Not many cruising boats heading west across the Indian Ocean make landfall on the tiny, mountanous atoll of Rodrigues, which is a department of the island nation of Mauritius.
The island sits 300 miles east of Mauritius and is known to be beautiful and remote but also difficult clear customs. Most cruisers heading west from Australia and Indonesia skip it and head straight to Mauritius. Not Canadian Brent Crack and Mary Bevan.
Brent and Mary don’t hue to the beaten path as they cruise their Lagoon 400 Knot Safely to the outer edges of the normal coconut milk run across the Pacific and beyond. They left Panama and sailed south to Easter Island before heading west into the prevailing winds to cruise through the Gambier Islands to Tahiti. This is not the easiest way to sail west in the South Pacific.
Then, they crossed the Pacific to Australia and instead of going over the top through the Torres Strait as most cruises do, they took the southern route into the Southern Ocean via the treacherous Bight of Australia to the western Australia. Not many choose to go this way against the wind and current.
In this installment of their round-the-world tale, we pick them up in Geraldton, Western Australia and sail with them to the remote island of Rodrigues, in the Mauritius Archipelago.
Strong winds, big Indian Ocean seas and long nights were one thing, but dealing with the bureaucracy in Rodrigues was a storm of a different magnitude. Read more on Noonsite.com read more here.
Here’s a link to a travel log on visiting Rodrigues. Click here.
Here’s a Google Earth snap of the island in the wester Indian Ocean.
