The photographic art of © 2005
Robert F. Burgess.
All rights reserved.
< home tech_sig.gif (6025 bytes) Email:hunterb4@gtcom.net
title: Marquesas Night

(see the full-size close-up below)

This pair of Com-Pac 16 sailboats, Nomad and Drifter, sailed out of Key West together one tropical July day, following the inside route called "The Lakes" that took them 30 miles west of Key West to the Marquesas Keys not far from where Mel Fisher’s team finally found the fabled long lost treasure of the Spanish Nuestra Señora de Atocha in 56 feet of water. The islands are named for the Spanish noble who headed Spain’s salvage crews searching for the shipwreck there. This scene depicts our evening arrival on the northwest corner of the island where we hastily tossed over anchors and waded ashore to a small dock, our sails still up, our cabin and running lights on. It was a perfect night with star reflections in the calm waters. Before leaving Key West, Mel told me to look carefully at the Marquesas beaches because the bow of the Atocha had washed ashore there. We found a piece of a ceramic olive jar on that beach the next morning, and believe it to be part of that wreck. The poster-sized enlargement of this scene is just as spectacular as the scene we saw that moonlit night.

 

This is a close-up image from the full-size print, showing the detail involved

marquesas-night-frag.jpg (190501 bytes)