Sailing to the Remote Anchorage of Motu Faama on Ranigora in the Tuamotus

Hello friends, my name is James and this is my 1965 Albert 30 Sloop Tritea. We are on a mission to sail around the world and see as much of this beautiful planet as possible. We are currently working our way through the South Pacific and I can't wait to show you everything we see. Good morning friends, it is time to haul up here at Kia Ora Anchorage on Rangiroa and we're going to make way for a very secluded anchorage called Motu Fama or Fama Motu. It is on the southwestern side of the atoll of Rangiroa. Rangiroa is the second largest atoll in the world. It's so big that you can't see the land or motus across the water. Our passage today is like 17 miles and we're going to be sailing directly across the uncharted lagoon. I've found accounts of people that have made the passage direct to this motu and they said there were no obstructions. I'll still be keeping an eye out for coral bombies but everything should be chill. We have a little bit of breeze. We'll see. We'll probably be motor sailing just so we make sure we get there before dark. One of the reasons I'm heading over to Motu Fama is because the winds are planned to increase to 20 knots southeasterly and this anchorage has good protection but I would get trapped here and not be able to explore any more Rangiroa and I need to be leaving this atoll in like a week's time. So I'm going to take advantage of the calm day today. Get over there. That anchorage has good protection from southeast winds and it's supposed to be fantastic. So it is time to haul up and make way. Wow there's a booby bird checking them out. We are motor sailing across the lagoon. It's interesting there's like maybe 10 knots of wind. I tried to just sail. I killed the engine. We're only sailing like two and a half knots. I want to get over to this anchorage and get settled. But look how much fetch there is just from 10 knots of wind. Like when that 20 knot wind show up I wonder the waves will be pretty decent in here which there's no swell. It's nothing compared to ocean sailing but it is interesting how much fetch there is just from 10 knots of wind. We're 11 miles from the anchorage and I can already see the motus on the other side of the lagoon. That's what's fascinating about this lagoon is so big that you can't see land on the other side. So when I first left it just felt like I was sailing into the sea but a giant like an ocean minus the ocean swells. So like a massive lake probably similar to what it feels like on the Great Lakes when there's not storms happening. But very very wild. Main thing you got to watch out for I'm not concerned about coral bombies so much. I am trying to keep a visual on everything but there's also pearl farms and they're not really marked so there'll just be a series of floats and so that's something we got to keep an eye out for. But we should be into the anchorage in like three hours and get the hook set. So now it's time to get back on buoy watch. Oh scary. Glad I was on watch. Yikes yikes yikes. Boy that'll get your blood pumping. That coral reef was like maybe two feet below the water. I saw the turtle which is rare. Turtles are kind of rare here. I saw a turtle before I saw the turtle before I saw the water color change and I'm a little shocked with this fetch that it didn't the water wasn't disturbed in a specific way which is scary and very telling. But it's a good lesson to learn you can't just think that you'll see disturbed water. Yikes. Oh ----. Okay we are about a mile from the anchorage. That other boat that came here I think they I think I said their name is Sugar Shack. They anchored right between these Motu Fama and whatever that Motu is called. There's like a pass. They anchored right there and said there was really good sand. We're gonna drive over and look at that and kind of scope out that zone and see what the seafloor looks like. Find a spot that's mostly sand and as little coral bommies as possible. We will be I have two floats so I can float the chain. When you hear the two Motus a lot of times you have to float your chain so that it doesn't get wrapped around coral bommies. So I don't but I only have two floats and it'd be better if I had like four to six. I could use fenders but fenders compress when they go underwater so when the wind blows and it pulls your chain it makes it sink the fenders compress and they're pointless. So the I have rigid called buoy pearl buoys is the best thing to use. I have two of them so we will definitely be floating our chain but we'd like to find as clear of an area as possible and um yeah that's what's up. We're gonna head for that spot right there. So the visibility was too poor to see the anchor itself but there's no obstructions there's no big bommies or anything that we're gonna have to worry about and I floated the chain so now we just chill out make some lunch and sit anchor watch. Okay we got anchor watch done let's go for a dinghy ride and see if we can find a place to land on one of the Motus. Hell yeah that was easy totally clear it's all sand there's like an opening no problem my first ever uninhabited Motu. Let's go have a look around there's this crazy beautiful I think they're called a size is what Kimberly taught me it's like the inside of an urchin or something but it it's got that looks like a sand dollar on that side look at that thing now how beautiful is that I don't know what it belongs to but it is very very beautiful that is neat oh maybe it's that crazy it's got spikes on it I don't want must be one of those dudes crazy let's walk out here to the ocean and see what there is to see that is so crazy looking there's like a ton of them over here look at that guy this would be a shell collector's paradise no one ever you know this is uninhabited Motu that probably no one ever comes to and the people that do come here probably aren't interested in picking up shells so many cool shells though standing in this field of like shattered coral broken coral everywhere it's making like rice crispy treats I mean rice crispy cereal sounds you can see through to the other Motus these crazy lava formations that have been worn down eroded over time this is one of the reasons I wanted to come here these shapes of these rocks is totally bananas they're also insanely sharp like razor razor sharp really really neat to see the ocean is raging against the outer reef coming in hard that's a scary thing for a sailor to see you get a in the grasp of one of those ways with that reef your boat is done for it so cool makes me very happy picked up some drinking coconuts I lost one here's my little one you can hear him so I picked up a number of little shells and then I thought better of it when I got to the boat just now to the dinghy and pulled them out of my pocket and looked and four of them had guys in them that big guy's he's getting out of here he's been in my pocket he's been in my pocket for like half an hour cool shell though look at him he's pretty cool huh these guys are high talent very very that's the first time I ever had that problem if you enjoy the content on this channel and would like to contribute you can consider joining the patreon crew thanks for watching fair winds until next time