Living & Learning Aboard the Good Ship Learnativity

Lovin’ the Lau Group in Fiji

I am long overdue to catch up here with blog posts since we arrived in Fiji and it will have to wait a bit longer till I get more time with good connections.  Right now we are over in what is known as the Lau Group of islands in the SE corner of Fijian waters and have been enjoying anchorages in VanuaBelavu island such as “The Bay of Islands” up in the north and for the last few days, including Canada Day, just off the village of Lomolomo and the uninhabited little island of Yanu Yanu.  17 17.731S 17 58.918W if you’d like to see exactly where that is on Google or Bing maps or sat photos.

 

We are about to weight anchor in a few minutes and head out the SE pass through the surrounding coral reefs and head south to see more of the Lau Group islands.  Depending on where Mother Nature decides to blow, we’ll either head to Vulaga (pronounced Falanga) or else Totoya or Matuko which are more to the west of Vulaga.  We won’t likely have any cellular connections till we get past those so no more FB or other web presence for the next week or too but we’ll try to keep posting via our sat phone connections along the way.

For now, I’ll let the photos do the taking with some shots of where the good ship Learnativity has been over the past few weeks. Sorry, no time to add captions right now so just enjoy them for what they are as we do.

		LTY in the Lau Group 2015 VIEW SLIDE SHOW DOWNLOAD ALL

LTY UPDATE: Tuesday, September 18th, 2012

LTY UPDATE: Tuesday, September 18th, 2012
Luganville Bay, Espiritu Santo, Vanuatu

LTY time: 16:45 (Vanuatu time = UTC +11)
Location: Luganville Bay, Espiritu Santo, Vanuatu
Position: 15 31.426 S, 167 09.759 E (you can cut & past this into Google Earth to see on map)
Wind: 10-15 SE
Seas/Swell: 0.5m ESE plus good tidal current through this channel
Weather: Sunny yesterday (Mon) Overcast today
Air temp: 82 F 28C
Sea temp: 90.5 F 32.5 C
Barometer: 1016mm

LEISURELY DAYS in LUGANVILLE BAY

Not too much to report from the anchorage here in Luganville Bay so I'll try to keep it brief as I spend my time picking up a few provisions ashore and catching up online with the good Internet connection I have thanks to my cellular modem.

First, thanks to all who sent me notes and concern about the dog bit and the update is that all is well and (sorry to disappoint any of you) I'm going to live! ;) The bite happened two weeks ago today when I was in Port Villa and the few (5) punctures seemed fine after good cleaning and keeping them that way along with antibiotic salve. But after ten days the largest deepest one suddenly became rather sore and red and the area around it on my inner right ankle started to swell a bit. This factored into my decision to leave my little slice of paradise pie over in Asanvari Bay early and come here to Luganville as it is the 2nd largest city in Vanuatu and has a hospital. By the time I got here to Luganville my ankle was feeling much better but I decided to be smart (hey! it can happen!) and go get it checked anyway. I won't be anywhere near any medical facilities for the rest of this month here in Vanuatu and then I've got the longer passage north to the Marshall Islands which is about 1500nm so that will take between 10-15 days.

I do continue to be able to find ways to surround myself with beauty.  On the walk back from the hospital I spotted this brilliant explosion of colour as a large bougainvillea had grown up intertwined with this tall evergreen tree.  And last night we had the amazing sunset you see below.

Getting around here in Luganville is pretty easy and I've got several options. I took my dingy up the bay a bit to the river entrance and was able to go up the river to the edge of the town center and tie the dingy along the river banks right in front of the market. In town there is a constant stream of vans and taxis such that if you put up your hand one will stop within seconds. Vans cost 100 Vatu and Taxi is about 150 - 200 so for between 1-2 US dollars you can get anywhere you like. The town is relatively small so you can walk to most places but it is spread out on just one shore side main street so it stretches for several kilometers and the van/taxi option is sometimes the way to go. I walked most of the town but the hospital is up the hills a ways out of town so I got a taxi to take me there. It was a tiny spot but there was a door marked "Emergency" so I tried that first and though it was locked, a smiling head nurse soon opened it up and invited me in.

Very Spartan but very clean facility inside and I received great care there. Contrary to what most people think, me included originally, medical care in pretty much all of the so called "developing" countries I have been to in the past 5 years has been very good and very affordable, so you have to initially work to change your views and attitudes accordingly. This most recent experience will give you some idea of what I mean. The head nurse asked for the details and gave me an initial exam followed by the attending physician. They pretty much agreed with my self assessment that there was an internal infection but it was getting better and recommended I take some antibiotics for 7 days to help ensure it was all cleared up. They also recommended a tetanus shot to guard against rabies and that I continued to clean the wound as I had been. I gratefully accepted their recommendations and prescriptions, confirmed that I had no allergies to medication and soon had a shot in my arm, a zip lock bag of Amoxicillin and a tube of antibiotic cream in my hand and was back out in the beautiful sunny day walking back to town.

Total elapsed time in Emergency: 15 minutes or less
Total cost: 3000 Vatu (US $30)

Need I say more? Well, just that today the swelling, redness and throbbing is almost all gone and my ankle and I feel very good.

Today I went back into town to get a few more provisions and top up my cellular modem to last me through my rounds of Skype calls, Emails, Kindle downloads and yes, PICTURE uploads of bats, boys and bread! I'll get to uploading those pictures tomorrow and let you know when I do but it is getting late, dark and cold for me here and the galley is calling my name so I'll sign off for now.

Night all!

Wayne

LTY UPDATE: Saturday, September 15th, 2012

LTY UPDATE: Saturday, September 15th, 2012
Vanihe Bay, Maewo Island, Vanuatu

LTY time: 18:15 (Vanuatu time = UTC +11)
Location: Vanihe Bay, NW end of Maewo Island, Vanuatu
Position: 15 16.556 S, 167 58.467 E (you can cut & past this into Google Earth to see on map)
Wind: 2 knots (inside the bay)
Seas/Swell: flat
Air temp: 82 F 28C
Sea temp: 90.5 F 32.5 C
Barometer: 1017mm

BREAD and BATS

Yesterday I sailed into Asanvari Bay on the south tip of Maewo Island and it has turned out to be a slice of the paradise pie Mother Nature seems to serve up for me so often. Tiny bay, verdant jungle rising up on the surrounding steep cliffs and hills, one small white and one small black beach to break up the otherwise rocky shore and perhaps most spectacularly the most picture perfect waterfall set back no more than ten meters from the midpoint of the arch that forms this bay. I spent some time ashore yesterday and talked with the few people who are living here right now and learned that while it is a very small village (3 actually, each having about 2-8 homes) most of the adults are away right now for various reasons. Chief Nelson is sick and has been in Port Villa for the past month and has a number of village members with him. There is a big gathering of all the women that is partly religious, partly for crafts and they are away for two more weeks on another island to the south. And many of the young men are away at other islands for work. In stark contrast to my previous anchorage in Namaram Bay where I was surrounded by throngs of kids and adults, Asanvari was pure serenity and the only sounds are those of the wind in the trees, and the slapping of the sea against the hull of LTY and the dinghy which is tied up alongside and the pulsating sounds of waves on the rocky shores.

No throngs of kids swimming out to see me this morning unfortunately but none the less I did have another surprise visitor at about 6:30 this morning. Ruby heard the approaching fiberglass skiff first as usual while I was in the galley making coffee and breakfast. I came up on deck to be greeted by an elderly man who wanted to know if I'd like a loaf or two of fresh bread?! Hmmm, gee let me think ……………….. YES please!! Seems he has a small home and bakery just north of this bay and he saw me come in yesterday and thought he'd drop by to offer me some of the bread he had just baked. With my enthusiastic Yes please! he reached into the bin at his feet and pulled out two hand formed loaves and passed them up to me. They were still very warm from the oven and filled my flaring nostrils with that magical intoxicating smell of yeast and fresh baked bread as I gratefully took them from him and paid the outrageous sum of 200 Vatu (about 2 US$). But hey, I thought I’d splurge! ;)

Of course in the way that serendipity and synchronicity always seem to look after me and help guide my life, I was on my last few slices of bread from Port Villa so this timing was perfect. Taking my treasure down to the galley I quickly altered breakfast preparations a bit, finished up fresh pamplemouss (grapefruit) I had already started eating which that some of the boys at Namaram had given me and finished frothing the milk for my morning latte. This is all pretty much my standard breakfast but now I sliced up one of the fresh papayas the boys had also brought out to me yesterday, pulled some tasty New Zealand butter out of the fridge and headed up to the cockpit. Pouncing on one loaf while it was still warm I sliced four thick slices and inhaled the steamy smells coming off the sourdough surfaces, smeared them with NZ butter that quickly melted and soaked in like the bread was a sponge and breakfast in paradise was served! Seemed more like dream than reality as I sat there savoring each mouthful and the splendor of this setting. What a way to start a day!

I enjoyed the next hour or so reading and finishing my latte out on my lounge chair on the aft deck and then the waterfall started to call my name so I grabbed my shower bag and Ruby and I headed ashore to take up yesterday’s offer to shower in the waterfall. Again, not a soul to be seen and within minutes I was having one of the best showers I can recall. Talk about water pressure! It wasn’t even very cold as the day had warmed up already and I was soon lathered up, shaved rinsed in no time flat. Ruby enjoyed the chance to nose around the surrounding gardens and jungle while I sat on the edge of the pool at the base of the waterfall trying to take it all in. As if the shower and waterfall itself wasn’t enough there were about ten or more little black and white birds, some kind of swallow I would guess and they were putting on the most amazing acrobatic air show just for me it seemed as they dove down from high up in the jungle trees and made a 180 degree arc through the mist from the waterfall, back up to the trees, and down again and again and again. I literally had to pinch myself just to make sure I wasn’t dreaming. Turns out I wasn’t!

I went over to check out the cave in the rocks right in front of where I was anchored and there was lots of coral growing around the entrance but the caves were too small to swim or snorkel into as they only went into the rock about two meters. Then it was back to LTY to figure out what comes next. As truly awemazing as Asanvari Bay is I decided for a number of reasons to leave and make the short sail (about 10nm) across to neighboring Ambae Island. I have some online banking and bills that I need to look after by the 18th and the only place likely to have a cellular or WiFi connection good enough to do this is in Luganville, the 2nd largest city in Vanuatu, and about 65nm from here and it would work best to break up the trip into two day sails so I arrive in good light. The other increasingly pressing matter is that the dog bite on my ankle I got in Port Villa ten days ago had started to act up. The little bugger had punctured my skin in about four places but only one had gone through to the bone and all of these had been healing up quickly in the past ten days, the three smaller ones already gone and the larger one quickly receding. However yesterday it started to suddenly throb when I was standing up and by late afternoon there was some slight swelling so that became a bit of a concern. I gave it a very thorough cleaning till it was down to fresh flesh, put on some antibiotic salve and did this every few hours. Slept fine last night with my foot propped up on some pillows and it felt better this morning but I figure that the prudent thing to do is go get it checked professionally and maybe get some shots. Luganville apparently has a good hospital and so for all these reasons I pulled up the anchor and set sail just before noon with a bit of sadness at having to leave such an idyllic anchorage so soon. This is a very unusual occurrence for me as I usually stay in an anchorage for as long as it captures my curiosity and only move on when the next new destination starts calling my name. But banking and bites conspired to get me moving a bit sooner this time.

Some high overcast had come in on the sail over to Maewo Island and so I decided to find an anchorage while there was still good light and pulled into Vanihe Bay and had the anchor down just before 3PM. Oh my, more paradise pie!

Vanihe Bay is yet another tiny little anchorage, this one created by a small rocky point formed by an outcropping of almost vertical cliffs which rise dramatically out of the sea and then slope back just enough to allow a thick lush growth of jungle to form above. According to my charts the bottom is supposed to slope up quickly from the deep as you approach the cliffs and so I motored ever so slowly up to these towering rock faces in front of me and sure enough the depth meter started to count down and I found some good holding sand in about 40 feet of water that was only about 100 feet away from the rock faces.

However these cliffs run N/S and the trade winds almost always come out of the SE so what little wind does reach me this close to the cliffs would be pushing me away and all would be well. It is a bit intimidating at first to be anchored with this vertical wall of stone right in front and beside me so I cleaned up the decks, put in the anchor snubber and coiled all my lines from the sail over while I let the anchor chain and wind settle in and make sure this was going to work out. As I was busy out on deck doing all this I kept looking up at these magnificent rock faces and the trees above because as I was creeping in and dropping the anchor I had noticed that there were hundreds if not thousands of huge black crows or ravens perched in the trees above. Something didn’t quite seem right though and as soon as I saw some of them flying I knew what it was; these weren’t crows or ravens, these were fruit bats!

I got the binoculars out the more I looked the more I saw!

** Click on any photo to enlarge

There were bats hanging from almost every tree and perhaps the most dramatic were over a hundred of them that were hanging from the limbs of a dead tree. If I wasn’t seeing this for myself I would have thought it was out of a movie set.

 

I’ve seen lots of these fruit bats in the South Pacific and so I know them quite well by now. They are quite large with wing spans up to a meter and bodies that are 12-18 inches long. They also have quite bright yellow and brown fur collars around their necks which makes it easy to mistake them for hanging fruit many times and also makes them look a bit like little friars to me. They are quite different that most other bats (I think?) in that they like to be out soaking up the hot sun all day as they hang from the trees and you often see them flying around during the daytime though they are most active just around sun down it seems. However I have never seen this many in one place and there are at least several hundred, perhaps thousands, I can't be sure (or count that high!) I must have spent almost an hour just enjoying this experience and marveling at this latest of Mother Nature’s unending spectacles.

So my day started with fresh baked bread for breakfast, a waterfall shower before lunch and has ended with dramatic cliffs at my side and thousands of fruit bats to entertain me. While they will most certainly be different in the details, I do hope that each of your days are as filled with moments of experiential learning that both satisfy and drive your curiosity. And if not, why?

LTY UPDATE: Friday, August 31, 2012

LTY UPDATE: Friday, August 31, 2012
Dillon’s Bay, Erromango Island, Vanuatu

LTY time: 17:100 (Vanuatu time = UTC +11)
Location: Dillon’s Bay, Erromango Island, Vanuatu
Position: 18 49.105 S, 169 00.694 E (you can cut & past this into Google Earth to see on map)
Wind: 10-15 knots SE (inside the bay)
Seas/Swell: 2ft @ 6 seconds SE (coming from)
Air temp: 78.8 F 26C
Sea temp: 85.1 F 29.5 C
Barometer: 1017mm

DELIGHTFUL DAY in DILLON’s BAY

I awoke to a new day with a clearing sky and it was a beautiful sunny day right up till this evening when the clouds have come back in again and cooled things down quite a bit. Not too much to report today as I’ve simply had a super simple day. Had several more men row out from ashore early this morning as I was having breakfast and traded for some fresh papaya and a few new fruits I don’t know and look forward to trying. Ruby and I went ashore to one of the few small sandy beaches in this bay, most of them are rock cliffs or rock beaches. She enjoyed her time ashore racing around as usual and I got some good shots of Learnativity looking out through some of the large coral outcroppings sculpted by the sea.

Did a bit of snorkeling but I’m afraid I’ve been spoiled with that I’ve found in Fiji the past few years and so it was a bit underwhelming but still gloriously clear waters and always interesting creatures to observe and learn from. I took the opportunity to give Learnativity’s hull a good inspection and clean off a bit of the growth starting around the waterline and all looks very good there. I spent a few hours ashore walking around the village that spreads itself along the river here.

One interesting thing I learned was that they all live on the north side of the river because the south side is where they bury their dead so this is all a beautiful cemetery area. It was the same simple village buildings and quite a large community by Vanuatu standards as they are a people who much prefer to live in small little communities of 10 to 50 people rather than create larger ones. In this case I think it is the river that creates a single area where more can live. Even so, the homes are all quite spread out and what I’m gathering from my walks through these villages is that the people are much more inclined to spend time in small groups than large ones. Though there was an area all cleared off under some beautiful huge trees that they explained was where the ladies held their market to sell their wares each Wednesday.  Two men rowed out to visit and brought me this delicious selection of Popos (Papaya) and Pamplemouss (Grapefruit) which will last me for several breakfasts as you can see.

And once again there was great care paid to keeping the village area and pathways very clear and well-manicured. The soil is very rich so there is great variety of plants, flowers and trees growing. They don’t have any electricity in the village but they do have a supply ship that comes in about once a month from Port Villa and brings things like building supplies, rice, flower and other goods they can’t produce. They also showed me an area where they are cultivating Sandalwood, which historically was a very sought after prize by foreign sailors from faraway lands. Too much so actually in that most of the forests of Sandalwood have apparently long been wiped out and hence the need for this village to try to bring this still prized wood back into prominence. They don’t do any carving or other processing of the Sandalwood, just sell it to buyers in Port Villa apparently and helps them generate some income to purchase the other goods they need.

I’m likely going to pull up anchor about 8pm tonight and make the overnight sail to Port Villa. It is just over 80 nautical miles so I’ll do this passage at night so I can arrive there in good light tomorrow morning. I still need to look after my full checking in as there was no Immigration authorities on Aneityum Island where I first entered Vanuatu. Port Villa is also the largest harbour and city in Vanuatu so it will give me another glimpse into this fascinating country and culture. I’m also looking forward to restocking my galley with fresh veggies, bread, cheese and the like. All the more so given the high French influence of this area so I’m hoping to enjoy some particularly good and different breads, pastries, cheese and wine. I’m also looking forward to meeting up with Philip, a single handed sailor from Switzerland who has become a very dear friend. We initially met when we were both checking into Ecuador about 3 years ago and have serendipitously met up several time since as we both ply the waters of the South Pacific. Philip and Teri have been kite surfing their little hearts out up north in Vanuatu the last month or more and looks like we might be able to meet a bit north of Port Villa and spend a bit of time with Blue Bie and Learnativity anchored together once again.

So life continues to treat me extremely well and I’m doing my best to enjoy, appreciate and savor each moment in an attempt to be worthy of such great fortune. I’ll write more once I get to Port Villa and let you know what urban life is like here in Vanuatu.

Wayne

LTY UPDATE: Wednesday, August 29, 2012

LTY UPDATE: Wednesday, August 29, 2012
Port Resolution, Tanna island, Vanuatu

LTY time: 16:15 (Vanuatu time = UTC +11)
Location: Port Resolution, Tanna island, Vanuatu
Position: 19 31.483 S, 169 29.800 E (you can cut & past this into Google Earth to see on map)
Wind: 5-10 knots SE (inside the bay)
Seas/Swell: 1ft @ 6 seconds SE (coming from)
Air temp: 77 F 25C
Sea temp: 84.2 F 29 C
Barometer: 1021mm

FALLING SKIES?

Just ash really, but certainly lots of it the past 24 hours. Yesterday afternoon I heard Mount Yasur give off a big explosion and that along with a wind change has had a steady rain of ash falling on the decks and everything outside. The trouble with having these nice shiny white new decks is that you see every speck of dirt! I’ve swabbed the decks down with seawater twice today but will just leave it till after I leave here to get the rest of it off. It’s interesting in that you can’t see the ash and it has been overcast and rainy since yesterday afternoon but each time you go out on deck there is a larger accumulation of the very black dust from the fallout. Nothing to be alarmed about and it washes off reasonably easy with a stiff brush and small price to pay for the experience of being here and being able to stand on the edge of that volcanic cone and watch Mother Earth do her thing.

One of THE most wonderful things about this lifestyle overall is the direct connection I am afforded with these forces of nature. It borders on being spiritual at times. Standing on the edge of that cone, feeling the ground thrum with the eruptions and then reverberate with the thud of each lava “bomb” hitting the ground around you, smelling the fumes and watching the magical firework display as the lava spewed every upward before falling back to earth was yet another of these visceral experiences for me that creates such a direct connection with this planet and the cosmos overall. I’ve become more and more enraptured and intrigued by physics and cosmology over the past few years and these kinds of experiences only serve to reinforce the very real and direct physical connections I’m learning we have with the cosmos we are a part of.

As I wrote last year, one of the most amazing things I’ve learned is how the very molecules and atoms which make up our body were created by the intense heat and energy in the explosion of high mass supernova stars and so in that sense we are quite literally all made of stardust! Therefore as astrophysicist Neil Degrasse Tyson nicely put it “We are connected to each other biologically, to the earth chemically and to the rest of the universe atomically. That is kinda cool! That makes me smile and feel quite large at the end of that. It’s not that we are better than the universe, we are part of the universe. We are in the universe and the universe is in us.” Having the kinds of experiences I seem to regularly have out here sailing the world makes me feel SO much a part of this grand universe, however small. So I will gladly clean my decks of volcanic ash in preparation for heading out for the next leg of this grand adventure.

As you may have guessed I did not sail north today. Woke up at first light as usual to find that it was drizzly and grey and why would I chose to sail in that when I can enjoy a day to rest and relax before a sunny day dawns for more adventure and action? Of course there is also a very pragmatic reason for being a sunshine sailor and that is that I depend largely upon visual navigation in these coral invested waters. As wonderful as all my digital technology of Radar, chart plotters and satellite photos is, there is still no substitute for what I can see with my own two eyes as I come into the next new anchorage and therefore I’m quite practically dependent upon having the light of the sun high overhead to light my way foreword. So it has been a wonderful day spent doing a few boat jobs and a lot of reading and we’ll see what the weather brings tomorrow and head north to Erromango when the sun is back.

I’ll be back to post an update when that happens and let you know a bit more about the next great anchorage I’m fortunate enough to experience.

Wayne

LTY UPDATE: Tuesday, August 28, 2012

LTY UPDATE: Tuesday, August 28, 2012
Port Resolution, Tanna island, Vanuatu

LTY time: 18:10 (Vanuatu time = UTC +11)
Location: Port Resolution, Tanna island, Vanuatu
Position: 19 31.483 S, 169 29.800 E (you can cut & past this into Google Earth to see on map)
Wind: 5-10 knots SE (inside the bay)
Seas/Swell: 1ft @ 6 seconds SE (coming from)
Air temp: 77 F 25C
Sea temp: 84.2 F 29 C
Barometer: 1021mm

WOW!!!!!

That’s about the best I can do to try to describe what it was like to stand on the edge of the volcanic cone of Mount Yasur and look down into the boiling lava pit below. It is yet another of those great experiential learning events where you just have to be there to understand it. Something majestic and “raw” about the whole thing. Standing there looking into the “core” of Mother Earth, the moon like terrain of fallen lava rocks all around you. It is a very visceral experience with the smell of the sulphur from the explosions, feeling the ground shake with each eruption and feeling and hearing the lava “bombs” as they land not more than 20 meters away in some cases. Yet another awemazing life experience and learning for me!!

Looking down into Mother Earth herself: Mount Yasur, Tanna Island, Vanuatu

 

I’d made arrangements with some of the villagers ashore for this trip and went ashore in my dinghy about 4pm to meet them. They have a small (Toyota) pickup truck with some wooden seats made up in the back and we crammed about 12 adults into the cab and truck bed for the half hour ride up to the mountain top. Roads were all carved out of the black lava dirt/sand and surprisingly good condition most of the way. They have a little entry way at the base of the mountain where they collect the 3300Vautu fee (about US$33) which I think is very reasonable and goes to support local schools and road upkeep on the mountain. The road goes up very close to the top and you only have to climb about the last 300m up to the edge of the cone which you can then walk around about 1/3 of to get different viewpoints. The volcano is quite active and there were about 15 eruptions or so I’d guess in the 2+ hours I was up there. Some are relatively small and just cough up some molten lava that sprinkles back down on the surrounding inner cone. And then there are some much larger eruptions and explosions where very large volumes of lava come right up and out and flings hundreds of lava “bombs” a few hundred meters up into the air. They make a sizzling sound as they make their upper arc and come back down to earth and you can hear and feel the larger lumps of molten lava, some larger than a big beach ball and many the size of a basketball, as they thump the ground upon landing only meters away on the slopes of the inner cone below you. Huge clouds of dark grey ash erupt with this and slowly rise upward and there is a noticeable but not overpowering sulphur like smell.

The eruptions are all very sporadic of course so trying to have your camera at the ready is a game of patience and timing. I haven’t had time to go look yet but I think I got several very good photos and at least two good video shots that will give you a much better idea of what it was like. I will likely get a good internet connection this weekend or next week when I think I’ll make it up to the big city of Port Villa so I’ll post the video and pictures then and you’ll get a much better idea than my poor attempt to describe it in words. Trust me, it was AWEMAZING and as real at it gets!!!

 

 

I’ve also spent more time exploring ashore and it is equally authentic an experience and a bit like going back in time. The Vanuatu people prefer to live in small little villages and don’t cluster together so even in this small bay where I am there are 5 different villages within about a 2km radius. Several have buildings for Primary and Secondary schools and there are even a few “Cafés” that would serve you if you wanted to apparently.

 

I just enjoyed walking around, learning and looking. You ask permission in each village with the first adult you meet and they are very happy to show you around, answer questions or let you go on your own. In one of the villages there were about 20 ladies and young girls all busy weaving palm leaves together for a new thatched roof on some of the village homes. They apparently last about 2-3 years and they spend about a week at a time creating a whole set of these woven “shingles”. The men look after building the superstructure for the roof (out of branches) and then layering on the palm fronds that he ladies have sewn together. They were happy to let me sit there and watch for about an hour, answer my questions and do a lot of giggling. Amazing to be able to be a part of for a bit.

Their villages are immaculate. Well groomed and cared for, nicely built and lots of attention to details. The walk ways and roads are all made of the dark almost black volcanic sandy soil and they must rake and brush these several times a day as they are so unbelievably smooth and clean that I was almost hesitant to walk on them. Children are everywhere, some helping out with various jobs with the adults, some playing by themselves. There are chickens, some pigs and some cows doing their thing and mostly in the areas on the outskirts of the village. Like I say it is like stepping back in time and feels very special to me that I’m allowed to walk into their world and experience it with them.

Meanwhile back on Learnativity today I spent the whole day doing some needed boat jobs. My house batteries are pretty much done after 6 years and I’m doing my best to coax the last bits of life out of them before replacing them. Two of the eight have dead cells in them now so I needed to do some rewiring to isolate them and I think I’ll be fine for a while now. I really should have replaced them in Fiji I guess but I was spending so much money there on all the other parts of the refit and I always like to squeeze every last penny out of all my equipment so I’ve left it till now. I’ll have a look around the big town of Port Villa when I get there and see what I might be able to source for new batteries there but I’m hoping I can make it up to the Marshall Islands where I have much better options for getting good batteries. I’ve got lots of ways of producing lots of electrical power from solar to wind to diesel generator to the alternators on my main engine, so no shortage that way, but as with what’s keeping solar and wind power from becoming true solutions for electrical power ashore, the issue is being able to STORE all that electrical energy which is where the batteries come in. However I use VERY meager amounts of electrical power compared to most so I’ll be fine.

Tomorrow if the weather looks good I’ll make head off and sail up north to the next island of Erromango. It’s about 55nm so just a day sail and there is also a tiny little atoll about 20nm NE of here that I may stop at and will just wait to see what weather and whim dictate tomorrow. After that is on to the big island of Efate and the big city of Port Villa, largest port and city in Vanuatu, about 30,000 people. I’ll let you know more about these as I experience them and should get a full internet connection in PV so I can upload pictures from the past few weeks.

Till then I wish you well and thanks again for joining me on this amazing journey!

Wayne

LTY UPDATE: Sunday, August 26, 2012

LTY UPDATE: Sunday, August 26, 2012
Port Resolution, Tanna island, Vanuatu

LTY time: 17:40:00 (Fiji time = UTC +12)
Location: Port Resolution, Tanna island, Vanuatu
Position: 19 31.483 S, 169 29.800 E (you can cut & past this into Google Earth to see on map)
Wind: 5-10 knots SE (inside the bay)
Seas/Swell: 6ft @ 6 seconds SE (coming from)
Air temp: 77 F 25C
Sea temp: 84.2 F 29 C
Barometer: 1020mm

GREAT SAIL to TANNA

I was up at first light to make breakfast and get things all ready to go and by 06:30 had the main sail up, then the anchor and we were on our way north to Tanna Island, home of one of Vanuatu's two active volcano's. It was a perfect morning with the scattered clouds dispersing as they day progressed and a good SE wind of 15-22 knots. Ideal sailing weather other than still a bit cold for my thin tropical blood. It was a fabulous and fast sail up to Port Resolution, just under seven hours for the 45nm sail. Swells were rather large out of the SE so must have been some good sized storms down in the lower latitudes which is typical this time of year but these make the ride all the more thrilling for me.

 

Port Resolution is a tiny and reasonably well protected bay on the SE corner of Tanna and you can check it out in Google Earth to get a good sense of it. I’m tucked in close to shore on the SE corner out of the way of most of the swell that hooks around the point and so far it is very comfortable. Some of the local boys/men have already been out in the dugout outrigger canoes just to chat, offering some fruit and the like. One of them is making arrangements for those of us who arrived today (three other boats) to get a ride up to “Yasur” the volcano and it looks good to be able to do that tomorrow afternoon and evening. We’ll leave here about 5pm so we get there in time to see both the sunset and then the fiery display in the night.

 

This is not your typical “tour” and would be outlawed I’m sure in most other places as there is always the danger of being hit by one of the “bombs” as they call them, which are the chunks of just hardened lava as it gets spit out and every year there are a few deaths apparently. However they monitor the volcanic activity and you don’t go if it is being particularly violent. With these kinds of things and most in life, I just play the odds and I figure the odds of getting hit are relatively low and well worth it to be able to peer down into an active volcano and have this overall experience so OF COURSE I’m going! I’ll give you the update tomorrow or the day after as it is likely going to be late by the time we get back tomorrow night.

Otherwise this is another gorgeous spot. I’ve been ashore to walk around for an hour or so and it is like a botanical garden in the small villages. There is even a “Yacht Club” in the form of a small building where you can gather and three small bungalow type huts that I think you can rent. I’ll spend more time ashore and go walk to the larger village and market tomorrow so will know more then. But from my excursions today it is absolutely beautiful, very friendly people and very remote.

Sun has gone down already here (6pm) as the bay is set as most are inside some relatively steep mountainous walls so the sun sets early and rises late visibly. That means it’s getting cold for me and time to go make dinner so I’ll leave you with this short update and have lots more to relate after more time ashore and the trip up to see the volcano.

Wayne

LTY UPDATE: Friday, August 24, 2012

LTY UPDATE: Friday, August 24, 2012
Itchepthav Bay, Aneityum island Vanuatu

LTY time: 16:50 (Vanuatu time = UTC +12)
Location: About 170nm WSW of Fiji
Position: 20 08.479 S, 169 46.633 E (you can cut & past this into Google Earth to see on map)
Wind: 3-10 knots SE True (in the bay)
Seas/Swell: flat
Air temp: 78.8 F 26C
Sea temp: 84.2 F 29.0 C
Barometer: 1023mm

ALIVE & WELL AGAIN

I’m finally back, both online and to the world of the living again! I spent the last seven days quite literally flattened by what now appears to have been Dengue Fever. As I wrote just after I arrived here last Friday, I wasn’t feeling great and figured it was just a bad case of the flu. However it continued to get worse and after doing a bit of research all the symptoms seem to support it being Dengue Fever. This is a mosquito borne virus that lasts about seven days and there isn’t much you can do but sweat it out. In my case it certainly lived up to its name as Dengue fever is also known as “break back fever” and it felt for most of those days that I had broken my back again with intense lower back pain that feels like it is right inside your spine. Along with the cycling fever/chill, severe headaches and pain behind the eyes and all your joints it wasn’t the most fun week I’ve ever spent. However I was in the perfect “sick Bay” in the form of beautiful little Anelghowhat Bay and the surrounding verdant majesty of the surrounding hills and mountains offset by the little palm lined Inyeug island on the other side of me. And so I sat, never left the boat for seven days and just slept, read and ate.

Kustom Ceremony Ashore

But it worked, and yesterday it all seemed to break and I felt human again. Perfect timing as the little village closest to the anchorage had organized a welcoming and cultural event for all of us and I was VERY happy to finally splash the dinghy and head ashore with the other cruisers yesterday afternoon about 3pm. Once ashore they took us to their small little village on the beach where they had several small cabins and a whole evening worth of entertainment, education and eating all prepared for us. It was wonderful as they are SO proud of their customs and heritage and so anxious to share it with us. I think pretty much every man woman and child in the village was involved and the children in particular were a real treat. They ran it as almost an educational seminar with one of the elder ladies acting as the “teacher” as she carefully explained all the different parts of their culture, customs, food, dress and dancing. She would have several members of the village come forward for example and go through the whole process of creating their “formal” dress which they make from local plants and she explained the whole process as it was being completed right before us. Additionally they showed us how they gathered wild grasses to make their homes, treated and wove Pandanas leaves into baskets and started a fire in less than 30 seconds using nothing but the friction created by rubbing a small pointed part of a branch with the larger branch. They also did several dances that acted out some of their historical activities and it all culminated with a full spread of delicious dishes for dinner. They had prepared chicken with tarrow, and fish with cassava both cooked in a fire pit with lots of coconut milk inside banana leaves. There was also fire cooked Parrot fish, squid & tomatoes ceviche and a very tasty and spicy coconut sauce. I had mine on a traditional “plate” of a fresh cut banana leaf and it was all the more delicious to me now that I felt like eating again and had my appetite back.

They also took us through their way of preparing Kava which is very different that what I’d become accustomed to in Fiji. In Fiji they use the dried root, the older the better and pound it into a powder which they then put into a cloth bag and strain out the kava by ringing the bag over and over to extract the kava flavor and oils, a bit like making tea. However here in Vanuatu they use freshly picked Kava roots and chop up every part into small cubes about the size of a sugar cube and then crush this by putting it through a grinder. It was explained to us that in the old days and still in some cases today, when they are just making enough for themselves they simply chew the root to shred it. But when making larger quantities for a celebration they now use either hand powered or electric powered grinders to speed up and improve the process. The result is quite noticeable in that the Vanuatu Kava is MUCH stronger than the Fijian ones I’ve had. It would still require three or more cups full to have you feeling quite “relaxed” I think but even just after one you can feel a significant relaxing effect that is quite pleasing. Locally they have Kava pretty much every evening to help relax after what is usually a very physically tiring day. Women now also drink Kava much more although there are still ceremonies they don’t participate in and the men and the women do tend to congregate separately in the evenings still.

There is also a very noticeable difference in the people as they are now all Melanesian by ancestry. The children seem to reflect this the most to me in their faces and many of them also have very different hair colours that include a whole spectrum of blondes and reds in their curly locks. I took a number of pictures which I’ll upload whenever I next get a good internet connect so you can see for yourself. For me this was a great introduction to the people of Vanuatu and has me all the more excited about the experiences to come as I start making my way north through the various islands.

 

On to the Next Anchorage North

As interesting and enjoyable as this all was though the anchorage was getting very crowded by my selfish standards. When I arrived there was just one other sailboat and by Wednesday there was TEN! And so I pulled up the anchor this morning and motored my way the short 10nm up to the NW corner and a tiny little bay I’d seen on the charts called Itchepthav Bay and it turned out to be just what I was looking for; small, well protected and not another ship to be seen! I thought there might be a small village here and I’ve seen about 10 people ashore in the past eight hours I’ve been here but they are all just passing through on their way to villages elsewhere. Works well though because I could finally sneak Ruby ashore for her favorite pastime of running on the beach. The beach is mostly all very well rounded rocks and stones with a few patches of mostly all black lava sand and there are two different palm covered areas where grass has grown up under them and makes for a very park like setting. So we spent a few hours ashore walking and exploring the beach and treed areas before returning to Learnativity, with her shiny new dark blue hull gleaming away in the late afternoon sunshine. I think it is the first time I’ve been able to see her from a distance in this type of setting and really feel the pride and pleasure of the past many months of hard work. No other feeling like that of enjoying the fruits of your labours and brought lots of joy as I slowly approached in the dingy.

Tomorrow I’ll try to get an early start and make the crossing from here to the next island north which is Tanna. I’ll put in at Port Resolution which is supposed to be a very well protected little harbour over on the SE corner. Looks to be about 50nm so should be an easy day’s passage and I can arrive in the early afternoon so I have good light for the visual navigation needed here in these waters that are all filled with beautiful but dangerous (to a boat) coral. The big attraction on Tanna is that it is home to one of the two active volcanoes here in Vanuatu and so I’m hoping that while I’m there the volcanic activity is low enough that I’ll be allowed to walk up to the top and look down into the cauldron below. Just have to wait and see and I’m sure the island will have many other fun adventures to discover while I’m there as well.

Night for now, will write you from the anchorage in Port Resolution tomorrow to let you know how the sail across went and what this next island has to offer.

Wayne & Ruby the Wonderdog

Vanuatu Here We Come!

Just took the Customs officials back to the Lautoka wharf and now have all my official outbound clearance papers stamped and signed so I have officially left Fiji!  WOW!  What a set of awemazing experiences and people!  Every bit of it good and I can only recommend that if you’ve never been or not recently, do your best to get here to see and experience for yourself. 

I’ve not got the dingy and everything else all lashed down and stowed, the fridge, freezer and cupboards are full with one last round of great fruit, vegies, meat and wine from Fiji.  It was a gorgeous sunrise this morning and other than a lot of ash falling from the sugar cane burning going on it is a perfect day to set sail.  Wind looks good according to the forecasts and we’ll see what it is like once I get out clear of the reefs to the west later on today.

Thank you Fiji for treating Ruby and I so extremely well and the lifetime of fond memories we are leaving with.  Thanks to each and every one who so sincerely and fully befriended both Ruby and I as you are what truly stands out from all our experiences.

While there is a bit of melancholy in leaving a place I’ve been in for so long and got to know so well, I’m equally excited about getting back to sailing, anchoring in secluded bays, new people and experiences and being back out on the open ocean again.  Should be about 4 days passage from here to Aneityum or Anatom island as it is sometimes known, the southernmost island of Vanuatu and about 480nm from here in Lautoka.  Winds look like they will cooperate so it should be a pretty much straight run from here to Anelghowhat Bay and I’ll keep you posted with updates along the way.  Be sure to check out the new SPOT Adventures site at http://www.findmespot.com/spotadventures/index.php/view_adventure?tripid=312876 (see previous posting for details) which I’m hoping will make it easy for you to see our tracks along the way as they are automatically uploaded to the map and satellite images.

And with that, we are off!  Vanuatu and more amazing experiences up ahead and glad to have you along for the ride!

Wayne & Ruby the Wonderdog,
aboard the good ship Learnativity
currently anchored near Lautoka Fiji
17 36.061 S, 177 26.442 E

Regular Email:    [email protected]
Email when @ sea or remote via sat phone:    [email protected]  (Yes! This is the correct spelling OCENS)
I typically retrieve and answer Emails to this account via our satellite phone at least once every 24 hours.  You can send as much text as you like but are asked not to send any attachments such as photos.
FaceBook page:        www.facebook.com/wayne.hodgins
Learnativity blog:    www.learnativity.typepad.com
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send short 140 character Text msgs via Email to:  [email protected]

Other contact info:
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Santa’s Ship is in!

Big day yesterday when the big cargo ship from Guam arrived and filled the US Post Office here to overflowing and then some.  As you may recall when I was back in the USA and Canada for November and part of December I took advantage of being there to go through the long list of items I’d built up over the past year of things I needed and can’t get over here.  This list was one that I had been building up since my last time back in the US almost a year ago so it had grown rather long.  Most of the items are boat parts like motor mounts, special engine gaskets, parts for my bow thruster, and then some hard to find favorites like dried cranberries and good coffee.  Some of the boat parts I just had sent to friends addresses and they were awaiting me when I arrived at their places to visit for a few days and others were trips to the likes of Costco, Wal-Mart, West Marine and some specialty marine suppliers.  So I would build up quite a collection of all these bits and pieces and then carefully pack and box them all up and ship them to myself here in Majuro.

Most of the time you just do without and there is very little that I miss or truly do without as a great deal of the fun and adventure of being in all these new and different places is the all new local food and materials you get to try out.  And it is also good for ones problem solving skills to turn parts and tool hunting into an adventure game as you roam some new city or country in search for some materials, parts or tools you need to look after a repair job.  But there are still some things such as special boat parts and tools which you simply can’t find or are prohibitively expensive, at least on my budget.  And so a list slowly builds up with all the things that I haven’t been able to find and still need and each year.  As you might imagine, over the course of a year the list gets rather long and so when I get back to the US or some other developed country, out comes the list and a shopping we will go!

One of the reasons I chose Majuro as the place to go when I had to leave Fiji before the cyclone season started, was because it is a former US protectorate, now independent, but still has a US Post Office and a US Zip code. (96960) This means you can mail things in and out of here with amazing ease and low cost as it is treated no different than mailing to any other state.  And so there is a US Post Office just a few hundred meters from the dinghy dock when I row ashore.  The other reasons for choosing Majuro by the way are that it is in a good location weather wise, cyclone season up here doesn’t set in till around June, there was a mooring available to secure Learnativity to for the two months I would be away and there is a big air strip on the SW end of the atoll that is still serviced by Continental Micronesia airlines which makes it only one flight from here to Honolulu. 

Most of the time when shipping things via USPS you send them via Express or Priority mail and they have some very good rates and it only takes about a week or less from them to be flown in here.  But as you can see from the photo of the dinghy with some of the boxes in it, I had a lot large heavy items which would be prohibitively expensive.  So I used Parcel Post to ship all my stuff back and this is the marine version of the Pony Express and takes two months for things to arrive as they come by ship and have to be loaded and unloaded several times onto different ships along the way with stops in Honolulu and then Guam before arriving here.

No big deal, all part of living by the different rhythms and beats of life aboard but it made for quite a celebratory day yesterday as the big boat from Guam came in and all the packages started to fill up the US Post Office.  People from all over the island are there along with all the yachties from around the world of course who also take advantage of having this convenient and affordable way to have things sent in from abroad.  As you might guess there was quite a large pile of boxes from the likes of Amazon here yesterday as well.  Once Customs has cleared everything, which is also very quick and easy here with the close ties that remain with the USA, I could start loading up the five boxes (still three more to come next month hopefully) onto my trusty 2 wheeled luggage cart and push, pull and drag them back over to the dinghy dock and manhandle them into the dinghy, hopefully without any going over the side into the crystal blue waters here!  Worked well and I soon had the dinghy docked alongside the mother ship of Learnativity for the even trickier transfer from the dingy to the deck as most of these boxes weigh in at 70-85 pounds. 

Fortunately Neptune went without any rewards and soon enough I had all the boxes up on deck and could open up these boxes of joy and have yet another form of Christmas as I carefully unwrapped each item inside and stored them in their appropriate spots down below. 

In addition to the necessary boat parts and tools I also took advantage of the opportunity to pick up things like wine glasses, hard to find books and some treats like my favorite dried cherries and coffee from good old Costco! 

I don’t think I will ever know what I did to deserve this rich and charmed life I lead as I already had two months worth of gifts back in Nov/Dec in the form of all my visits with special friends and family and now here I was getting yet another one over here in Majuro in January!!

As you can see, throughout the process, I was ably assisted and very closely monitored and managed by the Admiral, Ruby the Wonderdog.  Unfortunately for her, the boxes with her special treats and supplies in them (don’t tell her) are in the other boxes which I shipped just before leaving the US and so they won’t arrive for another month or more, but then I guess that just means we’ll have yet another day of surprises and unpacking when they arrive!

Otherwise all is well here on the Good Ship Learnativity in Majuro.  As most of you know I don’t have “plans” I just have “intentions” when it comes to when I’ll leave my current great destination and where I’ll go for the next so right now I have two sets of intentions; West or South.  Going west from here would likely mean spending several months or more to wind my way through the various islands of Micronesia between here and the Philippines which would include islands such as Kosrae, Pohnpei, Yap, Palau and possibly Guam.  That would put me hear the east side of the Philippines and I’d need to decide if I was going to go north or the south, though knowing me I’d probably follow Yogi Berra’s advise on what to do when you hit a fork in the road of life: Take it! So I might do a very big loop down south essentially down through Indonesia around Papua New Guinea and back to where I started in Palau or so and then head north up through the Philippines to China.  The other “intention” would be to go south from here and possibly head back to get another Fiji fix as I SO fell in love with that whole country last year, and then continue approximately NW through Vanuatu, Solomon’s, PNG and end up back here in the Marshalls or Micronesia and head go with my westward “intention” as outlined above. 

Whether West or South I’m not likely to head out on either of these till at least March or so given boat jobs and weather but I may take a month or so before then to sail around some of the gorgeous atolls surrounding Majuro that are part of the Marshall Islands chain.  As you can see I’m one of those poor unfortunate souls who is faced with the vexing problem of choosing between nothing but great choices! <g>  But then, when you think of it, aren’t we all?  At least that is the way I hope you are able to view your life.

Thanks to all the many Emails, Skype calls, Facebook updates, chats and other ways you reach out to connect with me.  These are easily the greatest gifts of all for me and please do keep them coming.  I’ll putt the full list of all the various ways you can track and connect with me below to aid an encourage you to do so!