After a long, 3 day motoring session, we finally arrived safely into the Salomon atoll in Chagos at noon today, Thursday. As chris said, its not as compact as the Lady Musgrave lagoon at the southern end of the great barrier reef. Anyway, its a beautiful place ringed by a coral reef which only opens to the sea at its north west corner. Around the perimeter of the reef are about 10, palm tree populated, beach rimmed islands. After crossing a rather shallow bar at the channel entrance, the depths increased to about 60 feet. We picked up a spot alongside 2 other boats, one from Spain and the other from Austria, in a shallow, sandy patch between two of the islands on the south east side of the lagoon. There are a total of 8 boats in the lagoon, 5 others off another larger island across the lagoon.

True to form, it seems like the easterlies are trying to make a comeback, just after we complete our 1900 mile trip to get here, the last 3 days with not a breath of wind. Anyway, we are lucky the diesel held out - it was rather nail biting as the diesel gauge never dropped below 7/16ths of a tank, so we didn't really know how much we had left. I think i need to get a flowmeter for more accurate measurement in the future.

Although slow, the last few days were peaceful and beautiful. On the second evening we had a seabird, a boobie, hitch a ride with us for 18 hours overnight. He sat on the transom, right behind the wheel. Then pooped and left at about 8am to fly back to his buddies. Not at all scared of people. And 100s of dolphins swimming around the boat, maybe leading us to Chagos. Baby ones jumping high out the water. Always a special sight, especially in this water which is so clear and blue. Oh yes, we stopped the boat that second evening and had a swim in the clear clear water, 3 miles deep. Lovely. Then watched the sun set - like a soft painting with pastel colors.

- S/V Galatea