158. Wayag

It had already been one week of cruising on SV Kismet and I was quickly growing back into the cruising lifestyle. We would be arriving in Pulau Wayag but first, we had another big milestone to check off: cross the equator south to north! It had been over a year since we all crossed the equator in the Pacific Ocean and went from polywog status to shellbacks. This equator crossing was much less monumental but we still took it as an opportunity to stop the boat mid-ocean and jump in.

A few hours later, we arrived in Pulau Wayag which seemed to be a labyrinth of islands with steep, dramatic peaks covered in lush vegetation. We motored to a sandy area and dropped the anchor before launching the drone. I nearly cried at what I saw from the sky. The archipelago was even more beautiful than I imagined and I had never seen anything like it, it felt like we were in the movie Avatar. Aside from the two other sailboats, the islands were completely uninhabited.

I woke up the next day and could hardly contain my excitement to begin exploring this paradise. As I stepped into the cockpit, I was disappointed to find cloudy, drizzly skies. I was in the most beautiful place in the world and couldn’t even leave the boat! Kevin, Sean and I worked on computer stuff all morning until I couldn’t take the cabin fever. I rallied everyone together for some snorkeling and we had an adventure of it. The designated dive sites were also quite unprotected with some big swell rolling in but we did our best to snorkel.

The next morning, the conditions hadn’t improved much, it was another rainy day. We repeated the same routing in the morning then Sean and I took the dinghy out exploring the inner lagoon. Luckily I loaded some maps on my phone because it was easy to get lost in the twists and turns. We snorkeled in the rain until it was too cold to be in the water. The next day was rainy yet again and it felt like nature was beginning to taunt us considering we only had one day left before making the trip back to drop off Sean.

The last full day in Wayag we woke up to sunshine and the surrounding islands were even more stunning. We got in the dinghy and then motored over to an island we heard had a trail to a viewpoint. The trail was quite steep but the hike only took around 10 minutes to get to the top and reveal a similar view I had seen with the drone: a more stunning landscape I still couldn’t believe this was our reality.

Afterward, we headed back to the boat to grab the scuba gear. Normally, when people come here to go scuba diving they stay on a liveaboard boat with full crew and tenders. Since all three of us wanted to dive, we couldn’t dive the marked sites because there was nowhere to leave the dinghy. We motored around and settled on a decent spot that we could anchor in and geared up.

We descended and picked a direction into the current and slowly made our way to the base of the slope, where the reef met a sandy bottom. A few minutes into the dive, I sensed a large shadow above me and looked up to see a manta ray swimming above! Sean had been joking all day that the only way this day could get any better was if there were mantas on the dive! We saw one, and then a few more passed us back and forth as they went about perusing the reef. About 30 minutes into the dive, we reached the end of the island and were greeted by the largest manta yet! We saw about six mantas on that dive and it felt truly special since it was our last day and we had randomly picked this dive site.

I was sad to leave Wayag after just one sunny day but we needed to drop off Sean in Sorong in a couple of days. So, we left early the next morning and spent the entire day motoring back to Pulau Pef, followed by the final stretch into Sorong the day after. We said goodbye to Sean and spent the next few days in a dumpy little marina in Sorong as Kevin ran a few errands. It was just a couple of days with Kevin and me before my friend Joni decided to join us for a surprise visit!