Tag Archives: republic of marshall islands

The Blues of Alinginae

The Blue Hues of Alinginae

Alinginae is a relatively small, uninhabited atoll. There are only 25 islands that total 2.8 square kilometers (1.1 sq. mile) that enclose a lagoon of about 105 square kilometers (40.91 sq. miles). Its location has the atoll positioned east to west making it hard for cruisers to go there as there is not much protection from the tradewinds.  We  were the 4th boat to visit the atoll in 6 years.  A true pleasure and adventure for us.

Only yachties get to visit this pristine atoll as there is no other way to get here.

Ailinginae supports habitats and species that are otherwise vanishing from earth. At present Ailinginae’s continued protection is essential for the survival of many species and habitats and related natural and cultural values in the Marshall Islands.

In Route to Alinginae

Our sail from Rongelap to Alinginae was gorgeous!   During the passage, we had 1-1.5-meter seas coming from aft of the boat.  The winds were a modest 15-17kts making this a downwind sail.  We put our large parasail (170 sq meters).  She is such a pretty sail!

A strange thing happened about half way through our passage.  A number of birds circled the boat looking for lunch.  But one strange bird got tired and landed on the boat.  In the past, several birds have landed on the boat and rested.  But they usually land on the life lines or the bow peaks.  Today’s silly bird landed on the mouth of our spinnaker.  He only stayed for 10-minutes.

We arrived Alinginae after a 6-hour sail, dropped the hook and enjoyed a stunning sunset.

Sugar Shack anchored at Bokoryuren Island.  We take the dinghy 3 miles in each direction to explore more islands.

We were the 4th boat to visit Alinginae over the past 6 years. Can you believe that?  This atoll is difficult to get to.  But it is really pretty!

Beautiful Blue Hues

The color of Alinginae’s lagoon are a variety of blue hues.  Simply breathtaking!

The islands are lush and teaming with wildlife.

Our blog runs 4-6 weeks behind actual events. 

We stayed in Alinginae during the last part of January 2025. 

Don’t miss out on the beautiful sunsets and sunrises of Rongelap – read our last blog post.

Japanese glass floats

Rare Japanese Glass Floats

Norway originally produced glass floats in the 1800’s to hold up fishing lines and nets.  Later the Japanese started producing them in the 1910 and mass producing them in 1920’s.  And since they made so many the glass floats became known as “Japanese glass floats.”  The glass floats range from 2″-20″ in diameter.  The Japanese made most floats found today.

The most common color is green because they were made from sake bottles. Other colors include aquamarine (turquoise), clear, amber, amethyst, and blue. The most prized and rare color is a red or cranberry hue. Gold was used to make the cranberry glass making these very expensive to make.  Other brilliant tones such as emerald green, cobalt blue, purple, yellow and orange were primarily made in the 1920s and 30s.

Plastic and aluminum replaced the glass floats in the late 1940’s.  So, the glass floats that we’ve found could be up to 80+ years old!

It is super difficult to find large 12″ glass floats which is why they are the find of the century!  We were lucky enough to find a beautiful turquoise 12″ glass float in French Polynesia 6 years ago.  I was over the moon with this rare find!  We then found a 12″ green one in Maloelap. 

The Path Across Rocks and Coral

It is amazing to me that these floats make it onto the shores.  They are at sea for many decades. Then they generally, cross over the reef and sharp rocks / coral to get to the windward side of the islands.  

Leaves and trash cover most of the floats that we find.  It is a true treasure hunt to find them.  Can you find the small 3″ glass float in the photo?  This float just arrived with the king tide. He was sitting on top of the rocks, near the bushes.

Here is another opportunity to find a float. This one is pretty easy.

It is amazing that these fragile glass floats make it across all of these rocks.  Do you see the glass float in the large photo?

We find many small glass floats.  Looking at our pile you would think these balls are easily found.  However, we walked around 35+ islands searching for them.  We looked through the rocks, broken coral, debris, bushes, and trash to find these floats.

Disappointing Breaks

In fact, we are 10 times more likely to find broken pieces of floats than complete, in tact, floats.

We find so many broken beauties.  We also get tricked a lot.  The sun reflects off plastic  and glass bottles. The trick of the eye makes you think they are glass floats.  This red lightbulb fooled me too!

Rolling Pin Glass Float

The most popular “rolling pin” glass floats are the Hokkaido and Tohoku rollers. The Hokkaido Roller is from the island of Hokkaido which is located at the northern Japan. The Tohoku Roller is from the region Tohoku – just below Hokkaido.

Roller pin floats are more fragile than the round floats.  We feel exceptionally blessed to have found four!

We actually found another rolling pin float called “a sausage” (far right).  A true treasure.

Matt and I find some great items on our treasure hunt!  

And we found some stainless floats.

We hunted over 4 months, across 8 atolls and on 40+ islands.  It was a true treasure hunt. 

Our blog posts run 8-10 weeks behind actual live events. 

We share many critters we find in Rongelap in our last blog post.

The Amazing Critters of Rongelap

Rongelap has a large lagoon of about 1,000 square miles and over 61 islands around the atoll.  Since it is uninhabited it makes for a great animal habitat both on shore and in the lagoon.

Giant Clams

Several other cruisers talked about finding giant clams.  However, since we have not been in the water much we had not seen any — until we got to Rongelap.

Many locals harvest small clams to sell to aquarium providers in the States (Likiep and Ailuk). The clams are a mere 3″ long by the time they are sold.

The giant clams we encounter in Rongelap are close to 4′ long!  At Tufa Island in the southern end of Rongelap, we find these giant clams in 10-40′ of water.

The largest clam we found was about 4′ long and the the others were between 1-2.5′.  Super cool and very beautiful.  Matt was able to free dive down to the larger clams which were in 30′-40′ of water and I checked out the smaller clams (1′-2’5″) in 10-12′ of water.

Matt said the clam expelled a lot of water and tried to close when he approached the large clam. Lucky for Matt he did not put his hand inside.  In our video (which you can see on sv Sugar Shack Instagram’s page from 1.22.25) you can clearly see the clam breathing and closing.  Pretty darn cool.

We ended up finding two really large clams and maybe 4-5 smaller ones (1′-3′)

Nurse Shark

We found the perfect place to leave the dinghy during our stay at Tufa island.  One morning, we spotted a rather large nurse shark hanging out.

We drove the dinghy right behind him and anchored. I got out, walked by the shark, and took some photos.  The shark did not budge during all of this activity.  He was a good 5′ long and just enjoyed the shallow waters.

Bird Sanctuary

Birds are thriving with no humans living in 99% of the Rongelap atoll.  Very similar to Rongerik, we find dozens of bird species, nests and babies all over the northern islands. 

We encountered the strangest nest we have ever seen.  Maybe you have seen or read something about this?  We saw about a dozen birds sitting in a circle on top of broken coral and rocks – strange.  We did not approach, but as we kept walking near the waters edge the birds flew away.  To our surprise, they were each sitting on either eggs or newborn baby birds, in a circle!

There are 7 speckled eggs and 3 baby birds in the photo below – can you find them all?

The boobie babies are covered in white fuzz. They are so cute and I’d love to see if they are as soft as they look!

The white terns lay their eggs on the branches (with no nest see bottom right photo) and their babies grow on the same branch (top right photo).

Portuguese Man-O-Wars

Not so pleasant are the Portuguese man-o-wars that line the shoreline.  Not sure why but they are everywhere.  Matt makes a game out of popping them, but I just try to avoid the poisonous buggers.

Our blog posts run 4-6 weeks behind actual live events.  I wrote this blog post during the first part of January 2025.  Check out our last blog post with more of Rongelap’s beauty.