July 10

We decided to leave Bagaman today finally. We had planned to leave on Saturday the 8^th but the weather closed in on us and it was 100% cloudy. We were going to head for Panacea island on the Western edge of the Calvados chain, but the entrance to that islands inner lagoon is very tricky (so the guide books and charts say) and can only be entered with good light.

Since it is getting on in the month and we are running down our food supplies we decided to head instead for the Duchateau Islands in the SW corner of the chain. This is our planned jumping off point for the passage to Australia and is supposed to be a lovely anchorage with no village on the island.

We motor sailed the 24 miles to Duchateau raising the anchor at about 9am and reached the Westernmost of the Duchateau islands at about 12pm. Skies were mostly sunny with a light 8-10k wind from the SE. We worked our way in through the many coral patches to anchor in only 15ft of water very close to the beach. It is very beautiful here. We are not sure how long we will linger here, perhaps for 3 or 4 days, before we leave for Australia .