was no wind at all and the water was smooth as glass. The water was actually a mirror, reflecting the clouds in the sky above. On the horizon, you couldn’t see where the water ended and the sky began. Up until the last couple of days the trade winds have been very strong. We thought around here the wind never died, so the calm has been something of a surprise for us.<\/p>\n
Manihi had no bugs that bit, so we were surprised to find that Apataki has a serious mosquito problem. They must breed in the pools of water. A few mosquito had managed to sneak aboard and just about ate us alive in our sleep. <\/p>\n
We ventured out in the dinghy in search of the village. We went about four miles and we saw one house and four metal shacks in the whole stretch. We also saw a motu, which is an itty bitty island in the middle of the lagoon. One of the shacks was on this motu. We saw one speed boat in the distance heading away from us. It is the only local boat we have seen since arriving.<\/p>\n
Along the way, we stopped in to walk around on the low land that separated the area we are anchored in from the area we were going to. In Manihi, the land was right at or just slightly under sea level, and it was a solid piece of land. Here, the low land was different. It was almost like there were several small lagoons parceled off from the main lagoon, all separated by small sand bars. These little mini-lagoons were quite deep in some spots. Eric hand rowed the dinghy through one of the mini-lagoons. It was neat because the water was clear and we could see a lot of creatures you don’t normally see when in a boat, like clams and sea cucumbers. The mini-lagoon ended at a pile of enormous rocks that separated the ocean from the lagoon. The rocks were barren of any foliage and almost looked like they were moonscape.<\/p>\n
During the day the water was still calm, but not still as glass. As the sun set, the water became calmer and calmer until becoming glass-like again. After dark we went out to watch the stars. With no moon it was very dark, making the stars amazingly bright. The stars were being reflected by the water. It felt like we were in outer space, with nothing but endless stars visible above us or below us. It was another unique moment for us, something that had never happened to either of us before. The time outside was short, as we were chased off by the mosquito and the sulfur smell.<\/p>\n
We know that most people learned this in high school, but Christi didn’t. So, for the benefit of all the people that went to her high school, here is a brief geology lesson. Islands are formed by lava shooting out through a crack in the ocean floor. The islands are big and mountainous. Plants eventually begin to grow on them, and over thousands of years the lava rock and the mountain erodes away. Meanwhile, in the shallow water areas surrounding the mountain, coral begins to grow and coral reefs form. Coral just keeps growing on itself, getting bigger. So, as the mountain erodes, the coral grows. A “young”\u009d island is still very mountainous with no reef, like the Marquesas. An atoll is an “old”\u009d island that has eroded away. Basically, all that is left is the ring of land that the coral grew around, like the Tuomoutus. A high island is in between. It has begun eroding but still has peaks, and it also has a coral reef around it. Tahiti is a high island. Everyone, please feel free to make any corrections or elaborations to this. Can anyone guess, will the atolls eventually sink, or will they last because of the reef?<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
This morning when we woke up there was no wind at all and the water was smooth as glass. The water was actually a mirror, reflecting the clouds in the sky above. On the horizon, you couldn’t see where the … Continue reading