Wotje is our second atoll that we have visited in the Marshall Islands. We spent a large part of our time at the Wotje motu discovering their WWII remnants. However, we also spent a lot of time exploring their beautiful motus.
A motu is a small, low-lying island or islet. It’s often used to describe islands made of coral and sand in tropical regions, especially in the Pacific Ocean.
We start our explorations with the neighboring motus. There are 4 that we circumnavigate over several hours. We have to work with the tides as it can be challenging to cross between motus. So, we leave an hour before low tide which gives us about 3-3.5 hours of exploring. Perfect for these 4 little spits of lands.
Normally Matt and I prefer to walk in flip flops, but with the terrain on the motus we have to resort to wearing shoes. About 1/4 of the islet will be sand with small pebbles. But at least 1/2 of the motu is made of sharp coral and reef which is difficult to traverse in anything but shoes.
The water is so clear it does not even look like it is there. In the top photo, there is water from me all the way to the dinghy. The 2nd left photo is one of our crossings between motus. The water is about knee high with a current coming from the ocean to the lagoon.
We meet some new friends including a grasshopper, lizard and lots of crabs.
The Unfortunate Truth
We come across this recently beached boat from Ecuador. Highly suspicious and probably a drug boat. It is over 6,000 nautical miles from home. Parts of fiberglass were strewn all over the beach. Drugs are rampant in the Marshall Islands and some drug runners use this as a transition spot into Fiji, New Zealand, Australia, and Hawaii.
I would be remiss if I did not show all aspects of motu walking. Unfortunately, across every country, every island has trash. The windward side being a collective area for everything plastic including tons of flip flops. Marshall Islands are no exception.
One thing we have never seen before in any of the countries we’ve been to over the last 8 years is a half melted mannequin. Of course Matt could not just leave her on the rocks…he had to position her sitting up.
We also take the opportunity to burn some of our trash. We have been away from civilization for about a month now with nowhere to dispose of our trash. So we take our paper and cardboard trash and burn it in an old FAD beacon. We leave no mark on the beach.
In the end, we walked about 15 motus within the Wotje atoll. Not very many considering there are over 75 motus around the perimeter of Wotje.
Our blog posts run 8-10 weeks behind actual live events. This blog post occurred around mid-November 2024. In our previous two blog posts we showcase all of the WWII remnants we found on Wotje including more anti-aircraft guns, coastal guns, bunkers, and several sunken planes and ships. Part I and Part II.
They had the most beautiful nativity set on display.
