Anchorage at Lelepa Island, Vanuatu

Our first anchorage once we left Port Vila just had to be Lelepa Island. Last September we spent some time here and loved it. The winds this time caused us to come around to the west side of the island to remain protected from the eastern trade winds.

I was thinking we'd have to take the tender over to the other side of the island to snorkel as it was so beautiful over there during our visit last season. Ha! It's even more fantastic over here! We're anchored in 16m of crystal-clear water about 150m off the shoreline. This entire side of the island has amazing coral from about 40m out and continuing right up to shore. Standing on our swim platform, you can look straight down and just about count the particles of sand on the bottom 16m down!

Motoring along this shore in our tender you can stop at a dozen little bays to swim and snorkel amongst clouds of reef fish who are unafraid and in fact want to hang out with you. Bringing a piece of banana along doesn't hurt either!

Closer to the village of Natapau on the southwest side is Fels Cave which is a Unesco World Heritage site. The cave contains petroglyphs that are 3,000 years old and we tagged along with another group to get a tour from a local guide. Extraordinary to stand in the same spot someone stood in 3,000 years ago to paint these petroglyphs!

This is a very special anchorage and we've been privilege to share it with only one other sailboat, however tomorrow we head out to continue our explorations of Vanuatu to the north.