Cruising Log of "Sabbatical III"
December 17, 2008
Sabbatical III was hauled out today. A few more repair and maintenance items and then we are ready to return to the US. The thick schools of big blue jellyfish were a concern this morning as they twice got caught in the water intake that cools the engine and clogged it. But we made it OK with a little help from our friends. We will fill in the details later.
M.
December 13, 2008
We are still in the Scarborough Marina getting the boat ready to be stored for the season. She gets hauled next Wednesday and we leave for the US two days later. We have been able to visit with friends and tour some of southeastern Queensland. Most of these photos are from Steve Irwin’s (the Crocodile Hunter) Australia Zoo. We went with our friends from Tackless II (Don and Gwen) and Whistler (Duncan and Robin). Tackless II brought Joshua, their grandson’s teddy bear, and took photos of Joshua meeting the animals.
Mark
Yesterday we left Dockside Marina in Brisbane and sailed to our final destination of this season – Scarborough Marina up in the small town of Redcliffe. It took just a few hours – a two hour motor down the river from Brisbane to Moreton Bay and then another 2 .5 hours north to Redcliffe. The Brisbane River was still filled with debris – logs, thick foliage, tires and bottles – from the 3 storms the previous week and we had to proceed very cautiously down the river. I stood on the bow as Mark steered and tried to alert him to any large submerged objects so he could veer around them. Our friend Jim on “Cardea†– who is sailing alone- followed closely behind us. As much as we enjoyed Brisbane, it was nice to leave the brown river behind us and head up into the cleaner water of the bay. Scarborough Marina is quite large – there are about 240 boats here – many of them belonging to Aussies – but a good number belonging to cruisers like us who are either leaving their boat here for the season – or just stopping off for a few months and touring the country. When we were about a mile from the marina we started seeing some blue blobs in the water and thought at first that there was garbage in the water – but it quickly became clear that it was not garbage – but very large, and abundant blue jelly-fish. There were thousands of them. They are actually very beautiful, but a bit creepy. We certainly won’t be doing any swimming here. There are also many sharks here – and not the kind you want to go for a swim with!
There is a terrific seafood market just ¼ mile from us and all the marine facilities that we need to take care of our end of the season boat maintenance. Mark has a huge list of boat maintenance projects we need to get through before we leave.
Happy Thanksgiving and happy birthday to Mark and his twin sister Frannie!
L.
November 22, 2008
We are still berthed at Dockside Marina located in the middle of the city of Brisbane. Towering over us is a set of 25 story luxury condominium/apartment buildings making up a large new development called Dockside. There are still some buildings under construction and units in the newest buildings are still for sale. All of this is located on a narrow peninsula in the Brisbane River called Kangaroo Point. The central business district is right across the Story Bridge, or, more conveniently, a ferry stop away. We bought a weekly Tranlink ticket that provides for unlimited use of the ferries, buses, and train within the central city. At AUS$23 each, it is quite a bargain.
Downtown is dominated by tall modernistic skyscrapers. There are restaurants and food courts everywhere. The densest concentration of shops is on Queen Street, a pedestrian thoroughfare with outdoor cafes and every imaginable type of store, including two underground supermarkets. On Thursday and Friday, we bought take-out sushi on Felix Street and then walked three blocks to the Botanical Gardens that front the river. After dining at a picnic table in the shade, we walked the length of the park and then crossed the river on a pedestrian bridge (Goodwill Bridge) to the Parklands, a beautifully park that stretches out for at least 2 kilometers along the south bank of the river. The Parklands contains restaurants and cafes, gardens, Griffiths University, the Performing Arts Complex (Concert Hall for the symphony orchestra, opera, and dance companies), the Museum of Art, an artificial swimming lake with a sand beach, and a gigantic Ferris wheel, among other things. The beach was crowded with mothers and children at one end, and teenagers at the other. We took a ride on the Ferris wheel, which provided us with an excellent view in all directions from the comfort of an air conditioned gondola.
The weather has been hot and humid since we arrived. As we noted in our previous post, the most damaging storm in 25 years blew through Brisbane a few hours after our arrival. There have two more severe storms in the past few nights. Having three storms in five days is very unusual for Brisbane, we have been told. The rain was torrential and by the time the third storm hit on Thursday night, there was serious flooding and wind damage. Roadway underpasses flooded trapping cars, roofs were ripped off houses, and there were power outages. The Brisbane River rose and flooded its banks to the north and west of the city. The river turned chocolate color and by Friday morning masses of debris – tree branches, logs, masses of green foliage, and discarded junk from the river banks upstream – started to fill the river. At the ferry landings and marina and other places where protrusions stick out into the river, this debris completely covered the surface of the water up to a foot thick, and birds walked out onto it. In the evening we heard something whacking the hull of Sabbatical III and went out to find that a large log had wedged between the boat and the dock and a huge mass of debris had collected behind it. As Laura held the flashlight, I used a large pole with a hook to move the debris away from the boat. Local boaters told us that they have never seen anything like this since the great flood of 1974.
Usually we are awakened in the morning by the wakes of the many ferries bringing people into the downtown area. This morning we slept in, undisturbed by wakes. It turns out that the river debris formed a hazard to navigation and all ferry service was cancelled quite suddenly at 6 pm yesterday (Friday) evening , just after we took the ferry back to the marina, and will not resume until Tuesday morning at the earliest. We had to use buses to get around today. The river is now eerily quiet, and the lack of roll from boat wakes which makes our time on Sabbatical III more pleasant. Our planned Monday morning departure for Scarborough Marina is unlikely to occur. With the river as it is, we would either damage the prop in a collision with some floating object, or overheat the engine as debris clogged the cooling water intake. We have had our departures delayed because of the weather many times, but never before because of debris in the water. On the bright side, this is a great town to get stuck in for an extra day or two, and all of this rain marks the end of a period of serious drought in Queensland. It is against the law to use a hose to wash a boat or water a lawn. Perhaps that will now change.
M.
This was the headline in the Brisbane newspaper on Monday November 17th, the day after we arrived. As we approached Moreton Bay in Australia (on Sunday) where we were to make our first landfall since leaving New Caledonia, we heard on the radio that there was a “high wind†advisory for the area . We had known that a storm was predicted for the coast of Australia on Sunday, and had timed our departure from New Caledonia six days before, calculating that we would arrive before it hit . The storm was not supposed to arrive until late in the day and we knew we would arrive by mid-morning so we were not overly concerned about it. It was a gorgeous, hot and sunny day and our entrance into Moreton Bay was lovely – the huge bay was filled with kayakers and sailboats and also big cargo ships waiting to either drop off or pick up cargo from the docks at the Brisbane River. It was not terribly windy and the skies were perfectly clear. We got to Rivergate Marina and immediately were boarded by the check-in officials from quarantine, customs and immigration. Everything went smoothly and they were all really friendly and professional, despite all the rumors we had heard from other sailors that Brisbane had extremely tough check-in procedures. It couldn’t have been easier. Then about 4:00 p.m. as we were just resting and relaxing after our long passage we saw the clouds start to darken, and by 5:00 p.m. the winds had increased to 30 knots, it was pouring and there was just an incredible amount of lightning. Huge jagged streaks came down from the clouds for the longest time with driving rain and gusts up to 35 knots. Finally the lighting stopped, but it continued to rain all night . We just slept through the night, however, being exhausted from the trip and also feeling all safe and secure in our slip. It was not until the next day that we found out that we had gotten there just in time for the biggest and most damaging thunderstorm in Brisbane in the last 25 years! Here is a quote from the newspaper: “ Soldiers, low security prisoners and police recruits will today help to clean up Brisbane, which was declared a natural disaster area after it was lashed by one of the most damaging storms to hit the Queensland capital in a quarter of a century.†Wow – we felt very lucky that we had not been out at sea when it hit!
We spent only one night in Rivergate Marina and then moved six miles upriver the next day to the Dockside Marina. Dockside is right in the center of Brisbane, on one side of the Brisbane River which is lined with dozens of very beautiful condominiums, manicured lawns and gardens, walking paths, several restaurants, and best of all, a ferry dock right at the marina that takes you across the river in 4 minutes to downtown Brisbane. It is a very large city – just jammed with commercial property of all sorts – banks, businesses, restaurants, coffee shops, malls within malls and every kind of retail shop you can imagine. There is a pedestrian mall downtown that stretches for blocks and walking along it at mid-day is like walking through Boston. It is jammed with people. Ferries run up and down the river taking people back and forth to wherever they are headed and there are efficient well marked bus routes and all sorts of public transportation. It is fun to be in such an urban environment for a change.
When we moved the boat up to the Dockside Marina from Rivergate we were a little worried about how we would tie up to the dock. Normally there is someone at a marina who can help you by grabbing your boat lines and tying you up to the dock. It is hard for us to do it alone as Mark has to steer the boat and that leaves just me to leap off the boat and tie off 4 lines quickly before the boat drifts off and knocks into neighbors. (Luckily we are rarely at a dock). This marina is mostly for locals who are at work all day and the woman who works in the office told us she can not help with lines. The weather forecast was for strong winds, and there are strong currents on the river which would have made bringing it up to a dock unaided even more difficult. We were in luck though, as our neighbors on the dock we were leaving were actually crew members (on a large and beautiful 68 foot Oyster). They, Lorenzo (Italian) and Candia (German) were nice enough to drive up to the Dockside Marina at the same time as we were sailing up, and then met us on the dock to help with lines. It turned out to be especially helpful because the slip that had been assigned to us had another boat in it when we arrived and we did not know where to bring the boat. We also could not easily contact the office as the woman who runs it does not moniter a VHF. Lorenzo found her by using his cell phone, got us another slip assigned, and then he and Candia walked down the dock and grabbed our lines and easily tied us up. What nice people we meet along the way!
It is very strange how some things don’t work very well here though. We have been trying to get a simm for our cell-phone for two whole days now and even though the downtown area is filled with mobile phone shops, we still do not have a working phone. Today we got a simm from Vodaphone – one of the two major suppliers here – and after spending 3 hours in the office – providing them with every piece of information possible (including our passport numbers!) we still do not have a working phone. They insisted on us having a local phone number before they would issue us a cell phone, so we gave them the number of the marina. How can you have a number here if you are getting a phone for the first time? When, after 3 hours, we were still there in the office and the simm did not work, we asked them to simply refund our money so we could go on our way. Unbelievably, they refused saying they do not make refunds. Even when it was clear that it was their product that was not working, and we never even left the office or were able to use the phone for one minute, , they refused, saying that once they sell you something it is “not refundableâ€. Amazingly frustrating. So, right now we are out $60 for a simm and a pre-paid phone plan that just doesn’t work. We are hoping that maybe the system will accept us somehow later today and we will be able to use the phone. We could get a cell phone chip that worked in all of the very undeveloped countries we have visited (like Vanuatu where most of the cell phone users don’t even wear clothing), but here in Australia it is all a big mystery.
At least we can use the internet from the boat here, and tomorrow we will get a regular old phone card and be able to use the pay-phones on shore.
No worries, mate.
L.
It is Sunday, November 16th and we arrived at the Rivergate Marina outside Brisbane at about 1:00 p.m completing our 830 nm passage in 6 nights. The last day of the passage was great – nice wind and smooth seas. All in all a very easy passage. We would have loved to have a little more wind, but with wind you get more ocean swell and therefore more discomfort, so I have to say that I was quite happy with how the trip went. We probably motored about half of the 6 days. We are both very tired now as we did not get enough sleep on the trip – just short stretches – and what we need right now is a quick dinner and a long uninterrupted sleep.
Good night. More tomorrow.
L.
Sailing from New Caledonia to Brisbane, Australia
Friday, November 14th, 2008
03:30 UTC (14:30 local time)
Position:
S25.25
E 156.59
Winds: light and variable
Seas: light
Speed under sail : 4.2 knots
Forecast: more of the same
We are now more than 600 miles from our departure port of Noumea, New Caledonia and only 200 miles away from our arrival port in Brisbane, Australia. At our current pace we expect to arrive in Brisbane on Sunday. It has been a slow, but comfortable ride. The forecast we had for light winds for most of the week ended up being light winds for the entire week. There is often not enough wind to keep the sails full so we have had to motor at least half of the way.
The engine noise and smell gets annoying and we are trying to sail as much as we can even if it means moving along at barely 4 knots (a good speed on Sabbatical III for a passage like this would be more like 7 knots). Days have been mostly clear with phenomenally blue skies and a deep blue ocean. It is warm. There is some ocean swell which keeps the boat rocking a bit, but nothing compared to our trip last year when we banged our way down to New Zealand with strong winds, storms and big seas.
The big full moon keeps it bright as day at night except when the occasional rain shower moves through. We take turns sleeping so that someone can look out for ships and make sure the sails are set right. So far we have seen two large ships, but both were several miles away. We have daily radio contact with 3 other boats. We are eating well on the boat, but will be out of all fresh food by the time we arrive. Good thing too as Australian quarantine is known to take away most everything that is not canned.
So, all in all, things are good.
L.
November 13, 2008
We sailed all night last night in light/moderate winds and rain showers. Today we are mostly motoring as winds are less than 7 knots since noon. The swell has increased to about 6-7 feet.
All is well but we are wishing for wind.
Position at 4:25pm New Caledonia time:
S 24 degrees 41.56 minutes
E 158 degrees 55.25 minutes
Course 240 degrees magnetic, motoring at 6 knots. Winds west at 4 knots, seas 2.0-2.2 meters in swells.
M.
November 11, 2008 10:20 am local time
We left the fuel dock in Noumea at 12:30 pm Monday, well ahead of our planned Tuesday morning departure. There is a storm forecast to come up the east coast of Australia from the south that should reach Brisbane late Sunday night. We wanted to be sure that we were in Bribane before the storm arrived, so we left early.
In spite of the forecast of light winds for Monday, we had a terrific sail coming out of New Caledonia. As soon as we left Petite Passe and entered the huge lagoon of New Caledonia, we were making 8.5 knots under sail. We entered the ocean through Passe Dumbea, about 10 miles away. The ocean swells were light and the wind was great. We kept up 8.0 – 8.5 knots in flat seas until 10 pm. Then the wind just died. We motored Monday night in clear skies and an almost full moon.
Yesterday (Tuesday) morning, we set poles and set our genoa to port, but when we tried to set our ballooner (spinnaker) to starboard the head of the sail ripped, rendering it unusable. It would have been the perfect sail for much of the day. We improvised by sailing wing-on-wing with the genoa and main. We had to motor a few more hours during the day, but just before sunset the wind came up a bit and we were able to sail all night, although at only 5 knots. The wind has moved forward of the beam this morning and we are motor-sailing in 6 knot winds from NNW and seas less than 1 meter. Skies and clear and the air is warm.
Our position at 10:30 am Nov 11 (Local time) is:
S23 degrees 41.93 minutes
E161 degrees 51.43 minutes
We are making 6.3 knots on a course of 239 degrees magnetic.
The other good news is that I cannot find any trace of water in the transmission, so the repair we undertook in Noumea seems to have fixed the problem.
Both Laura and I heard whales surface near the boat last night but by the time we looked for them, they were gone. I wish they would stay and visit with us for awhile.
We left Noumea just two hours before Cardea with Jim and Kevin aboard, and 20 hours before Sol Searcher with Ray and Peggy. We have an informal SSB net with Carea and Sol Searcher every evening. Magnum (Uwe, Anne, and Kara) joins in the net as well even though they are still hanging out in Iles des Pines waiting for more wind.
M.
November 10, 2008 (0900 local time)
We will leave Noumea for Brisbane, Australia in about two hours. There is now fuel at the fuel dock and a bit of a weather window. This window will not last long, so we need to depart today. The passage is about 830 nautical miles (950 miles) and will take about 5 1/2 – 6 days. The winds are forecast to be light/moderate to start, becoming light and variable, then becoming moderate to strong at the end. There will be some wind shifts as we pass through a area of weak low pressure. We will send updates along the way.
M.
November 8, 2008
We are still berthed at the Port Moselle Marina in Noumea, New Caledonia, waiting on the weather. It appears that we may leave for Brisbane, Australia on Tuesday morning. We have been waiting for a low pressure system to come up the eastern coast of Australia and dissipate, and for another area of low pressure to the west of us to move away. Both events now seem likely.
We were going to do the checkout from New Caledonia on Monday. Fortunately, our friends on Magnum decided to check-out yesterday (Friday) morning and then came back to tell us that they learned that Monday and Tuesday were public holidays and all of the offices would be closed until Wednesday. So, we canceled our lunch date and immediately engaged Rikki of the boat Temerious to drive us in the appropriate order to the three offices (Customs, Immigration, and Port Captain) required for clearing out. She also stopped at the Casino supermarket so we could pick up some heavy items. With the four day holiday, we are clear to leave anytime through Wednesday without having to contact any authorities. I also emailed our details to Australian Customs and Immigration, as required. Our plan is to leave the marina tomorrow morning, purchase duty-free diesel (as a departing foreign vessel), and then sail to one of the small motus near the Passe Dumbea , our planned exit from the reef that surrounds the big island (Grand Terre) of New Caledonia, and anchor out until beginning our passage to Australia Tuesday morning. We walked over to the fuel dock just before it closed this evening to learn the lay of the land and found out that they are out of fuel! Two large motor yachts came through and bought all of their fuel. The woman at the fuel dock said that they ordinarily get a fuel delivery on Monday morning, but this is a long holiday weekend, so that it not certain. Even though it is likely that the fuel onboard Sabbatical III is sufficient for our passage to Australia as the winds are forecast to be good, I hate to leave on a long ocean passage without a full tank. Tomorrow, we will see if the yacht club can sell us duty-free fuel, if not we may have to stay in the marina until the fuel dock gets a delivery. I am hopeful that we will make our Tuesday morning departure schedule since weather windows are scarce around these waters and we have been waiting 2 ½ weeks for this one.
M.
October 31, 2008
We are still in Noumea, waiting for the right wind to blow us to Australia. The forecast suggests we may be here for a least a few more days.
Yesterday we went to the beautiful Tjibaou Cultural Centre which celebrates Kanak culture.
M.
Some of our photos from the past few months are now available for viewing. Just click on the links below. Each set of photos will open in a new browser window.
Photos from Vanuatu:
Plus a short new video of dolphins chasing Sabbatical III on the way to Noumea is available on our video page.
October 28, 2008
We remain at the Port Moselle Marina in Noumea, New Caledonia. We have completed almost all of our preparations to go to sea and now just wait for a weather window for the passage to Australia. The earliest we can leave is Thursday morning since we have not yet done the check-out, which involves stops at Immigration, Customs, and then the Port Captain. A wonderful weather window opened on Saturday and resulted in the departure of many boats including most of our friends. There is a big fat area of high pressure in the Tasman Sea and no low pressure for hundreds of mile. It is not clear that this good weather window will last until Thursday, and if not, we will wait patiently in Noumea.
The reason that we could not leave with the others is that we had an important repair to make on Sabbatical III. After we arrived in Iles des Pines, I noticed that oil in the Amel transmission was suddenly mixed with sea water. Amel’s like Sabbatical III are unusual in that they do not have a prop shaft. Instead, power from the engine is transmitted through a set of gears that are contained in a tube located in the keel. This tube is filled with about 2.5 gallons of oil and rises into the engine compartment to a point above the waterline. The prop itself is attached to the keel. This is Amel’s own design and it has various benefits. The drawback of this system is the possibility that seawater may find it’s way into the oil-filled gear tube as the prop turns. To reduce that risk, Amel’s have three redundant seals on the bronze bearing for the prop. These seals and the bronze bearing need to be changed every two years or so as they can wear out. The bearing and seals on Sabbatical III were changed just before we were relaunched in New Zealand in May, and so are quite new. Nonetheless, the presence of water in the oil indicated a leak and the only logical place for the leak is where the prop turns in the bearing at the bottom of the keel.
When we arrived in Noumea, I found a marine repair specialist, Monsieur Caubert Gerard, through the Cercle Nautique Caledonien, the yacht club of New Caledonia. Gerard and his associate Patrick met us at the marina on our first day in Noumea. They took us to Nouville Plaisance in their truck, the marine repair facility on the far side of the bay, to book a haul-out, and then we all went out for lunch in the port district. We were hauled yesterday morning and it took about 3 hours to replace the bearing and the seals. Fortunately, I had two spare sets of bearings and seals aboard Sabbatical III or else we would have to have them shipped to us from Amel in France. Gerard speaks only a little English so Laura translated my understanding of how the prop drive system must be disassembled. That understanding came from a detailed English-language document written by an American Amel owner and posted on the Web. In preparation, Laura researched mechanical and marine terms in French in her “French for Cruisers” book. The boat was back in water a bit more than three hours after she was hauled. Things seem fine but we will not really know until she has been running under engine power for some hours. The need to haul the relaunch the boat for this repair made it fairly expensive but we are quite fortunate to be in a place with a yacht haul-out facility (for example, there is none in places like Vanuatu, Tonga, and Samoa), and to have an experienced person like Gerard around for the job.
The hardest part of the day was getting back into our berth in the marina. The wind kicked up while the boat was “on the hard” and was blowing 25-28 knots when we were put back in the water. Typically, it is pretty easy to back Sabbatical III into a slip by using the bowthruster, a small electrical propellor in the bow of the boat that turns the bow to port or starboard. To steer in reverse, I can only use the bowthruster as the rudder is pretty useless then. Yesterday the wind was blowing so hard across the bow that the bowthruster was not powerful enough to fully counter the big gusts. I had to abort my first attempt to back into the slip as we were almost blown onto the boat that shares our double-wide berth. I made it on my second try thanks to a team of fellow boaters than ran out to help catch the lines that Laura threw, and then pulled the boat into place as I worked the bowthruster as hard as I could. We were both frazzled by the experience. In hindsight, we should probably not have even tried to come back into the marina under those conditions.
To our delight, Regine and Gerard of the French boat Galdus came into the marina and are berthed just 30 feet away from us. We have not seem them since Tonga last year except for a very distant wave in Lifou a few weeks ago. From that distant wave we knew they were somewhere around New Caledonia. They served us a wonderful lunch on Galdus today and we had time to catch up with each others adventures. They also enquired about Benjamin since they got to spend time with him when Ben visited us in Tonga last year. This is the second circumnavigation for Regine and Gerard, their first was 25 years ago.
Plans
When we leave for Australia, own plan is to sail to Brisbane (Queensland) and do our formal check-in at the port-of-entry at Rivergate Marina up the Brisbane River. If the wind does not cooperate, we may instead make landfall at Bundaberg, about 120 miles to the north. This is a passage of about 830 nautical miles and should take us five and one-half to six days. From November until next May, the boat will live at the Scarborough Marina in Moreton Bay, about a two hour sail north of Brisbane. She will be in the water until mid-December and then get hauled for dry storage for about four months.
M.
It’s Friday, October 24th and we are now in Noumea, the capitol city of New Caledonia. We are on a dock for the first time since we left Opua, New Zealand six months ago. We left Ile des Pines a week ago and had a beautiful 45 mile sail to Baie Uie where we spent 2 nights. The sail took us past a few reefs and tiny islands (all accurately charted) and through a gorgeous channel (Canal Woden) which flows between the mainland of Grande Terre (the name used to describe the big island of New Caledonia) and the outlying island – Ile Ouen. We had heard that the chop and the currents in the channel could be daunting, but the winds were light and we had the current running with us and it was fantastic. Really a beautiful passage.
The weather turned nasty once we tucked into Baie Uie and we just stayed on the boat, watching movies for a day, waiting for the weather to clear to finish the sail to Noumea. On Monday we sailed in to Port Moselle in Noumea . A couple of large dolphins swam and dove around the boat for a while as we neared the entrance to the harbor. Noumea is a busy place, with hundreds of sailboats at the docks and out in the anchorages. It is a good sized town – much bigger than any we have been in on this trip. We keep running into other sailers that we know – which is a lot of fun. We have a couple of friends here who we have been trying to catch up to all year, but our paths never crossed until now.
We are really enjoying being on the dock – there is a fantastic fruit and vegetable market right next to us – coffee shops, patisseries, restaurants, stores. It is very much a French island and the food is all wonderful. We could easily eat every meal out if it weren’t so expensive! We have been visiting with friends, doing boat chores, doing a little shopping, and getting ready to have the boat hauled on Monday in order to do a small repair.
We will probably be heading to Australia within 10 days!
L
October 13, 2008
Soon after we posted our last blog, we left Baie de Ouameo for Baie de Gadji in the northwest corner of Ile des Pines. Baie de Gadji is strewn with small islands and reefs that form a protected basin, almost like a lagoon, in a beautiful setting. The only problem is that Sabbatical III draws too much water to enter the basin. Instead, we inched our way along the southeast cost of Ile Moenoro until we had less than a meter of water under the keel, and dropped our anchor in a spot less than 500 meters from the basin. The spot we anchored in is not well protected from strong tradewinds, but is perfect for light winds, or winds from the north or west. The forecast called for winds clocking around to the north and then west, which they did, so it was a perfect place to spend four days.
The snorkeling was among the best of the season. As the winds fell to less than 5 knots and clocked around from the north, we were able to snorkel on the fringing reef where ordinarily large swells would break. We snorkeled over 100 meters of shallow coral alive with small fish to reach a drop-off with a wall of coral descending at least 30 meters into the sea. Along the drop-off we saw lots of larger fish including a blacktipped shark, sting ray, eagle ray, and big groupers and trevally, as well as a sea turtle.
In the shallow protected basin, we found only one vessel, Cool Change, one of the boats that was with us in the Port Vila to Ouvea rally. As a catamaran with retractable dagger boards, Cool Change needs only a meter of water depth. They reported that catching trevally (fish) was easy from the dinghy, and showed us one they had just caught, so Laura and I gave it a try. We had no success, although it was fun to try. I think my lures are all too large — they target large pelagic fish like tuna rather than the smaller species that live in lagoons. (Ciguatera is not a problem in this lagoon.)
After four days in Baie de Gadji the tradewinds came back in force, and our location became less advantageous. Moreover, the chop and swell made snorkeling difficult. So we headed back to Baie de Ouameo (5 miles away) in order to arrange a car rental (our first of the year) from the Hotel Kedjoe. Our first priority was to buy fresh fruit and vegetables from the market in Vao, which is held only on Wednesday and Saturday. We got our car at 8 am Saturday, the earliest time that it was available, and drove along the coastal road to Vao where we ran into our friends from the Dutch boat Joanne whom we had not seen since Samoa. We got to the market at 9 am at which time the fruit left for sale consisted of a single pamplemousse. The pamplemousse was still available because of the small worm hole on one side. We were desperate so we bought the pamplemousse (no discount for worms). The only veggies left in the market were unappetizing green tomatoes, not counting yams and sweet potatoes. We had brought a big backpack and some cloth bags that we intended to fill with fresh fruit and vegetables from the market, and all we got was a single wormy pamplemousse. At the grocery store in Kuto we found some New Zealand apples, and in the boulangerie we found some oranges from Mare. But local produce was not to be found.
After a coffee on the beach at Kuto, we drove to Baie d’Oro on the northeast coast. Our friend Sebastien from the boat “Rayam”, who shared the anchorage with us in Mare, told us about this fabulous restaurant on the beach — Restaurant Le Kougny. To get there, you park in the lot of the Hotel Medien, the only 5-star hotel on Ile des Pines, cross a tidal river to an island, and follow a footpath through the woods to the other side of the island. There, on the beach, is a small campground with some rough hewn tables set under the palms with a beautiful view towards a lagoon and reef. That is the Campground/ Restaurant Le Kougny. We had called the day before to order our meal, which is required. The choices are langouste (lobster), escargot (an Ile des Pines specialty), and fish. We had ordered the lobster, as did almost all the other dozen or so guests. It was an unforgettable meal. The lobster was large and sweet and we spent an hour finding meat in various lobster appendages. A full bottle of chilled white wine encouraged patience. The meal came with a small salad, rice, fruit salad (mostly canned!), and of course, lots of French bread.
After lunch, we strolled through the grounds of the Hotel Meridien and ran into Randy and Sherry of Procyon, whom we had not seen since Ambrym Island (Vanuatu). Randy had been hospitalized in Noumea after stepping on coral and getting a very bad infection. He seems to have made a complete recovery. We then drove to the Grotte de La Reine Hortense, a famous cave in the interior of the island. I guess we are not much enamored by caves even though this one is impressive. We also visited the grounds of the prison colony that took up nearly one-half of the island. After the uprising in Paris in 1870/71 (Commune de Paris), those involved were either executed or deported to a new prison colony at Ile des Pines. The French also sent rebellious Algerians and Kanaks from Grand Terre to the Ile des Pines prison colony. The prison finally closed in 1911 and the land returned to the local people. We visited the striking cemetery where the Paris Communards were buried in unmarked graves.
We are now back in Baie de Gadji. It is a day of squalls and rain so we are staying on the boat. We are hoping that it may clear up but a new weather forecast suggests we may have squalls for a few days. Well at least we have a bit of fruit to ward off scurvy.
M.
October 5th
On our last day in Mare – Friday the 3rd of October – we decided to hitchhike back to town one more time. We had one important mission to accomplish and that was to dispose of the garbage that has been accumulating on board since we left Port Villa, Vanuatu – 3.5 weeks ago. When you are at sea you can dispose of all food and paper, plus glass bottles and tin cans. You are never supposed to throw any plastics at sea, and it is amazing how much of that stuff starts to accumulate on the boat – plastic food wrapping (stinky from fish or meat), plastic bottles, milk and juice containers, Styrofoam egg cartons, etc. In the other Loyalty Islands (Lifou and Ouvea) – the towns would not accept any garbage from sailors. It is just too expensive for them to dispose of it. In Mare, however, the tiny little town was just filled with large garbage dumpsters and there was no problem with us dropping it off there.
It says a lot about life on a boat when you can get a great deal of pleasure from simply throwing away some old stinky garbage bags – but it’s true. We felt great about it. The only problem was trying to mask the embarrassing smell from leaking out of the bag, stuffed in a large backpack, as Mark held it on his lap during our brief car ride to town. The local who picked us up probably just assumed that we smelled like all other sailors he had met.
After disposing of the garbage, we walked over to the marketplace and found that there was a great deal of activity there. Lots of people, a live band, and a huge barbeque grill set up. It was a real party. It turns out that there is a local high school and on Fridays (or at least this Friday) they had come to town to make and sell food to one and all. Some of the teachers had formed a band and they were singing a variety of French and English songs. They were excellent. Besides grilling fish and chicken, the kids and their profs were making French fries and selling pastries. We tasted a little of everything and then loaded ourselves down with fresh tomatoes and went back to the boat to prepare for the next day’s passage.
We left Mare on Saturday morning at 5:45 a.m. It is a 70 mile passage from Mare to the Passe de Bumbu at Ile des Pines and we wanted to time the trip so that we would arrive at the pass right at low tide which was going to be at 4:20 p.m. The currents going through the passes here are very strong and it is best to time your entrances for the slack water that occurs at either high or low tide. It turned out to be a terrifically fast and easy passage – the wind was 20 knots right on the beam and we were flying along at 8 to 9 knots. We were going so fast, in fact, that we had to reduce sail drastically to slow down – otherwise we would have arrived at the pass way too early. As it turned out we reached the pass at 2:30, almost two hours before low, but it was clear that we could enter without any problem.
So here we sit in Baie de Ouameo in the famous Ile des Pines of New Caledonia. We are the only boat in this anchorage and we have not left the boat all day. As a matter of fact, it ended up being another “Mark fixes another critical system” day, as the first thing we noticed when we arrived was that the toilet in the aft head was not working. The seawater flush pump failed so the head could not be flushed. Fortunately, we had a replacement pump on board. The replacement pump would not fit without some alteration to both the electrical and plumbing connections, so it took longer than it might have, but now the head works as good ever. Life is good.
L.
October 1, 2008
We are still enjoying the island of Mare . The anchorage is beautiful with big pine trees on a high plateau all around, and caves in the coral wall by the sea. There only other boats here are two small French boats out of Noumea with young people on them. One boat has Sebastien and Elsa, both nurses at a Noumea hospital, and the other has Stefan, an urban cartographer and friend of Sebastien and Elsa. We had the three of them over to Sabbatical III yesterday evening for wine, baguette, brie, and other goodies that we bought earlier in the day.
Our anchorage in the Baie de Pede is very pretty. The water is crystal clear but there is coral everywhere, which makes it a challenging place to anchor. Two days ago we hiked on a beautiful path that starts at the white sand beach and goes for about 3 km through the pine woods and then through a coconut plantation, and then finally through a mixture of pines and palms on a path beside the south-facing beach. Off the beach, breakers were crashing onto a fringing reef. Inside the reef the water was a diverse palette of blue. It was cool and breezy on the walk – not like the hot humid walks we usually have in the topics. The pine trees smelled delicious and the walk was great. The best part was finding that the walk ends at a very beautiful and fancy French resort – really the only really fancy place we have seen on this whole trip and we were just in time for their beautiful Sunday buffet brunch! We didn’t even ask the price. (Turned out to be very reasonable). They set up a table for us on the veranda by the swimming pool and we helped ourselves to plates of delicious Indian food, salads and several kinds of deserts. We decided to hitchhike back to the boat and it only took a minute for someone (from the hotel) to pick us up. Back on the boat, we watched a beautiful sunset while watching the silhouettes of the pine trees on the hills in the distance.
Yesterday was market day in Tadine, the town 5 kilometers to the north. We hitchhiked to town – it only took one minute to get a ride. There was plenty of fresh veggies in the market but almost no fruit, and once again, no bananas. There is not much in Tadine except a post office, gendarmie, bank, and a small grocery store, the Magasin Trop Tard. We took a look around the grocery store and found that they had none of the delicious French soft cheeses that we like. Indeed, the refrigerator case was almost empty. We walked down to the pier and noticed the ferry “Havannah” from Noumea was being unloaded, including palettes of grocery items. We hung around town for an hour and then returned to the store just as workers were stocking the refrigerator cases with the newly delivered goods. We hitchhiked back to Baie de Pede with bagging bulging with fresh foods.
We have snorkeled every day that we have been here. The best place seems to be to the south where the peninsula capped with the tall pine-covered headland meets the reef. There is a maze of deep underwater canyons with interesting fish and coral, plus an abundance of white-tipped sharks. The sharks and us have an unspoken understanding that we stay away from each other. We also saw a beautiful spotted eagle ray, a banded sea snake, and a moray eel swimming on the bottom rather than holed up in a coral crevasse as they usually are. Sebastien and Elsa have seen a number of turtles in the bay, but we have not as yet.
Today we will once again hike the path through the forest that ends at the hotel. There is something appealing about ending a hike at a restaurant.
M. and L.
September 28, 2008
We are anchored in Baie de Pade on the island of Mare (Loyalty Islands). We arrived yesterday (Saturday) afternoon at 3:15 pm local time after a 14 hour passage from Lifou Island. Thursday evening, a swell from the north rolled into Baie de Doking in Lifou and worsened on Friday. The wind was still ESE in Lifou so we took the swell on the beam which makes the boat roll uncomfortably. The forecast called for wind shifting to northerly, but it was slow in coming. We planned to leave Lifou for Mare on Friday but the wind stayed ESE and it rained. Since Mare lies to the ESE of Lifou, that would make for an unpleasant day of motoring. So we took the kayak out to explore the cliffs and caves, and then went to bed early hoping to leave very early Saturday morning. Just before 1:00 am the anchor alarm went off. I rushed outside to find that the wind had shifted from the north and the boat had merely turned on the anchor, and that the rain had ended. I downloaded new weather info and then woke Laura. By 2:00 am we started to raise our anchor. The anchor chain was caught on coral, and because of the dark so we could not see enough to figure out which way to turn to free our chain. After 20 minutes of maneuvering, the chain and anchor were retrieved and we were off. It was an easy passage with a mix of sailing and motoring. We were constantly looking out for whales, which are said to spend September in these waters, but were disappointed to not see any. Baie de Pade looks very pretty and is much more protected from swell than Baie de Doking. One great advantage of stopping in Mare is that it will make it much easier to get to Ile de Pines which lies pretty much due south of here.
M.
September 25, 2008
We remained anchored at Baie de Doking on Lifou Island (Loyalty Islands). It is very comfortable here and we are in no rush to begin a difficult upwind passage to Ile de Pines. The wind is forecast to back around to the northeast on Sunday and Monday. That makes our current location less comfortable and safe but also makes a move to the east-southeast much easier. So we will head for Ile de Pines or perhaps Mare, the easternmost Loyalty Island, when that wind shift occurs.
All the other ICA boats are now gone, including our friends on Tackless II. However, Dandelion and Exocet are here. Dandelion is a South African-built Leopard catamaran with a South African family who we first met in Fiji. Their youngest daughter Fern, who is 7, took very ill the morning after they arrived here (Monday) and was sent to Noumea in an air ambulance with her father, Roger. Her mother Sharon and older sister Storm (11 years old) remain on the boat. Fern had emergency surgery to remove an intestinal obstruction. She is doing well and she and her father may return tomorrow or Saturday. Exocet is a beautiful and very fast French-built Outremer catamaran built as a racer/cruiser and sailed by Luis and Natalya, a young couple from Colombia. We made friends with them in Ambrym (Vanuatu) and saw them in a few other places in Vanuatu. We went snorkeling with them yesterday but could hardly keep up. They dive 25 feet under the surface and just hang out there for a few minutes before they need to come up for air. We saw a huge squid and two sharks, among other things. Luis spears fresh fish or octopus for dinner every day. We ate on Exocet last night, and had fresh poisson cru and ceviche, along with Laura’s famous meatballs from Shirley’s recipe. At the end of the evening, they begged for the recipe.
The coral in this bay is very nice and the water is especially clear. We are less than 200 miles south of Port Vila but the climate is very different. The temperature falls into the mid-60s at night, so we sleep with two blankets and wear sweaters and long pants in the evening, and it only gets into the mid-70s during the day. The water is quite cool – if you jump in wearing just a bathing suit you need to get out after 15 minutes. We wear full body wetsuits of 3 mm neoprene to snorkel, as do the others. The added buoyancy makes it difficult to dive under the surface without wearing dive weights.
Lifou is a raised coral island about the same size as Tahiti, but with only 10,000 inhabitants. The shore is a very steep cliff of ancient coral. There is no beach and no good place to tie a dinghy. Getting ashore involves using both a dinghy anchor and a line tied to a rock ashore. Then one has to ascend about 200 steps to the plateau on which the small village sits. The cliffs have been eroded into a pattern of deep caves with stalagmites and stalactites visible from the water. It is a beautiful setting.
Repair issues continue to be a bother. On Sunday evening, our watermaker started spraying salt water all over the engine room and I had to shut it down. I hoped that it might just be a loose connection but soon found out that it was more serious. In order to diagnose the problem and affect a repair, I had to unbolt the whole apparatus containing the pressure tubes from the engine room bulkhead and ceiling and bring it on deck. To do that, I had to remove duct work and piping in order to get access to the bolts. With Laura’s help, I took it apart and found that the high-pressure fittings at one end had corroded. Fortunately, I had a set of new fittings that I had ordered from France 3 years ago and kept as spares. It took all day to remove the old fittings, re-assemble the pressure apparatus, and then put everything back together in a very difficult to access corner of the engine room. If I was 5 feet 2 inches tall, 100 pounds, quite strong, and had nimble fingers, the re-installation would have been a lot easier. But I am none of those, and am still sore and bruised from my efforts. The watermaker now works perfectly, and without leaking a drop.
The village here has only the tiniest store. Yvette, a friendly older Kanak woman, runs the store and lives next door with her husband Pierre. If she is not in the store, which is much of the time, you just ring the cow bell in front and she soon appears from the house. The only fresh food in the store are onions and garlic, plus delicious bread. One afternoon after the bread truck delivered, people from the village waited impatiently for Yvette to open the store but she did not appear even after many rings of the cow bell. So someone took a screwdriver, removed the lock hasp, and opened the door. Everyone took bread and left their 200 francs on the counter, then screwed the hasp back in place and returned the lock.
We needed more food than this little store could provide plus we desperately needed to get more French Polynesian francs. The only francs we had were the small starter amount we bought in Vanuatu. There is no foreign exchange service in Ouvea, our first stop in the Loyalty Islands. So on Tuesday, we arranged for Pierre to take us and Don from Tackless II to the capitol city of We on the other side of the island in his cute little Renault truck. He took us to the bank, a Thai restaurant for lunch, the combination fruit/vegetable market and bingo parlor, and the small supermarket. There was not much local produce as it was not a regular market day – we could not even get bananas – but were able to load up on tomatoes, lettuce, bok choy, papaya, and imported apples. Pierre has arranged for some bananas to be available for us at the local store today.
M.
September 20, 2008
We are anchored in the Baie de Doking on Lifou Island, about 40 miles east-southeast of Ouvea. We left Ouvea a bit earlier than we had planned to take advantage of a brief weather window to make a passage to the east. Otherwise we may have had to remain in Ouvea for another week. That would not be a hardship, but time is getting short.
On Tuesday, September 16 the village at Ile Mouli, the island off which we were anchored in Ouvea, hosted a big feast for the Island Cruising Association (ICA) fleet as well as the fleet of the Cercle Nautique Caledonien (CNC). The Cercle Nautique Caledonien is the yacht club of New Caledonia which is celebrating its 60th anniversary this month. Fourteen CNC sailboats came out to celebrate their anniversary and made the ICA boats honorary members of the CNC for the year. We all got CNC shirts and an invitation to their grand fete in Noumea at the end of the month. The food was good and plentiful. After lunch, the CNC members led us all in singing “Alouette” and then the ICA sang some Kiwi (New Zealand) songs in Maori since the ICA is based in NZ and most of the membership are Kiwis.
Our Belgian friends Roger and Lucy on Catamini corrected Laura’s French pronounciation of Ile de Pines prior to her conversing with the French-speaking CNC members. Laura’s pronounciation was “Ile de Peen” which means “island of ‘coarse word for penis'”. The correct pronounciation is “Ile de Pahn” as in the French word “pain” for bread. Roger took delight in constantly reminding Laura of her earlier mispronounciation.
Wednesday we did a tour. utilizing every van and mini-bus on Ouvea. There is not much to see on Ouvea. One of the highlights was to be the coconut oil distillery, but it was closed. As in many places we visit, the best views are from our own boat, in this case, we had a view of 20 miles of white sand beach and azure water. The CNC boats left Wednesday morning, and the ICA boats, now no longer a fleet, all dispersed by yesterday. However, five ICA boats are will us in Dokin, including our American friends on Tackless II.
The yellowfin tuna I caught coming into the pass at Ouvea turns out to be one of the best tasting fish we have ever caught. We gave some to our English friends Jackie and Brian on Songster, as well as to Gwen and Don on Tackless II, and they loved it.
We will hang out in Lifou for a few days before making the passage to Ile de Pines, to the east of Grande Terre, the main island of New Caledonia.
M.
September 15, 2008
We are anchored in the southeast corner of the azure colored lagoon of the Ouvea atoll (Loyalty Islands of New Caledonia). The lagoon is huge, more than 20 miles across. We came through the Passe du Coetlogon yesterday about 8:30 in the morning. We cannot leave the boat until checked in by customs and immigration. That should have happened already except that the customs and immigration officers missed the flight this morning from Noumea. So all the boats in the ICA rally are waiting for them to arrive.
Preparation for Departure
We left Port Vila on Friday evening around 5:30 pm, which is about as late as we could leave and still have enough light to get through the narrow exit of our bay and pick our way through the anchored boats on the other side. We were not going to leave until Saturday morning but the weather forecast suggested that we might have a greater chance of making most of the passage under sail, rather than power, if we left Friday evening. Even an hour before we left, we were not sure that we were leaving that evening since we still had not completed all preparations to go to sea. All of our time was spent preparing the boat (and ourselves) for the trip since we returned to Port Vila five days previously. Armed with long lists of things to do, we spent the week trying to get at least 80 percent of the things on the list done. Among other things, we had the carberator of our outboard cleaned (it had been the victim of bad fuel, as were the outboards of other cruisers), filled up Sabbatical III with 415 liters of duty-free diesel, bought new gasoline for the outboard, refilled our big propane bottle, changed oil and filters on engines, reprovisioned, bought duty-free wine and beer, had laundry done, uploaded photos and video to our web site, and even got haircuts (at Headhunter salon, an interesting name for a hair salon in a recently cannibal society).
Reprovisioning is a complicated process. It involved numerous trips to the supermarket, Au Bon Marche Nambatu. We go there on the mini-buses that ply the main road along the waterfront. You just wave them down and hop in and they drop you were you want for 100 vatu a person (about $1). We ordered steak, veal, and mince (hamburger) to be vacuum-bagged and frozen plus an export certificate that should permit the meat to enter New Caledonia. We also shopped at the open air fruit and vegetable market that is open 24 hours a day except Sunday. There is not all that much for us to buy in that market unless you like to stock up on taro, yams, and sweet potatoes. There are bananas and occasionally pamplemousse — no pineapple, mangoes, or other tropical fruits — plus plenty of bok choy and lettuce which are very good but do not stay well on a boat. Tomatoes came into season just before we left. In any case, one cannot legally bring fresh fruit and vegetables into New Caledonia.
Passage to Ouvea
The forecast called for winds from the east at about 10 knots on Friday night, becoming light and variable Saturday, and then 15 knots from the SSE Saturday night and Sunday. South-South-East (SSE) is right on the nose for this passage so the plan was to sail to the east of the rhumb line(the rhumb line is the most direct route) Friday night and Saturday morning so that we would have an angle to sail when the wind came up from the SSE. We took it as a good omen that the sunset was so beautiful as we headed out of Port Vila and were pleasantly surprised that the wind was 12 knots out of the ENE once we left the wind shadow of Efate Island. That allowed as to sail well east of the rhumb line and probably more east than any other boat in the ICA fleet. It was a beautiful night — with flat seas, a full moon in a clear sky,and steady wind from a good direction, so we were under sail all night. By 9 am Saturday the wind died as forecast, and we turned on the engine and I put out a couple of fishing lines. At 2 pm, as we sailed under clouds that stretched out to the southern horizon, the wind came up from the SSE at 20 knots very suddenly. By 3 pm the wind increased to 25 knots and by 4 pm it was blowing 30 knots, still from the SEE. The seas, which had been very flat, got ugly as quickly as the wind rose. This was not forecast and I hoped that it was just the passage of a small front and would quickly be gone. That hope was not realized. We had sailed so far east in the previous day that we could sail in this wind because our course was now further to the west, but just barely. It would be impossible to make progress under engine alone in these seas and wind. We had up just small handkerchief size sails as the boat pounded badly in confused seas — waves coming from different directions.
The decks were constantly awash and there was only a tiny place in the cockpit big enough for just one person to be safe from drenching spray. Every so often Sabbatical III would fall off a large, steep wave and come crashing down in the wave trough. The masts and rigging shook violently. I kept telling myself that Sabbatical III was built to take a pounding. There was lots of radio chatter in the fleet about what to do. Boats to the west of us now realized that they could not easily make the preferred southeast pass to Ouvea, there was too much wind and wave on the nose, so they decided to bear off to the west and try for another pass on the northwest side of the 20 mile wide lagoon. That pass has the drawback of being unmarked and strewn with reefs, so one needs good light to do an eyeball entrance. We continued to head for the preferred Passe du Coetlogon, which is buoyed, on the southest side of Ouvea. We could do this because we had headed so far east of the rhumb line before the bad weather came up.
It was a very trying evening and night. It was impossible to sleep as the boat pitched and rolled, and the noise of the wind in the rigging was impressive. The wind did move to SE over the night and gave us a somewhat better sailing angle but the seas stayed large and confused. For the first time in the five years that we have sailed Sabbatical III, she was pooped. In this case, it means that a large wave broke over the side of the boat and completely filled the cockpit with water. The companionway was open, so some seawater poured down below. Now we understand why the boat was designed with an enclosed depression at the bottom of the companionway stairs. It’s job is to contain any seawater that finds its way down. After being pooped,and evacuating the water that found it’s way below, we kept the companionway slider up to keep water from getting below again.
I decided to slow the boat down so that we would approach the Passe du Coetlogon in good light. I was concerned that waves might be crashing into the pass, so I wanted a good look at the sea state to the northeast of the pass before committing to an entrance. As it turned out, the pass was well protected from breaking waves and it was an easy entrance.
The fishing lines had been out all night since I did not want to go the stern of the boat and mess with them after the seas came up, and even as we approached the pass, we were rolling too much for me to leave the safety of the cockpit. About 4 miles from the pass, as we sailed along the east side of Ouvea, a mahi-mahi (dorado) took one of the lures. We saw him jump and thrash trying to get unhooked, but he was on good. I could not pull him aboard in in these conditions, so we decided to just tow him behind us until we entered the lagoon. About one mile before the pass, something hit the other line very hard. So hard that the latex shock absorber was torn from the backstay where the line was attached, and the line dragged low in the water. When we entered the lagoon the wind still blew hard but the water was relatively smooth, so I went to the stern and hauled in a nice green and gold mahi-mahi. It was dead — asphyxiated by our 8+ knot run to the pass. It had managed to get my two fishing lines tangled together. After landing the mahi-mahi, I tried to untangle the mess of lines and retrieve my other fishing line. There was very little pressure on the other line until I had it just behind the boat when suddenly it came to life — there was a very large yellowfin tuna (ahi) on it. This tuna was the fish that broke the shock absorber a mile back but must of stayed on the hook and was starved for oxygen by our fast run to the pass. Once we slowed in the lagoon, it came to life. It was so heavy, I had to strain to lift it on the boat. So there I was, completely exhausted by lack of sleep and a difficult passage, with two large fish on the afterdeck begging to be gutted and cleaned. As Laura motored slowing around in the lagoon, I got to work. The result was a huge amount of the two best-eating species of fish in these waters. So, after a nap, we had fresh yellowtail sushi and broiled mahi-mahi for supper. We were hungry since we had not eaten since lunch on Saturday. We still have enough tuna left for 25 meals and enough mahi-mahi for six meals. We hope to give much of the tuna away.
We have now cleared customs and immigration but are waiting for quarantine to visit the boat. OK, quarantine just left, taking our onions and garlic with them. I took the Q flag down and put up our tattered French tricolor. We are cleared in and ready to enjoy what looks like very beautiful place. The wind is still howling but in the lagoon the boat is comfortable and the lagoon calm. The temperature was a freezing 73 degrees this morning and the humidity was just above 50 percent. We have not seen that for awhile.
M.
September 10, 2008
We are in Port Vila and have just posted a few videos of the festival in North Ambrym. Just go to our photos
and video page at
https://sabbatical3.net/slides.htm
and scroll down to the video section. Select the videos from Ambrym. Laura’s favorite is “Men Cooking”.
We will be adding more photos to the blog in a day or two. We will leave Vanuatu for Ouvea in the Loyalty Island (New Caledonia) on Saturday (September 13). More on that later. M.
Mark M. Pitt
Professor of Economics
September 5, 2008
We anchored in Southwest(Metenovor) Bay, Malekula for almost three days now. We left Malua Bay on Tuesday (September 2) intending to go to Dixon Reefs. The passage was pleasant enough to start but then the seas starting to build and it got wet and wild. We knew that Dixon Reefs would not offer reasonable protection from the large seas so we kept on going to Southwest Bay, where Sabbatical III lies quite comfortably.
We have had a few visits from Solomon and Rita, and their two small children, who come out from the village in their dugout outrigger canoe. We met Solomon when we were here last month when gave him a bag of rice as a gift. This time he came to us and brought us a load of pamplemousse, some papaya, and coconuts. We have provided some new gifts to them as well. We have enjoyed their visits.
We have been plagued with a series of repair issues for the past few days that have taken most of our time to address. The heat exchanger on the generator sprung a leak and sprayed salt water over half the engine room. I was able to fix the leak. However, equipment in the engine room will corrode if exposed to salt water, so I had to clean it all with fresh water and then apply Lanacote anti-corrosion spray to everything.
Even more annoying is the failure of our outboard engine. It sputtered in Espritu Santo and failed entirely when I tried it here. It would start fine but die within a minute or two. I replaced the spark plugs, the fuel filter and the fuel hose but nothing worked. It turns out that the likely culprit is the gasoline that we bought in Musket Bay, Fiji and stored in a large jerry can — it seems to be bad. Since that is the only gasoline that we have left, we are stuck on the boat. I hope that I will be able to get the outboard engine working again once we get to Port Vila.
Our Plans
We have been waiting for a weather system to pass by. It should be gone by tomorrow and we plan to leave for Port Vila (Efate Island) tomorrow (Saturday, September 6) around 3 pm . With the wind and waves on the nose, it may take 18 to 20 hours to make the passage.
On September 13, we will leave Vanautu for Ouvea Island in the Loyalty Islands. The Loyalty Islands are administered by France as part of New Caledonia. Ordinarily, it is very hard to visit the Loyalty Islands on a private boat, especially Ouvea Island. There is no Port of Entry in the Loyaltys and the French are strict about these things. Boats are allowed to stop in Lifou Island for a few days before either sailing to Noumea, the capital city of New Caledonia, for check-in, or paying for a Customs oficer and an Immigration officer to fly to Lifou and do the check-in. To get around this, we have joined with a set of boats organized by the Island Cruising Association of New Zealand. They have organized a “rally” to Ouvea. The boats in the rally essentially share the cost of flying officials out to the seldom visited island of Ouvea for a check-in on Sep 16.
More on all of this later. We just wanted to provide a heads up on our plans.
M.
August 31, 2008
We have been anchored in Peterson Bay on Espiritu Santo Island for for past two days. We have not done much here — some boat projects and a little snorkelling. We are the only boat anchored off of Malono Island, just off Espiritu Santo. There are about a half-dozen other boats in an ‘inside’ anchorage but Sabbatical III draws too much water to enter there. It has been very peaceful here.
Tomorrow morning we begin the difficult task of heading back to Port Vila. Difficult because the route takes us right into the wind and seas most of the way. Consequently, we will have to rely on our diesel engine for much of the passage.
We will leave at 0615 local time. Our route takes us south down the eastern side of Espiritu Santo, past Malo Island, and then into the Bougainville Strait where we should be able to be under sail for a few hours. We hope to arrive at Malua Bay on the western side of Malakula island while there is still some light, if not we will spend the night at sea.
M.
August 27, 2008
We are off of Espirito Santo Island, just across the channel from Luganville, the second largest city of Vanuatu. I just posted some photos to our Ambrym blog (see below). We will be here for a couple of more days re-provisioning, getting more vatus to spend, and doing some boat maintenance. We had a great sail here from Ambrym two days ago. This is where James Michener was posted in WW II and formed the basis for his book on the South Pacific. There was a huge US base here during the war. The old Quonset huts are still in use. We will write more later.
M.
August 23, 2008
We have been anchored off Nebul village in the far north of Ambrym Island, Vanuatu, since Monday, August 18. We have been so busy with the ‘Back to my Roots’ festival we have not had the time to update our blog until now. A lot has happened during these past days and there is much to tell. Our experience is much better conveyed by photos and video but we will be unable to post any of these until we return to Port Vila in 10 – 14 days, depending on weather. The people of north Ambrym have been fantastic and the festival was extraordinary. It ended with the most famous dance of Vanuatu, the Rom dance, that is only performed here.
Passage to Ambrym.
We left Awai Island in the Makelynes on Monday (Aug. 18) with the promise of 15 knot winds from the SSE — good enough for the 36 nautical mile trip to north Ambrym. There is a very strong current in the channel that separates the Maskelyne Islands from Malekula. Fortunately it was a fair current that morning and we made over 8.5 knots through the channel. As we headed almost due north and moved away from the islands the current disappeared and so did the wind and we had to motor until we ‘turned the corner’ past the big bulge in Ambrym Island and altered course to the northeast. The very high twin volcanoes that dominate central Ambrym diverted and accelerated the wind up the western coast and allowed us to finish the passage under sail. The Mt. Benbow and Mt. Marum volcanoes are quite active and their ash plain takes up one-third of the island’s area. The anchorage off Nebul village was filling rapidly and there were at least 8 sailboats within view coming up behind us and half a dozen ahead of us. We monitored the marine radio traffic and learned from ‘Rise and Shine’ that anchoring in close to the shore would be a mistake — their anchor rode was entangled in rocks and coral. Unexpectedly, we got a radio call from ‘Vera’ and learned that they were just 6 miles ahead of us, having spent the previous day at the hot springs area of Ambrym Island. When we arrived they directed us to a place just to their port side. Michael had dived on his anchor and the nearby sea bottom and found only black volcanic sand. We are sitting in nearly 75 feet of water. I would not feel comfortable anchoring in anything deeper. We put out every last foot of chain we have (265 feet). You have to put out lots of anchor chain because strong gusts of wind (williwaws) come thundering down the slope of the volcano, straining anchors and making boats swing and dance. Everyone is aware that a few years ago some boats dragged out to sea (but recovered) and that last year one boat wound up on the reef at nearby Olal. The whole village of Olal came out and pulled the boat off the reef.
By the end of the next day there were 25 boats in the anchorage plus some overflow at the nearby Ranon village anchorage. Two fully crewed sailing superyachts also showed up — Silver Tip and Squall. Luc and Jackie from Sloepmouche once again acted as the liasons between the ‘fleet’ and the villages involved in the festival. Every evening they would make annoucements on the marine VHF radio with information on times, places, and events. There is no hotel or airport in north Ambrym, no roads or electricity, and only a single pickup truck, so it is very hard to attend the festival if you do not have a boat. Nonetheless, there were eight tourists who took the cargo steamer from Port Vila and stayed either at the mission house or on the floor of the rural cooperative bank. A four-man French film crew was also in attendance, having received permission to make a movie of the event. The film crew was not friendly and took it as their right to jump in front of us with their camera and sound boom, occasionally blocking the view at key moments. Back to my Roots Festival.
We dinghied to shore at 8:30 am on Wednesday for the first day of the festival. We were greeted by Zebulon Taleha, a barefoot and handsome 20 year old of Rantvetgere village. His job was to guide a group of us to the ritual dancing grounds every day. I am not sure why, but Zebulon took a particular liking to me. He treated me as if I was the ‘chief’ of our small group of yachties. He walked along side of me answering questions and offering explanations. Our group would not come or go until Zebulon asked for my assent. My connection with Zebulon added importantly to our experience as described below.
The ritual grounds are near the Kastom (traditional life) village of Halhal. To get to Halhal we walked thirty minutes along a beautiful coastal path that is intensely lush and green. Just before the northern-most village of Olal, we took a simple foot path into the interior. For another 15 minutes we walked through groves of coconut palms and forest until we reached the ritual grounds. It is a small area of grass with large tamtams –, logs with intricate faces carved on them and then hollowed out for drumming. The tamtams on north Ambrym, as well as wood carving more generally, are considered the finest in Vanuatu. They take hundreds of hours to produce. Traditionally, those making illicit copies of tamtams were executed. The largest tamtam at the ritual ground is 15 to 20 feet tall. There is also carved stone sculpture. In the forest just 50 meters away is a grass hut (nakamal or mens clubhouse) and surrounding area that is reserved for men. Here men dress (or undress) themselves for rituals, drink kava, and store ritual items such as the distinctive club used to kill pigs, a key element in north Ambrym rituals now that ritually killing humans is tabu. Interestingly, the men that were to be ritually killed and eaten were called ‘long pigs,’
Once men reach maturity, they begin the quest to reach higher levels (grades) in society in order to earn respect for themselves and their spirits when they die. To do this they must own many pigs and use pigs as currency to advance in grade. In north Ambrym there are 14 grades although no man currently alive is higher than grade 11. Men must also pay with pigs to acquire a bride. Zebulon is a grade 1 and is unmarried as he has not acquired the pigs necessary to advance in grade much less marry. In order to take part in the ritual events we were to witness, a man must have a sufficiently high grade and/or pay a price in pigs for the honor. It is a great honor to be a costumed dancer in the Rom dance and men must pay their chief in pigs for that honor.
On the way to the ritual grounds we stopped at Zebulon’s house and he gathered up a load of carved bamboo flutes that his father had made. They are beautiful and inexpensive so we bought enough to outfit a small orchestra. About 200 meters from the ritual ground, there were young men in the path collecting the admission fee of 7000 vatu per person for the three days (about $80 per person). As a trade good, we brought along a brand new Camelpak backpack, the kind with a water bladder and drinking tube plus plenty of zippered pouches for storage. We thought this backpack would be perfect for someone trekking up and down the volcano. We asked if we might trade this backpack for admission for the both of us. The young men taking the admission fee could not make this decision themselves, they had to ask the chief. Two minutes later a burly bearded man wearing only a namba (penis wrapper) walked up to me and, in accented English, asked to see the backpack. We bargained for a minute and a deal was struck — the backpack plus 2000 vatu ($21) would get Laura and I in for all three days. One of the young ‘ticket takers’ was delighted. He is the son of the chief and he put on the backpack and wore it for the rest of the day. We saved nearly $140 and made someone very happy.
Speaking of nambas, on the walk to the ritual grounds, Zebulon quietly sang. At one point he sang “Oh when the saints go marching in; Oh when the saints go marching in; I want to be in that namba; When the saints go marching in.” I am not sure whether he knew the word as “number” or “namba”. The latter would seem a more likely phrasing to him.
The seating for us yachties consisted of two bamboo poles set on trees branches. Laura and I brought small cushions. Some yachties had small folding chairs which were much more comfortable. Part of this bamboo seating area was covered by thatch augmented by a plastic sheet. The covering is important since it has rained about 20 times a day since we arrived — and this is the dry season. The tall volcanoes that produce the williwaw gusts also cause it to rain incessantly over north Ambrym. Drying laundry is pretty much impossible. But this weather is good for growing yams and taro in the rich volcanic soil.
The chief who traded the backpack from me was the master of ceremony for this event. His name is Napong Norbert and he is a very charismatic individual. He described and interpreted every dance and ritual act in both pretty good English and very good French. It is likely that he used French for the benefit of the French film crew as there were no other Frenchmen in attendance (but there were three Belgians). During the colonial period, Vanuatu, then known as the New Hebrides, was jointly administered by England and France. There are French speaking (and nominally Catholic) villages next to English speaking (and nominally Presbyterian) villages. Kastom villages tend to be in the interior of islands.
All the foreign guests were asked to leave the ritual grounds so that we could be led in by the chief and other high grade men dancing the welcoming dance. Most of these men were between 40 and 80 years old as it takes many years to achieve a high enough grade. (Young men danced in most of the other dances.) The male dancers were followed in my dancing barebreasted women in grass skirts who likely are their wives. Then the foreign guests walked behind until we were in the ritual grounds. There were also many ni-Vanuatu (local Vanuatans) were stood in the background to watch, particularly on day three when the Rom dance was performed. This festival was organized by a number of different villages so there were a number of chiefs present. Chiefs carry carved wooden walking sticks as badges of office.
The dances that were performed during the first two days of the festival did not involve intricate steps. The men typically were in a tight circle with their bare butts facing us, and they stomped to the beat of the tamtams while singing or chanting in their local language. All the men wore a leaf namba that attached their penis to a bark belt. Various kinds of leaf foliage stuck into this belt covered the small of their backs. The dancing was very energetic and the songs and melodies were mesmerizing. I will leave it for the video to describe the action. On both the first and third days of the festival, a pig was ritually killed. On the first day it was a smallish pig that squealed mightily. We did not know what was about to happen but had some inkling that the pig might meet with violence. Chief Napong Norbert spoke in the local language and then took a club to the pig. It was a bit of a shock to us. That pig was served for lunch two days later.
There were food stalls at one end of the ritual grounds. Women sold laplap, bananas, coconuts, boiled eggs, fried dough, bread rolls with meat inside, and nangae, on oval, nut-containing fruit that tastes like an almond. A dozen nangae are sold skewered on a thin bamboo reed, and are quite delicious. Laplap is a pasty mixture of taro root and yam covered in coconut cream and served on a banana leaf. The food was very tasty and inexpensive. I also indulged my recent fondness for kava with help from Zebulon. At the end of the second day we went to the nakamal of one of the chiefs, and he served me and the Veras some potent fresh kava. We also had some kava on the third day in Olal village.
Part of the activities on the second day was a communal lunch. The buff young men of low grade prepared most of the food. It seems that low grade men must prepare their own food and only higher grade men have it prepared by women. The food preparation was in the men’s only area next to the nakamal — a woman could be killed for entering this tabu area. I went there to take photos and some of the women cruisers then gingerly entered as well. One of the chiefs told the women yachties to leave but then the highest chief (by grade), Napong Norbert, over-ruled that chief and said that foreign women could enter. The food preparation was as energy-intensive an activity as the dancing. Wearing only their nambas, the young men scraped coconut meat and squeezed it into coconut cream, and collected firewood and roasted breadfruits. They pounded the cooked breadfuits into paste and laid the paste onto large banana leaves. Hot stones were extracted from the fire and put into open coconuts in order to heat the coconut water which was then worked into the paste. The large sheets of paste where covered with coconut cream and then cut into pieces. The work was so grueling that men would rotate into and out of tasks to give each other a breather. While this was going on, the wives of the high grade men sat some distance away and roasted yams on an open fire. They would reach into the fire to snatch out a yam and proceed to scrape its exterior with the edge of a tin can top. They did this repeatedly, scorching a yam, scraping it, and then repeating the sequence. Laura and I found the food a bit on the starching side and prefered the bread products at the food stalls, but the preparation was really a very interesting sight.
The famous Rom dance was performed on the third and last day (yesterday). The Rom dance is connected to a secret and sacred society of men that remains a mystery to outsiders. I asked Zebulon about it and he provided only ambiguous responses. Fantastic and fearsome masks and full body costumes of banana leaves are one distinguishing features of the Rom dance. These costumes are worn by those being initiated into the secret society and they must make their own masks in secret and according to secret rules. Any outsider who witnesses a mask being made is to be whipped with nettles, or pay a fine (a recent and welcome amendment to the rules). Members of this secret society are keepers of the powerful ‘black magic’, a set of magic skills that can kill men or make the yams grow. Zebulon is hoping to be an initiate of the Rom secret society next year and dance in full costume. We hope to be there. Those who were initiated into the secret society in the past, including all of the chiefs, also danced in the Rom dance but wear only nambas. The Rom dance has a whole different look and feel to it than the dances of the previous days. The men stomped and sang more intensely and seemed in a trance-like frenzy. Sweat poured from bodies. I can only imagine how steamy it must have been for the young men who were completely covered in banana leaf costumes with large, heavy masks on their shoulders and covering their head. Toward the end of the dance, a very large pig was brought out and ritually killed and then left to the side as the rituals continued. The ritual grounds were crowded with ni-Vanuatu who came to see their chiefs and their sons dance. It is said that the yam harvest depends on it. The final dance is a farewell dance that is also a bit of a frenzy. Inside there was a tight circle of singing and dancing men. Outside of that circle women in grass skirts were pulsing slowly to the beat. The foreign guests were invited to join. A gentle rain fell even though it was sunny — and the dancers bodies were glistening. I danced with the men while blindly shooting digital still pictures at very close range while Laura danced with the women and took video.
After the festival was over, there was a banquet in Olal village for the yachties. Some chiefs and those who organized the festival also attended. There was a formidable spread of local foods including the ritually killed pig from the first day of the festival. While waiting for the banquet to begin, Zebulon approached me and said that one of the chiefs wanted to give me his chiefs walking stick. He brought over Chief Massing, who seems to be about 80 years old. We had met Chief Massing, who has some close connection to Zebulon, on the first day of the festival and took a great photo of him. We printed that photo on glossy photographic paper on the boat and gave it to Zebulon to give to the chief on the second day. The chiefs walking stick he gave me had been used by his father, Chief Naroum Naim, and so was quite old. I was quite taken aback by the honor accorded me. Perhaps Chief Massing was grateful for that photo, or perhaps Zebulon persuaded him that I was a chief lacking a walking stick. The people of north Ambrym were uniformly generous and so this act of kindness may not be as unusual as it seems. Zebulon told me afterwards that a man of my age and status must have a chiefs walking stick, and now I do.
M.
[flickrvideo width=”640″ height=”480″]http://flickr.com/photos/sabbatical3/3229479243/[/flickrvideo]
Men Cooking Video
Aug 16, 2008
We left Metenovor (Southwest) Bay, Malekula this morning are now anchored off of Awai Island in the Maskelyne Islands, a group of small islands that lie just off of the southeast corner of Malekula. The passage here is mostly southeast into the prevailing tradewinds so today was a good time to go since there was little wind to contend with. We motored the whole way, about 34 nautical miles. Lot’s of other boats that were in Metenovor Bay for the festival also left this morning and 9 of them are anchored here with us. The plan is to stay in the Maskelyne Islands until Monday when the wind is supposed to build and then sail northeast to Nebul village on the island of Ambrym for another festival.
On Wednesday, August 13 we were at Labo village for an all day festival of Kastom dancing by Small Nambas, arts and crafts, and lunch, all put on by Labo village. The event they put on was nice but more appropriate for a visiting cruise ship than for yachties. It was a bit too scheduled. While strolling on the beach at Labo we ran into our kava-growing friend Justin from Wintua village. He was brewing fresh kava in a knoll nearby, mostly for the dancers and locals. He invited us to join in, and we did.
On Thursday, we went to Benahur village at the far tip of Metenovor Bay. We were invited to tour the village and, for a small fee, snorkel the wonderful reef that stretched out from Ten Stick Rock just across from the village. This was much more informal and low key. They put out some local foods for lunch and village people came by and chatted with the yachties who dropped by. It was a rainy day, so not that many people came off of their boats. After lunch and a tour, Laura, Britta, and I snorkeled the reef. The water was very clear and the reef was exceptionally beautiful, one of the nicest we have seen. There were lots of very big fish swimming around, which is always fun to see. A woman from the village told us how Ten Stick Rock got it’s name. In 1942, the village chief granted the US Navy the right to use the rock (actually a small island) for target practice in return for ten sticks of tobacco (10 cigarettes).
Yesterday, Laura and I snorkeled off the reef of Labo village, which was very disappointing. Our Labo village hosts had told us that their reef was a “marine reserve” with giant clams. But most of the coral was dead, there were only a few clams and these were not very giant at all, and these had been transplanted from a thriving reef in an attempt to attract tourists. We then crossed the bay to return to the wonderful reef of Ten Stick Island.
M.
Aug 12, 2008
We have had an interesting 24 hours. To our great pleasure, “Vera” sailed into Metenovor (Southwest) Bay, Malekula yesterday afternoon and dropped anchor right alongside of Sabbatical III. They have changed their plan to depart for the Torres Strait and will now attend the festival here in Malekula and then continue with us to the Black Magic Festival in Ambrym Island. They shared in all of our adventures of the past day.
Yesterday evening “Vera” and “Sabbatical III” dinghied to Wintua village and met Justin the kava grower on the beach as arranged. He took us to meet Chief Wilson to whom we paid our respects with some small gifts. Then he took us to the nakamal for kava. He explained why kava from southwest Malekula is considered among the best in the world. His kava is exported to New Caledonia and Fiji as well as all the islands of Vanuatu. However, the kava shipped outside the village is dried first which, according to Justin, appreciably reduces it’s quality. The kava we were to enjoy was just cut fresh and prepared in the traditional manner. The bark is carefully cut away from the kava roots which are then washed and chopped by hand and then washed again. The chopped roots are then kneaded with water by hand until a soft mush. This kava mush is then pressed through a cloth baby diaper to get the kava we drink. This process produces a potent drink that he refers to as “morning fresh” since there is no morning hangover. Much of the other kava sold in Vanuatu and elsewhere he referred to as “two day kava” because it leaves an unpleasant hangover on the second day.
We put his kava to the test. None of us are experienced kava drinkers (Michael and Britta had never tried it before) but we all found it to be a most pleasant experience. It is hard to describe since it is really nothing like alcohol or anything else we know of firsthand. It’s effect might be understood by Michael’s comments before and after. As we entered the nakamal, Michael said “I really do not want to he here..let’s not stay long.” After drinking kava Michael said “This is really a nice place. Let’s stay here longer.” Kava puts you in a nice place. Our hosts were careful that we not consume to much and that we safely found ourselves back to our dinghies.
This morning we went to Tisri lagoon for the grand opening of the “Southwest Malekula Yacht Club”. The yacht club is a grass hut meant to attract yachties like us to an area that does not get tourists due to its inaccessibility. There are no cars or roads, no electricity, and no ferry or regular air service to this part of Vanuatu. The “yacht club” is a joint endeavour of the community and Luc and Jackie of the Belgian vessel “Sloupmouche”. “Sloupmouche” has been in Vanuatu for two years and runs the cruisers net on the VHF radio in Port Vila. There was live music, flowers for our hair, fresh coconuts, speeches by local dignitaries, and a ribbon cutting ceremony. A total of 33 boats were at anchor (up from two when we arrived last Friday). The cruisers brought gifts for the community and the community served lunch and danced. Sabbatical III and Vera had to leave before the lunch and dancing in order to get to Lawa village, about 4 miles north, for the burial ceremony of the father of Chief Albin Reuben. We had been specially invited by the Chief to photograph the event.
When we arrived at the beach at Lawa, we were met by John who told us that the ceremony had begun some hours before. He directed us to follow him to the place. Fortunately, as directed by the Chief on Sunday, we brought hiking boots as we were led at a fat pace deep into the tropical forest on a muddy trail, ascending steep hillsides covered with tropical hardwoods. We met people coming from the interior highlands carrying parts of pigs and loads of taro root. Each person greeted us and extended their hand to us to shake. Finally we reached a clearing demarcated by stone pillars. Laura almost fainted from heat exhaustion. We had missed the ceremony. Chief Reuben apologized profusely and explained what had happened. His father, who was born in 1915, was the most important link between the coastal dwelling Small Nambas of Lawa and the other villages on the coast of Malekula and the Manbush people in the rugged interior. There are fewer than 1000 Manbush people left. The Manbush people have no contact with the outside world, including the Small Nambas on the coast. They have never seen the sea. They have never intermarried with Polynesians and other potential partners of lighter skin, and thus are smaller and darker than the coastal peoples and have mistakenly been described as pygmies. Chief Albin Reuben’s father protected them and was their contact with the outside. They came out of the forest to this clearing high in the hills to honor a Small Namba man that they had known and respected for decades. Unfortunately, the Manbush people are not attentive to issues of time, and they showed up three hours early and left just before we arrived. While they were there they danced and performed rituals to honor the dead father of the current chief. It is almost impossible for outsider to ever see the Manbush people and we are sorely disappointed that we missed doing so. Chief Albin Reuben said that such a meeting of Small Namba people and Manbush people may not happen again for years.
Nonetheless, Chief Albin Reuben instructed the drummers to return to their places and play while he and his nephew performed the funereal dance of the Small Nambas just for us. I filmed it with our Flip video camera.
M.
We have spent three days in Metenovor (Southwest) Bay. Two days ago we went to Wintua village which lies just across from Sabbatical III. It had rained heavily in the previous 24 hours so the paths were quite muddy. We were told that Wintua received more rain than villages just one mile away, and that is why it’s gardens are so productive. We met Justin who cultivates a kava garden and also runs the farmers cooperative. Villagers cultivate kava and copra for export to Port Vila. Their kava is highly regarded in Vanuatu and has a ready market in other islands. After a tour of the village, Justin picked some pamplemousse (pomelo) for us from his uncle’s tree. We gave him a new t-shirt. He expects us to return this evening at 5 pm for a visit to the nakamal, the place where men drink kava. Women are ordinarily forbidden from the nakamal but an exception will be made for Laura as she is not bound by all the local customs.
There is one particularly nice house in Wintua. We asked about it and were told it belonged to an Australian woman named Beverly and her husband from the village. The Australian woman had come to Wintua years before as a missionary along with Australian husband. After some time she divorced her Australian husband and married a local man. Unfortunately, he died some months ago and his widow was back in Australia visiting her grown children from her first marriage.
Yesterday, we went to Lembinwen village about one mile south of us. As claimed, it is a drier place that Wintua. A New Zealander controls a very large area of land around the village that he uses to graze cattle amid the coconut trees of a copra plantation. This enterprise gives employment to many villagers and is likely the cause of the prosperous character of the village. Most homes are of cinder block construction with metal roofs, and all houses are on large cement foundations. There were solar panels on many roofs and we could hear recorded music playing from inside (it was Sunday). Villagers are also fishermen, with at least half a dozen small skiffs powered by outboard engines plus one small tuna boat that said “Gift of the European Union” on it’s bow. Everyone in Lembinwen village is a Christian– either Presbyterian, Seventh Day Adventist, or Christian Life Church.
Lembinwen village sits astride the entrance to Tisri Lagoon. The lagoon is quite large covering a few square miles. It has mangroves on much of it’s shoreline but the water is quite clear, not brackish, and full of fish. Laura and I took a dinghy tour through parts of the lagoon that gave us an idea of the size of the cattle/copra operation controlled by the New Zealander.
This morning a powered skiff came up to Sabbatical III with two men. One of them said he is Chief Alben Reuben of Lawa village. His father had died and there is to be a funeral ceremony for him tomorrow. He asked if we would be willing to photograph the events. We agreed. We found Lawa village on our charts. It is about 3 miles north and it should be a safe place to anchor with the predicted light winds from the east. To our surprise, we found Chief Albin Reuben mentioned in our guide book. His village is the gateway to the densely forested interior of Malekula where there are villages that live as they have for one thousand years. He is the contact person for expeditions into the interior as well as cultural sites along the coast where Lawa is located. We are quite excited about this opportunity. We will leave a cd-rom with the digital photographs with the Vanuatu Cultural Centre in Port Vila.
So we have an exciting couple of days ahead — a visit to a nakamal for kava, official photographers for the funeral of a chiefs father, followed by the Kastom dancing of the festival that brought us to Metenovor Bay in th first place.
M.
We arrived in Metenovor (Southwest) Bay, Malekula yesterday morning after a very good passage from Port Vila. We have not left the boat yet but will later this morning. It is a very pretty bay with clear water. Laura is anxious to go for a swim but some of the bays of Malekula suffer from a “shark problem” and we want to confirm that this is not one of them.
M.
August 7, 2008
We left Port Vila about 11am ago for the one hour trip to the anchorage off of Mele Island about 5 miles away. We will be here for only a few hours. At 5 pm we will depart for Southwest Bay, Malekula. The trip is about 100 miles. That is too far to do during daylight hours and still arrive with good light. We expect the passage to take about 15 hours although we cannot judge the wind yet since we are still in the wind shadow of Efate Island. We needed to leave the mooring field of Port Vila by noon in order to avoid low tide. There is a narrow and shallow pass to navigate to leave, thus the need to stop at Mele Island.
It has been raining off and on for the past 4 days. We carry our rain jackets wherever we go, and we have had a lot of places to go. We had to re-provision the boat which was a time consuming task that required stops in a variety of stores and markets. We also added 150 liters of diesel to our tank by schlepping jerry cans in our dinghy. We also had some nice meals out ranging from a cheap meal at the vegetable market sitting at a common table with all the other customers to two nice meals at French restaurants.
There is a three day festival in southwest Malekula that starts on the 12th. There will be Kustom dancing and other events. The two major groups on Malekula are the Big Nambas and the Small Nambas. The names originate from the size of the penis sheath (namba) that men wear. Apparently, the Big Nambas and the Small Nambas have not gotten along over the years, although there is no warfare between them these days. The size of your namba still matters alot in Malekula.
The Big Nambas wind purple pandamus fibers around their penises and secure the fiber to a belt made of bark. The testicles are exposed. They kept a stone fireplace where outsiders who they disliked (Small Nambas) were ritually cooked and eaten. If a Big Namba woman pleased her husband, he would permit her to have her two front teeth knocked out by hammering them with a rock. Small Nambas wear only one leaf on their penises, which they tuck into their bark belt. Testicles are also exposed.
No other boats are accompanying us for this passage. The Vera’s are in Epi Island and we might not see them again. They are leaving Vanuatu for the Torres Strait (north of Australia) in a weeks time. We expect to find quite a few other boats coming to this festival since it has been talked about alot.
M.
Please have a look at our new photos and video that are found at https://sabbatical3.net/slides.htm
We have been in Port Vila, the capitol city of Vanuatu for the past 10 days. It has been a good chance to catch up on all the internet work we had to do (mostly getting the blog to work again!), upload photos and videos, eat in restaurants and sit and drink cafe latte in nice little coffee shops, get some boat work done, and hear what other cruisers are up to. This is quite a nice city – very clean and modern. All the moorings in the harbor are taken – so many sailboats here. There must be 50 boats or so – way more than we have seen since leaving New Zealand. It is just a very comfortable stopping off point. Two things are incredibly cheap here for some reason – beef and cell phones! The beef in Vanuatu is delicious and very inexpensive and so we have been eating steak a lot. Cell phones are also very cheap here – they almost give them away – so everyone seems to have one. There is a big vegetable and fruit market open every day except Sunday and it is really fun to go there – tons of incredibly inexpensive greens (lettuce, bok choy, green beans), fresh peanuts, bananas, tomatoes, grapefruit and tons of tubers and sweet potatoes. We were excited to find fresh wild raspberries in the market today – first time we have seen berries anywhere on our trip. The grocery stores are well stocked and convenient. There are a lot of Chinese run stores here that are filled with movies and music. We were surprised to find (of all things)- five seasons of Curb Your Enthusiasm and bought it for a song. Really seems like a funny place to find Larry David.
All is well onboard Sabbatical III….
L.
Anchored and moored boats in Port Vila Harbor
July 26, 2008
We have been in Port Vila for the past three days. There are a number of boats that we know here, including those that got stuck in New Zealand until early July by the horrendous weather of all of June,and only recently arrived direct from New Zealand.
Before our passage to Port Vila, we had one day in Dillon Bay on Erromanggo Island. Two locals in a skiff (Wilson and George) invited us to view the children’s day celebration on the island that was being hosted by Upongkor village just up the Williams river. They offered to take us to the village and we accepted since it seemed tricky to navigate the river mouth without local knowledge. Before heading off, we bought two large freshly caught lobsters from them. Having no good place to keep live lobsters on the boat, George just cut off their tails for us to freeze.
We leisurely walked around the village waiting for the 2pm start of the celebration, and spent time talking to villagers and schoolchildren. The wait was for children from the village on the other side of the island who had not yet arrived. To get to Upongkor they had to hike for a full day, with an overnight spent in the mountains. As we toured around, Wilson pointed out the rock on the Williams river on which the outline of it’s namesake, the missionary Reverend Williams, had been etched in stone before he was cooked and eaten.
At 2 pm, the children and chaperons of the other village processed over the river and onto the public square, led my the Opongkor children singing songs of welcome. In the square, there were welcoming speeches by local dignitaries (in Bislama) as well as a long fiery sermon by the local minister.
Like children everywhere, the speeches made the children fidget and inattentive. There were more songs and the day ended with Kustom dances by the men (with bow and arrows and other weapons), and then the women in grass skirts. I took lots of video and photos and promised to send a DVD to the village as soon as we got to Port Vila.
When it was time to return to Sabbatical III, George and the skiff were nowhere to be found, so Wilson took us in a tiny outrigger canoe. Wilson plus two big white persons is a bit of an overload for the outrigger. Laura put the camera bag on the bottom of the canoe in front of her. Sea water entered the canoe as Wilson paddled us back to the boat, and our Canon mini-DVD digital movie camera was ruined. We are very disappointed as we had hoped to film dances and other rituals we will encounter as we make our way north through Vanuatu, and because we cannot send a DVD of the children’s day celebration to Opongkor village as promised. We have a little low resolution Flip video camera that we bought just before we left Rhode Island, so we still have some video capabilitiy.
We were up at 3 am that night to begin our passage to Port Vila. After getting past the considerable wind shadow of Erromanggo, it was a fast if somewhat rolly downwind sail with poled out genoa plus mizzen. The town of Port Vila looks fine but a little shabby. There is one nice supermarket (Bon Marche II) about a 15 minute walk from the dinghy dock. There is fruit and vegetable market in town that is open 24 hours a day, except weekends. In the market, there are a few dozen vendors selling manioc, taro, and sweet potatoes, plus coconuts, bananas, pamplemousse, and some prepared foods.
We have not solved the internet problem yet. There is no wireless in the harbor, and connect time is quite expensive if paid by the hour. We may buy a weekly pass from a place near the Bon Marche II but they are closed over the weekend. We tried to buy a SIM for our cell phone from the central office of Digicell, but there is not a SIM or cell phone to be had in the country. They are just all out. We will remain at least through the celebration of Vanuatu’s National Day on July 30.
M.
Click on the image above to play video of Mount Yasur eruption.
July 22, 2008
It is morning in Dillon’s Bay on the island of Erromanggo, Vanuatu. We arrived yesterday afternoon after an 8 hour (55 mile) sail in near perfect conditions. As we left Port Resolution and headed north, we could see Mt. Yasur puffing black clouds into a clear blue sky.
Two days ago, we made a trip to the cone of Mt. Yasur to have a look inside. We were accompanied in the pickup truck by Michael and Britta of Vera, plus “the Italians” (two interesting couples on two boats), and three Aussies from two boats. One of the Aussies left earlier to walk up the volcano. Everything in Vanuatu is owned by one “family” or another. A family owns the volcano and charges 2000 vatu to ascend to the top ($1 = 88 vatu).
This is not an experience that would ever be permitted in a Western country. You hike up the cone and look down into a boiling cauldron of lava. There are no railings or viewing platforms of any kind. The only safety instruction is “do not turn your back on the volcano.” This instruction has nothing to do with offending the spirits. The volcano has a mini-eruption every few minutes in which it throws out flaming balls of lava (“lava bombs”). It is said that 99.99 percent of these fall back within the cone (500-750 meters in diameter). You have to be prepared to dodge the 0.01 percent that do not. As you walk up the cone you can see the congealed remains of lava bombs littering the slopes. In principle, it should be much easier to dodge a flaming lava bomb than it is to catch a pop fly to center field in the Minneapolis Metrodome, for example. It just that the ill consequences of misplacing these fly balls are so much more severe. Fortunately, our abilities to track flying objects was not sorely tested on this evening.
The volcano is the main tourist attraction on Tanna. There are a number of very simple resorts near the base of the volcano that shuttle their guests up to Yasur for the view. There were about 40 people,including some children, at the volcanic cone the evening that we were there. The volcano put on a spectacular show for us. I juggled three cameras and have some great photos and video. Each eruption is preceded by a roar and then the fireworks begin. As night fell, the sight of bright red plumes of lava being thrown high into the sky was a “National Geographic” moment.
I tried my hand at fishing during the sail to Erromanggo. It was too rough on the trip from Fiji to even consider fishing. I hooked a very large fish just off the north cape of Tanna. Unfortunately, we had not prepared my “fighting belt.” In fact we did hot even know where it was since we had not used it since Tonga last year. As Laura rummaged around below, I tried to reel the fish in with the rod still in the rod holder. I had to tighten the line brake quite a lot to keep the line from unspooling, and grabbing the rod without the fighting belt seemed unwise. Even then, I got the fish almost to the boat before he broke the line (70 pound test) and headed off. Ninety minutes later I got a bite on my handline. The handline uses 200 pound test and the only equipment required to haul in a fish with it is a pair of gloves. I landed the heaviest fish in my short history of fishing. It was a 20 pound tuna that was more than one foot around.
As the sun set in beautiful Dillon Bay, we enjoyed very fresh sushi and sashimi and two bottles of cold white wine with the Veras. Britta is expert at preparing sushi and sashimi and brought over pickled ginger, wasabi,and sushi rice. We had the tuna and soy sauce (but, alas, no chopsticks). After dinner we listened to songs from Mercedes Sosa, our favorite singer this sailing season, and watched a million stars, including the Southern Cross, shine in a crystal clear night. As Michael and Britta dinghied back to Vera at the end of the evening, their dinghy left a brilliant trail of photoluminescence in its wake.
There is a strong low pressure system headed our way. The plan is to leave Erromanggo at about 3:30 am (local time) tonight (actually tomorrow morning) and head for Port Vila on Efate Island. We should arrive there before sunset tomorrow. Port Vila offers protection from all directions of wind and wave. It is the capitol of Vanuatu and has real supermarkets (French), internet access, fuel, and restaurants. We hope to upload photos and video to our web site from there and also fix our blog.
Satellite photo showing Mt. Yasur cone (red icon) and Port Resolution anchorage (yellow icon)
M.
July 16, 2008
Port Resolution, Tanna Island, Vanuatu
We have been in Port Resolution, Tanna Island, Vanuatu for only 48 hours and have had more adventures than in the prior month. We arrived here after a rollicking sail from Fiji and a rather scary entrance through a narrow pass into this bay. The pass was scary not just because of the big seas breaking on rocks and reefs but also because it is so badly charted that it looked like we had to sail onto a high hill (according to the chart) to get into the bay. A 50 foot Beneteau sloop was famously lost on the reef here 4 years ago, so we were a bit anxious. Someone said that the chart is based on that prepared by Captain James Cook when he was the first European to visit Tanna in 1774. There is a famous painting of Captain Cook coming ashore in this bay to meet the locals. The bay is named after his vessel, HMS Resolution. When HMS Resolution left here, she went southeast and discovered New Zealand.
Captain Cook stopped here because he saw a great glow in the sky and wanted to investigate. The glow was the Yasur volcano that towers over this bay, and the volcano is still erupting. More on that later. Some decades later Cook was followed by missionaries. The locals preferred to cook and eat the first few sets of missionaries. Cannibalism in Vanuatu ended finally in 1969. The island population is split among three main groups, Christians, Kastom (customary ways except cannibalism), and John Frum (a cargo cult).
Port Resolution is a fairly small bay with a black sand bottom. On the shore just 50 meters behind Sabbatical III, steam and hot water comes boiling out of the rocks. You can swim close by and a have a very warm soak but the flow of hot water is variable and it can get too hot. Another volcanic vent just above the shore regularly puffs out steam. When Captain Cook anchored here in 1774, the bay was significantly deeper. The volcano caused the shallowing mostly through uplift (primarily in1928), not volcanic deposition.
Early yesterday, our first morning here, we picked up the Vera’s in our dinghy and motored our way to shore. We had to pick our way through rocks and reefs to find a beach on which we could land. A steep path took us up to the “Port Resolution Yacht Club.”
It is not a yacht club in the usual sense. It is a pavilion with two walls and a roof that was set up by the village of Port Resoluton to help the visiting yachties interact with the traditional culture of Tanna. We found Wery, who is the person designated to talk to yachties, to arrange transport across the island to Lenakel, where one could check in. Wery said that he would have a pickup truck available to take us the next day (today). He said that there was a wedding celebration in the village and we were welcome to walk around and watch. Before heading off for the village 500 meters away, we told Wery we would like to have lunch in one of the small very informal island restaurants. You need to give them at least a half a day’s notice (presumably to find some food to serve you).
The wedding celebration had started the day before but yesterday was supposed to be the big day. In the morning there was a formal ceremony in which the couple was presented with gifts, lots of pots,pails, and washbasins. At noon, we were then led through a narrow path across the peninsula to a small hut on stilts overlooking the crashing ocean surf. Some young girls from the village scooted by us in the path carrying pots and trays with food, which it turns out was our lunch. They set out a buffet lunch of rice, taro root, manioc, sweet potato, some other tubers, island cabbage, bread, “shoo-shoo” (a green vegetable), bananas, and chicken curry. It was a huge amount of food for the four of us,and we loved it. We sat on a low bench in the hut and ate our fill.
We returned to the village and found that the dancing had begun. It started off slowly but the tempo was building as the afternoon progressed. We took photos and videos and chatted with Wery’s sister Esther. The dancers were of all ages but danced separately by sex. Most wore t-shirts with colorful grass skirts. The bride had feathers in her hair and white powder on her face. The wedding party sat under a canopy of palm fronds, and sometimes the dancers danced in a circle around the canopy. They also did a line dance that looked like the hora. By late afternoon we were feeling a bit sunstroked and dehydrated, and returned to our boats. We were told that the dancing would intensify and go on through the night. We thought of returning in the evening but could not see how we could navigate the dinghy to the beach in the dark.
This morning we were us at 5 am in order to take the truck to Lenakel. The truck was an open pickup with no shade and hard benches 9 inches wide along the bed.
Forewarned of this, we brought sun shirts and cushions. We also brought jackets and warm tops since we would have to climb over Mt. Yasur to get to the west coast of the island where Lenakel is located. Lenakel is the capitol city of the southernmost province of Vanuatu, encompassing a number of islands in addition to Tanna. It has a customs office and an immigration office, as well as a market and some small stores, in a city of nearly 1000 people. Joining Vera and us were David and Mary, two retired doctors from Victoria, Canada. Victoria has a special relationship with Tanna. In particular, it supports the small hospital in Lenakel. David and Mary had boxes of medicines with them to deliver to the hospital that they brought from New Zealand in their sailboat.
Stanley, the young son of the village chief of Port Resolution, came along to guide us. Stanley had been partying most of the night at the wedding and had drank 7 bowls of potent kava (kava in Tanna is said to be the most potent in the world), plus a bottle of vodka. He claimed that it was the vodka that did him in. He had returned to his home at 3:30am and his wife would not let him in his house. He slept on the ground for a couple of hours before meeting us at the pickup truck. He was very hungover. Fortunately, Stanley did not drive the truck. He did pass out at lunch and slept on the beach at Lenakel in the afternoon. When we returned to Port Resolution early this evening, his wife met the truck and angrily balled him out (in Bislama, the pidgin English national language). She was angry at his vodka binge the night before (not his kava drinking, since that is customary), and for forgetting to buy the things she asked him to get in Lenakel.
It was quite an amazing and scenic trip across the island. The road is just a track through the forest. You have to keep your head down to avoid getting whacked by a tree branch. The pickup truck bounces vigorously as it jumps over rocks and ruts. We climb up the forested slope of Mt. Yasur and had wonderful views in all directions. Suddenly, vegetation disappears and we drive in a moonscape of rocks, gullies, and crevaces. Finally, we cross below the volcanic cone, driving in ash, curving around large dunes of grey volcanic ash. Puffs of smoke and ash rise from the volcano’s cone. Two hours after we depart Port Resolution, we descend into Lenakel. Immigration and Customs are both extraordinarily efficient and friendly — quite unlike Fiji. There are simple forms and warm greetings. Receipts are provided without having to request them. Our doctor friends are dropped off at the hospital with their cartons of medicines, and the Sabbatical’s and Vera’s check out the market and find lunch. It was not a market day (those are on Friday and Monday), so there was not much for sale but we did get some avocadoes, pineapple, peanuts, lemons, and ginger. Bananas are not for sale since they are everywhere and in every yard, so who would ever buy them, except the odd yachty?
Stanley came along with us to a small restaurant where the menu consisted of rice and beef or rice and fish, but they were out of fish. That made choosing so easy. Stanley was still feeling his hangover but did rouse himself when the food arrived. After lunch, we had 3 hours to kill until the pickup returned. There is not much to do in Lenakel and there was literally almost nothing on the shelves of the few small stores. We could not even find bottled drinks for sale. We hung out on the beach under a banyan tree and watched women strip bark off of branchs to make “grass” skirts. The trip back was somehow even bumpier than the trip out, but in the late afternoon light the scenery was even more spectacular. As we stopped beneath the volcanic cone, it gave a loud burp and puffed out a nice cloud.
When we returned to the boat, we were dehydrated, dead tired, and covered in volcanic ash. After a shower and quick dinner, I wrote the above and we headed off to bed. Stanley had invited us to a circumcision ceremony at the village at Black Sands, for the next day, but we could not see ourselves making the 7 am start. Now it is the next day (Thursday July 17), and we just returned from the circumcision ceremony. We went late but it did not matter, we were there for the best parts. It was quite extraordinary. The recently circumcised boys had painted faces, flower leis,colorful feathers in their hair, and other special attire, as did their families. There was joyful dancing, piles of taro and manioc, laplap, and the killing of pigs (the latter is what we missed by coming late). We gave a pair of new flip-flops as a gift, and received a large taro stalk. Six of the seven boats at anchor were present, and we were all treated as welcome guests. I took lots of photos and video. People do not mind having the photos taken if you first ask permission, and they love it when you show them the digital photo. The children scream with laughter.
So it has been a very eventful two (now three) days. We have not had the opportunity to take down our spinnaker pole until just now, and boats chores have gone undone. But what can you do you do when the neighbors invite you to a wedding and a circumcision?
M.
July 14th,2008
5:00 P.M. local time
Monday, July 14th
Position:
S 19 degrees 31.6 minutes
E 169 degrees 29.7 minutes
Hooray. We just arrived in Port Resolution on the island of Tanna in Vanuatu.Our passage from Fiji took exactly 2 days and 8 hours. We had expected that it would take 3 days and 3 nights. It was a record breaking sail for us in terms of speed – we had two days where we made 200 miles each day. This was the first time we have ever made 200 miles in a day. This speed got us into Vanuatu well before sunset and saved us that 3rd night at sea. Conditions were far windier than we had expected – with winds of 30-40 knots pretty much the whole way – and large seas – up to 6 meters at times. It was not a comfortable passage – but at least I can say that it was not our worst either. We left Fiji with Vera and were within 7 miles of her the entire 465 nm passage.
We had mistakenly written in our last blog that we were sailing east-southeast, but just to clear the record we were sailing west-southwest. Just wanted to keep you all on your toes.
We are really tired. There is a huge volcano here and it looks gorgeous from here. Time for sleep!
L.
July 11, 2008
Tomorrow morning (2030 UTC July 11) we will leave Momi Bay on the big island of Viti Levu, Fiji for Port Resolution on the island of Tanna, Vanuatu. The course is a 460 nautical mile straight shot from here on a course of 246 degrees magnetic. The forecast is for winds 22-26 knots from the east becoming ESE with seas of 3 to 3.5 meters, easing. These robust winds should get us to Tanna Island fairly quickly. We may need to slow down in order not to arrive before dawn (local time) Monday in Tanna. If the wind is too strong on arrival or out of the north then we may deviate to Port Vila on the island of Efate since Port Resolution has limited protection. “Vera” will be traveling with us. Our current position is:
South 17 degrees 54.9 minutes
East 177 degrees 15.9 minutes
Port Resolution, Tanna Island, Vanuatu is located at S 19 degrees 31.6 minutes, East 169 degrees 29.1 minutes.
M.
July 11, 2008
Yesterday I had another interesting unusual birthday. Last year we were in Papeete, Tahiti on my birthday searching through the industrial section of town(incredibly ugly) looking for a water pressure pump. This year we were in Lautoka, the second largest town in Fiji – doing last minute stuff to prepare for our departure to Vanuatu. It is a pretty ugly town too – with lots of crime. It is recommended that you do not walk anywhere at night (and we did not) – and we found that even during the day there a lot of unsavory characters walking around. Too bad, because it “could ” be a very charming town, filled with Indo-Fijians – complete with saris, sari shops, curry, etc. There is a terrific fruit market with piles of fruit and vegies and kava to buy – everything for either $1 or $2, depending on how big the pile was. We were thrilled to finally stock up on some fresh fruit after having very little of it these past 3 weeks.
The night before my birthday we went to a nice Chinese restaurant with Michael and Britta. All of the stores in town have metal grates covering windows and doors and someone has to unlock the door for each customer. Lovely. The meal, however, was yummy, and we were able to jump right in a cab after and head back to our boats. The other bad part about Lautoka and the harbor is that they process sugar cane right by the docks and there is a huge plume of black sootpouring out of the factory night and day. It gets into your lungs and by morning the entire boat was covered in black soot. So much for paradise.
We were able to go to an internet cafe yesterday (first time in 2 months), but are still not able to get our blog working. We will try again in Vanuatu.
We had a little birthday party on the boat last night with Michael and Britta from “Vera” and another couple we just met on “Promesa” (she is from Columbia and he from Holland). It was really nice – I even got presents!
We checked out of Fji this morning – after filling out four pages of forms (with the exact information we had been asked for in triplicate when we checking in a month ago). It is quite sad – such a beautiful country, but bad government and a whole lot of unhappy citizens do not make it a paradise for visitors. We enjoyed the islands very much but would never want to spend any time on the “mainland” where the cities are.
So now we are anchored in the lovely quiet and clean little anchorage 25 miles south of Lautoka awaiting the morning light when we will lift anchor (with Vera) and start heading the 460 miles east-south-east to Vanuatu.
Thank you to everyone who sent me birthday wishes. I had a memorable birthday!
L.
July 9, 2008
Some people have asked us what sevusevu is (referred to in our e-mail a few days ago). It refers to a ceremony which I will explain. In Fiji the people (men actually) love to drink a kind of tea made from the roots of the kava plant (a type of pepper plant.) It is slightly intoxicating – mostly it numbs the mouth and throat and makes you quite mellow. It is a big deal here and when we visit an island , it is traditional to go to the chief (yes, there are village chiefs) and ask permission to stay. You are not supposed to do anything without first asking permission of the chief. You start by offering him some dried kava. We bought several bundles of the stuff in the main town of Lautoka before heading out to the islands. Although we stayed in several different anchorages, all on different islands, there was only one that actually had a village and therefore a chief – so that was were we presented the gift of kava and asked for permission to stay. That is called making sevusevu. Apparently they often ask you to stay and drink some of the stuff with them after they grind it up and mix it with water, but that usually happens at night. We made a point of visiting during the day as we did not really want to drink it (we have tried it and find it kind of nasty) and also we did not want to walk back across the island to return to our boats after dark.
All of the resorts here do little kava ceremonies here with the tourists as well and we have seen it a few times (also in Tonga). Traditionally there is a big wooden bowl filled with it in the center of the room. Everyone sits on mats and there is one person who is assigned to pass out the kava in little coconut shells – same shell passed from one person to the next. You have to clap your hands once, say “bula”, drink the whole cup, and then clap your hands three times before passing the coconut shell back to the leader. It seems phony, but is actually done with great seriousness as far as we can tell. The locals will drink many cups of the kava and get quite euphoric or mellow, or maybe just stoned. Hard to say. It is extremely popular here.
We are still carrying a kilo or so of kava with us and it doesn’t look like we will have anyone to give it to. Should we send you some?
L.
July 7, 2008
We have had some adventures the past few days. I guess most of our adventures involve mishaps of some sort. Two days ago we left Land Harbor at the northern part of the Yasawa Islands and started heading south. We need to get back south in order to check out in the town of Lautoka. It is too hard to sail directly back to Lautoka (because of all the reefs in the way) so we have been breaking up the trip with brief stops at the islands along the way, just as we did as we worked our way up the Yasawas.
Unfortunately there are just not very many anchorages that provide good protection from wind and waves and swell here. We ended up dropping anchor at a very lovely, anchorage – basically a narrow channel just below the southernmost portion of Naviti Island. It is protected from the north by Naviti and from the south and some of the south-west by two small islands (Narara and Naukakuva).Because it is actually a passage (with openings at both the easterly and westerly ends) the wind can blow quite strongly through there. The bottom looked sandy, however, and there was no swell inside the anchorage and by the time we reached there it was almost dark and we had no other safe options for the night.
It was lovely, with hundreds of birds circling overhead and green palm trees covering the small hills close by us. The current running through the passage, however, was very strong, and during the night we noticed that although the wind was blowing from the east, the current was running from the west, and the boat had turned around and instead of facing into the wind (most preferable), it was facing into the current. That, in itself, is not necessarily a problem, but we could tell from the sounds below us that our anchor chain must have gotten wrapped on something on the sand-bottom due to all the turning. We could hear a scraping sound from deep under us every time the boat moved, meaning only one thing – the anchor chain had gotten wrapped on coral. The boat was also doing a lot of slapping up and down as it bounced up and down on the swells coming in with the current.
Sometimes it is easy to unwrap an chain caught on coral, just by moving the boat forward or backward a bit when pulling up the anchor. This time, however, it was clear that it was really stuck badly and we would not be able to get it out without someone diving to the bottom and actually unwrapping the chain from whatever was holding it. The water was fairly clear, but the anchor was way too deep to dive down without diving equipment. Luckily, our friend Michael, on Vera, has diving gear, and after he got his anchor pulled up (with some difficulty too), he put on his diving gear and came over to help us. The current in the passage was so strong that he had trouble swimming even 10 meters over to our boat, and he had to hang on to our dinghy trailing behind our boat in order to make it the final few yards. He dove down and found that the anchor chain had actually wrapped itself over, then under, and then sidewise across a very large and solid piece of coral. Very bad situation! But, with Michaels’ diving skills, and Mark floating in the water above him wearing his snorkel gear, we were able to maneuver the chain free – with Michael giving Mark hand signals from down below on when I should pull up the anchor chain (done with an electric windlass, so there is no strength needed). It worked great and 15 minutes after Michael went down we were free and we all sailed off together – very glad that all was o.k. and that we were buddy sailing with such competent friends.
Our next stop was just 8 miles south of there – the anchorage on the western edge of Waya. We stopped here two weeks ago and loved the little resort – the Octopus – and thought it was one of the most beautiful anchorages we had seen in the Yasawas. Unfortunately we were chased out of there last time by a tremendous swell which made it an incredibly uncomfortable place to try to sleep. When we pulled in on Saturday it was pretty calm and the wind forecast looked good. Within an hour, however, a strong squall blew in from the west (the most unprotected direction for that anchorage) and we had to wait out a monster downpour for a couple of hours. The beautiful sunset that followed was worth the storm though, and it ended up being a relatively calm night.
Sunday was clear and calm and we decided to risk staying another night. The winds were very low and the seas were quite calm, but the forecast was for winds to pick up to 20-25 knots by midnight (that’s a lot) – but from a direction which should be ok for that anchorage. Well, the winds did pick up, but not from quite the direction we had expected, so had another very rock and rolly night at Waya. Earlier in the day we had met our friends from Wombat of Sydney who were anchored at an anchorage just 4 miles away, and were much better protected. They had hiked over the hill and met us at the Octopus Resort for a drink at sunset and told us how comfortable it was on their side. So first thing this morning we picked up our anchor (easily) and we (Vera and us) motored through rough seas to the northern anchorage of Waya which is totally protected from the rough seas and strong winds out there. We are very happy to be here. It is not only well protected, but is really gorgeaus – one of the prettiest anchorages we have been in yet. With the weather forecast predicted to be rough for the next 3-4 days we may be here for at least that many days.
All is well on Sabbatical III……
L.
July 4, 2008
We liked Land Harbour so much we stayed there until this morning. A wind shift from the north was forecast and Land Harbour is protected from every direction except north. It was time to move on in any case.
We are now anchored in the Mocelutu Passage, a narrow strait between Yaroiko and Nanuyalabalava Islands. It was a seven hour sail through reef strewn waters to get here. We actually sailed (rather than motored) for most of it since we followed the route that we took in. That route was recorded and saved on our digital chart plotter. The wind did indeed come out of the north and this is a good place to be. Our current position is:
South 17 degrees 11.6 minutes
East 177 degrees 10.6 minutes
We did have some adventures in Land Harbour (called Nadala Bay by Fijians). On our second evening there, a small canoe came alongside and asked if we wanted to trade for fish. We had seen the lone fisherman working a handline in the hours before and were happy he stopped by. We gave him a box of cookies, some candies for his children, and pair of men’s shorts. We got two good-sized fish called “Sweet Lips.” He also said that we should go to the village of Tamasua and do sevusevu with the chief.
The next morning we dinghied to shore along with Michael and Britta of Vera to look for the path to Tamasua. It was low tide and the southern part of Nadala Bay was almost dry. It was about 1/2 kilometer to the beach from the edge of the tidal plain. We pulled the dinghies onto the tidal plain and put out dinghy anchors and hoped that they would hold since we knew that the tidal plain would be under water in just a couple of hours.
It was difficult to find a path but we finally found one and followed it inland through 2 meter tall grass and the occasional tree. This was the flood plain of the small river that drained the tall hills of southern Yasawa Island. It was 40 minutes until we got to the small, neat village perched on the windward side of the island. We were directed to the chief who performed the short sevusevu ceremony on his veranda. We presented him with two bundles of kava root, he made some incantations over it, and then thanked us in English.
We then toured the village, led by our fisherman friend of the previous day. We traded sunglasses and a t-shirt for fruit and a pumpkin, and then were led on the “short-cut” path back to Nadala Bay. The dinghies were where we left them but floating in two feet of water. That night we cooked the two Sweet Lips fish on Vera — they were delicious.
The snorkelling in Land Harbour was excellent. The coral was almost as good as Navadra and there were lots of fish, including big fish. The water was not as clear, however. The Vera’s were the only other boat in the bay all the time that we were there.
We will continue to retrace our route through the Yasawa Islands and back to Lautoka. We expect to provision and check-out of Fiji in a week or so, heading for Vanuatu about 520 miles away.
M.
June 30, 2008
We had “Italian food night” on Sabbatical III last night. The Vera’s brought antipasto and wine and we provided pasta and meat sauce. Rain arrived just as the Vera’s were leaving at 9 pm and continued for some hours. It conveniently washed the salt and schmutz off the deck, but it was a bit warm and sticky in our cabin with the hatches and ports closed. This morning it cleared and a nice cool breeze blew in from the southeast. We had a great snorkel on the nearby reefs which are teeming with fish. This place suits us fine and we and Vera have decided to stay here (Land Harbour) for a few more days.
M.
June 29, 2008 Position:
South 16 degrees 49 minutes
East 177 degrees 27 minutes
Hard to believe June is almost over. We ended up staying 4 nights in Blue Lagoon. It was very comfortable there (no ocean swell to keep us up at night) with nice views and good snorkeling. Big excitement yesterday was finding a large reddish colored octopus on the reef where we were snorkeling. He (she?) was not more than 5 feet below us and was quite large. He saw us and blinked a lot, and then instead of hiding like they usually do, he decided to show off a bit and proceeded to slink in and out of little crags in the coral, spread out its arms, turned upside down, did some amazing camouflaging (it went from being reddish purple to looking exactly like the reef, complete with bumps and fissures right before our eyes), and played a little with a huge grouper that was nestled in next to him. Very cool.
We decided it was time to get away from the cruise ships that come into Blue Lagoon every day so today we headed north to another anchorage. We are still traveling in tandem with our friends on Vera. Our new anchorage is on Yasawa Island and is called Land Harbour and it is the farthest north in the Yasawa Island chain that we will be going.
It was only a 12 mile sail (motor actually) – but right in the middle of it we had to traverse an area that was exceptionally shallow. As with most of the waters around here, it was not accurately charted for depth so we had been proceeding cautiously, but still it is always scary to suddenly see the coral heads right under you – with just a few feet of water between the bottom of your boat and the coral. We managed to make it through, but not without getting our fishing line snagged on coral and losing the fishing yo-yo (holds the fishing line) and a couple hundred feet of fishing line and a good lure. Oh, well – certainly could have been worse.
In a few days we will be heading back to Lautoka (about 50 miles south-east of here) and check out to begin our trip to Vanuatu.
L.
Friday June 27, 2008
LikuLiku Bay, Fiji
We have been in contact with some of our friends who did not leave New Zealand when we did because they were were either not ready yet, or were not comfortable with the weather forecast for that week (which was really very good). Hard to believe, but one month later only one of the 20 or more boats waiting in New Zealand has been able to leave to make the passage up to Fiji or Vanuatu(and that boat apparently had a terribly difficult passage). There has just been one storm system after another between New Zealand and here – so if we had not left when we did we would still be in New Zealand – one month later! We knew that it was hard to find a good weather window for the crossing, but this is even stranger than we had expected. We would have been so frustrated by now.
We are currently anchored outside the Blue Lagoon Resort in the Yasawa Island Group of Fiji. Blue Lagoon is a wonderfully protected anchorage surrounded by several relatively small islands (Matacawa Levu, Nanuya Levu, Nanuya Lailai, and Tavewa Islands in case you were interested). It is named after the Brooke Shields movie which was shot here in 1980. Each island has one or two resorts on them, but we have not gone to any of them yet. There is one resort that is very exclusive (Turtle Island Resort) and costs about $5,000 a night. We are not allowed to go onshore there – but, we don’t feel the need to. We actually have a more beautiful view from the boat than any of the resorts have.
Three days ago we left Navadra Island for Likuliku Bay of Waya Island. We did the passage to Waya Island with “Vera”, but without “Wombat of Sydney”, who had to return to the big town of Lautoka to fix their generator. We have had to motor between anchorages most of the time in Fiji rather than sail because there are so many uncharted reefs around. It is much easier to avoid hitting a reef if you are motoring and don’t have to mess around with sails. Too bad, as it is in theory a wonderful place to sail. It is just a little too hair-raising to know that you can be sailing along in 60 meters of water one minute and up against a 2 foot deep reef the next. The charts for Fiji are only partially accurate – and with this type of adventure you need perfect accuracy. So all of our “sails” are done with the engine on and Laura sitting high up on the mast to look out for reefs as Mark steers.
The anchorage at Likuliku Bay looked exactly like a picture perfect postcard of what Fiji should look like. When we pulled in there were 6 other boats in the anchorage (which is a lot around here) the water was calm and clear and wonderful. Plus, the Octopus Resort was on the shore with a bar and restaurant. The Australian manager of the the resort was extremely hospitable. After a beach walk with Michael and Britta and some Fiji Bitter beer, we enjoyed a delicious and plentiful Indo-Fijian curry supper at the resort. After dinner, it was a bit hair-raising to get the dinghies off the beach and through the shallow reef to get back to our boats in the dark as there was suddenly some surf running. As we neared Sabbatical III we could see that she was rolling back and forth like a pendulum. During the three hours we were on shore, the ocean swell had found it’s way into Likuliku Bay. It was not a good night as the swell was constant and large. Everything loose on the boat rattled and we nearly had to hang on to our berths while trying to sleep. When we peeked our heads out in the morning, we saw that all the boats were leaving and “Vera” called us on the VHF suggesting we leave in 15 minutes. Surf was crashing on the reef behind us and rollers were breaking on the beach where the evening before we had landed our dinghy with ease. These were conditions for surfers, not boats at anchor.
Leaving Likuliku Bay in the morning is not advisable since the sun is in your eyes when looking for coral reefs, but with a swell like this we all just wanted to leave. We headed for Drawaqa (yes, no ‘u’ after the ‘q’) Island which seemed well positioned to have smoother waters. A two and one-half hour sail brought us into another pretty bay but without a good place to anchor. We headed north to a bay at the south end of Naviti Island but it was also too exposed to ocean swell. We were tired and hot but decided to stop wasting time looking at other nearby bays and instead headed for the one place that we knew was protected, Blue Lagoon, more than three hours away.
We arrived sunned-out at Blue Lagoon at 3 pm and promptly took naps. There is no roll in Blue Lagoon, and like the rest of the Yasawa Islands, it is very beautiful. There is good snorkeling, gorgeaus views in all directions from the lagoon,plus long sand beaches for walking.
Our position is
South 16 degrees 56.6 minutes
East 177 degrees 22.0 minutes
Love, L and M
June 23, 2008
Navadra Island, Fij
We are still anchored off Navadra Island. This place is too special to leave quickly. The coral reef here is perhaps the best we have seen except for Suvarov. There are not many large fish but the coral makes up for that.Yesterday afternoon, Wombat of Sydney anchored here as well. They went hard aground a few miles out and were lucky to have a Fijian power boat come by and pull them off. Last night, we had Vera and Wombat over for a supper of opur ayam (Indonesian chicken curry).
We will stay here today but will almost certainly leave tomorrow for the southern Yasawa Islands.
M.
Navadra: satellite view
Navadra Anchorage
June 21, 2008 (UTC + 12)
We spent six nights at Musket Cove on Malolo Lailai Island. It is a very comfortable place to spend time. The weather improved and we experienced clear skies every day after that stormy first day. At Musket Cove we socialized and snorkeled with Vera (Michael and Britta), Wombat of Sydney (Mike and Lynn), Horizon (Ray and Marilyn), and a few other boats.
We became “life members” of the Musket Cove Yacht Club which gave us the right to use the facilities of the resort. Laura swam in the pool, we ate some meals in the restaurant, shopped in the grocery store, and snorkeled. At low tide, a long sand bar would stick out from the water about one mile from where we were moored. Off of that sandy island, there is a beautiful and vibrant reef with fish in such abundance that it seemed like there were traffic jams of fish getting around coral heads. Some of the fish are varieties that we never saw before. The fish are very unafraid of humans because when the boats full of resort guests come out for a snorkel the guides feed the fish so the tourists get their money’s worth. We often took our dinghy to this reef just before noon. During the lunch hour, the resort guests are back at the resort standing in buffet lines, so the reef is less crowded.
Yesterday (June 20), Sabbatical III and Vera headed out for the western Mamanuca Islands. Our first destination was Monuriki Island, which along with the nearby Monu Island, was the setting for the Castaway movie starring Tom Hanks. The problem with sailing in the Mamanuca and Yasawa Islands is that there are no good nautical charts. We bought the “Lautoka to Yasawa Islands” (F5) chart from the Fiji Hydographic Office, but this marks only those reefs that are visible from aerial photography. For much of the chart there are no depths noted. These waters are strewn with uncharted reefs and rocks and so the passage required constant attention. Laura sat up on the whisker pole about 15 feet above the water and scanned the clear blue water for color changes or other indications of depth changes. We wound our way through reefs into what we thought was deep water, and Laura got off of her perch to get out of the hot sun. It was a cloudless day. Of course, as soon as she got down, the depth sounder went from 65 meters under the keel to 2 meters. We were over a reef in water so clear we could make out the detail of the coral fans and fish. Fortunately, we turned around and made our way off the reef without touching bottom. Vera was 100 meters behind us so our sudden speed and course change, plus a radio call, alerted them to the danger. It was slow going the rest of the way to Monuriki Island. As we pulled up to Tom Hank’s beach, a schooner full of tourists was dropping anchoring and disgorging people ashore. They schooner sent a long boat out to us to tell us that they had exclusive rights to the island, granted by the chief on Yanuya Island. We could not go ashore until they left and even then we needed to visit the chief and obtain permission. Yanuya Island was a bit of a schlep from Monuriki, plus the anchoring depths and holding were only marginal, so we decided to proceed with Plan B, the anchorage at Navadra Island, about two hours away. This time Vera took the lead and we followed, allowing Laura to stay out of the sun.
The Navadra Island anchorage is very beautiful. Protected from the south and east by Vanua Levu Island and from the north and east by Navadra Island. Although these islands are uninhabited, every bit of Fiji “belongs” to a clan headed by a chief. This includes the reef, fish, beach, and water. These particular islands are uninhabited due to a lack of fresh water, but a fishing boat from the village on another island that owns them came by and asked us to perform sevusevu at the cave on the island. This entails leaving an offering of kava root, which we did (we brought 6 bundles of kava with us just for this purpose). The root is made into a drink that is mildly euphoric and intoxicating. The Veras also filled a water jug for the fisherman. We had a nice supper on Vera and watched an almost full moon rise. Sabbatical III and Vera are the only boats here.
We will spend the day here snorkeling and exploring. Tomorrow we will probably head northeast to the Yasawa Islands. The weather forecast looks very good for the next three days, after which the winds and seas will pick up. We plan to be in the Blue Lagoon of Matacawa Levu Island when that happens.
M.
We are safely at anchor in Momi Bay on the island of Viti Levu,
Fiji. About 7 hours ago we transited Navula Pass through the
fringing reef that protects the west side of this large island.
Momi Bay is just opposite the pass. After a quick lunch we napped
all afternoon. We woke up at 6 pm (NZT) just in time to help
guide Vera and Wombat of Sydney via radio through the passage and
into this bay in the dark. They are now anchored just next to us.
The last 36 hours of our trip here was characterized by
gradually increasing wind and seas. For the last few hours we had
wind consistently above 30 knots and often above 35 knots, and
very large seas. The large waves were moving pretty much in the
direction we were so they were not too much of a problem, although
they would occasionally make the boat round up or give the
cockpit a good dousing. With all of this wind, we arrived at the
pass just at noon, earlier than we thought, and thus had plenty of
light with which to navigate.
Tomorrow morning we will head up to the city of Lautoka to do
the formal check-in. It is about 20 miles north of here and the
trip is entirely within the reef.
There is certainly no one left at Minerva Reef. The day that
we left, the GRIB files forecast a very nasty “squash” zone
centered on Minerva starting tonight. An unusually high high
pressure area was moving close to a low coming down from Fiji to
create a zone of 20 foot seas and 45 knot winds. There was no
choice but to leave Minerva well before these conditions were
felt. We even got two emailed warnings about this squash zone
from friends who were worried that we might not be looking at the
new GRIBs. We always look at the GRIBs even while at anchor just
to avoid surprises.
The passage here was pretty comfortable even though there was
too little wind to start and too much at the end. The only
problem was the result of an ill-conceived late night gybe in
gusty winds that broke the spliced loop on the main sail outhaul.
An hour later we had the outhaul repaired and the main sail
back in action.
The nights were quite clear and the stargazing spectacular
during the passage. Both of us saw the largest shootest star we
had ever seen. We are not really sure that it was a shooting star
since it was seemingly so close and was green, red, and gold with
a sparkling tail. I though that it might be a distress flare and
scanned the sea with a flood light. But it had to come from space
given its trajectory and speed.
It’s back to bed for us. The three hour nap only made us long
even more for a long stretch of undisturbed sleep.
M.
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Position: 14:10 NZT or 02:10 UTC
Tuesday June 10th
South 19.02.3
East 177.50.8
We should be in Fiji by sunset on Wednesday. The winds we have
been expecting have not arrived yet so we have done way more
motoring than we had wanted to. With the cost of diesel fuel we
might have flown to Fiji cheaper. Oh well, what fun would that be?
Vera, left Minerva about 15 hours after we did, and we have been
in contact with them via our satellite phone. The say they have
good winds now and we hope the winds will catch up to us very soon.