Living & Learning Aboard the Good Ship Learnativity

LTY UPDATE: Friday, September 14th, 2012

LTY UPDATE: Friday, September 14th, 2012
Asanvari Bay, Maewo Island, Vanuatu

LTY time: 17:05 (Vanuatu time = UTC +11)
Location: Asanvari Bay, SW tip of Maewo Island, Vanuatu
Position: 15 22.505 S, 168 08.020 E (you can cut & past this into Google Earth to see on map)
Wind: 50-20 knots (inside the bay)
Seas/Swell: flat
Air temp: 82 F 28C
Sea temp: 90.5 F 32.5 C
Barometer: 1017mm

AWEMAZING DAY in ASANVARI BAY

I awoke as usual to first light this morning and enjoyed watching the sky brighten gradually to bright blue as I lay there looking up through the large hatch directly above my aft cabin bed. I have a similar view of the night sky each evening when I go to bed and so my days start and end with these vivid reminders of just how fortunate I am and how amazing the cosmos is. Just as the changing hues and brightness told me that the sun had just peaked above the horizon I heard some odd splashes and the sounds of young voices followed by some slapping on the aft transom steps directly behind my head on the bed. In many ways I’ve learned that you sail by sounds and you get to know each and every one of the thousands of different sounds on the boat and know when something changes or there is a new sound. I hadn’t heard this symphony of sounds for some time but I knew just what it was; my first visitors of the day had arrived!

I’m starting to get used to it but it is still an odd feeling when I first come up on deck each morning and find a whole group of people already sitting on the beach looking out at Learnativity and waiting for me to rise. As soon as I’m spotted on deck the calls, whistles and shouts begin as they try to get my attention and it happens throughout the day and right into the evening in many places. I guess it is partly because wherever possible I seek out small little bays or anchorages that are not charted or popularly promoted in the sailing guides and so I am often the first boat and “white man” they have seen in quite a while. Then as soon as my first visitors discover Ruby and that I’m quite happy to host them onboard, show them around and answer their questions, it seems that more people that I could ever imagine were living ashore come out of the jungle. It is a school holiday for two weeks right now and so there are more children around with all day to do as they please so there has been a particularly large number of them aboard the past few weeks.

As I mentioned in yesterday’s post I took a group of about ten boys for a ride with Ruby and I in the dinghy and had a few more of them onboard so word was out that this new boat in the bay was “visitor friendly” and the procession began early. Apparently their enthusiasm got the better of some of the braver ones this morning and they just couldn’t wait for me to be sighted so about six of them swam the 100 meters out to Learnativity “just in case” I was up before six today. It is such an amazing sight that brings such a smile to my face as I step out onto the aft deck and see six young glistening brown bodies hanging on and peering up at me from the bottom swim step, laughing excitedly and sounding like a bunch of young school girls even though these are almost always young boys ranging from about five to twenty years. So that’s how my day started and the procession of visitors from ashore continued for the next two hours and I think I must have had well over thirty of them onboard in groups of four to ten. I was just going to do a short sail of about 15nm up to Asanvari Bay today so I didn’t have to rush to get away and just reveled in the joy and laughter with all my new found Ni Vanuatu friends. (this is how the people of Vanuatu refer to themselves).

Not a bad “commute”! How was yours?? ;)

Once the swimmers had all been out to see me I got things stowed away, raised the anchor and was sailing out of Namaram Bay by about 09:30. The weather was perfect with clear skies and calm seas and although there was no visible wind off to the west of Pentecost I was reasonably sure I’d pick it up once I got up to the north end and out in the pass between Pentecost and Maewo islands. Almost as if I knew what I was doing this is exactly what happened as the wind continued to build as I sailed north and I was soon doing over 7 knots with the full main and genoa out to Port as the SE trades blew through at 1-20+ knots. It was only 15nm up to Asanvari Bay which is on the very SW tip of the long skinny N/S running Maewo Island and I had the anchor down by just after noon.

Asanvari had come highly recommended by Philip and Teri who had been here a few weeks ago and just loved it and I’ve read that every boat that has been here has raved about it. You never know just how a spot is going to strike you though as we are all so different, but this spot is right out of a movie set or poster and is just the most perfectly pristine little tropical jewel I’ve seen in a long, long time. Funny how life works as I found myself thinking over the past few days how Vanuatu was very beautiful and the people most interesting but didn't create the same degree of awe and amazement in me that Fiji did. Then I sailed into Asanvari Bay. If you get the chance do check this location out on Google Earth or Bing as I’m certainly not able to do it much justice with my impoverished prose though I think it would be a challenge for even great writers. I’ve taken lots of photos and videos already and whenever I get a good internet connection, maybe as soon as next week, I will post my backlog of photos up on the blog so you can get a much better idea of just what I’ve been experiencing lately.

Asanvari Bay is a very small arch cut into the SW corner of Maewo Island with a protruding finger of rock and coral creating a small west pointing finger at the south end and then curving in an arc that is probably no more than 2km long along the coastline. At the south end of this little bay there is a white sand beach with about ten or so huts and houses and the villagers I met there this afternoon tell me there is another small village a few hundred yards east on the other side of the point. Unlike Namaram Bay I did not see a single soul ashore for the longest time and then only a few young boys out in their dugout outriggers and maybe three adults ashore. As the shore curves around to the north it goes back to being craggy black volcanic rock until it reaches a large stream that enters the bay and a cascading waterfall set just back into the island that you think must be a mirage it is so beautiful and picture perfect. The shoreline continues on the shallow arch around to the north and changes to steep sided cliffs that have risen up out of the water with some underground forces and comes complete with a tiny cave that I am anchored right in front of. As the arch finishes its curve north there is another beach, this one of highly polished black volcanic stones sprinkled with white shards of dead coral that has washed ashore.

On my visit there this afternoon I met Jason, a man of about 40 I would guess who lives in one of the two small houses there and amongst a large and very fertile plantation behind his house he has two pigs who get their own beachfront palm oasis and seem to enjoy a steady supply of coconuts based on the thick carpet of coconut husks they were sleeping on. Ruby did her best to get them to play with her and they seemed amused by this strange little critter but weren’t up for any games.

I made a brief stop at the waterfall on my slow trip around the bay in the dinghy and someone has gone to a lot of trouble to pour a very substantial concrete sea wall and erect a small little “bar” building complete with stools. However the waterfall itself is Mother Nature at her best and so I just stood in about two feet of this clear fresh water that had just crashed down the rock face of the waterfall above. I’ll go back in tomorrow as the elderly man and woman there said I’d be welcome to come back for a shower and/or to wash my clothes. Now THAT is my kind of shower and laundry facility!!

I could go on and tell you how clear the sea water is, how there was a steady flow of the most beautiful little black and white birds putting on the most amazing aeronautical acrobatic show as they zoomed through the moist air just in front of the waterfall, but I’ll leave it at that and the pictures to follow for now. Suffice it to say that as I try to comprehend how just this one day has started and ended I think you can appreciate why I keep repeating and appreciating just how fortunate I am. As with today I have no idea and no expectations of what great surprises and experiences tomorrow will bring but I’ll be back with more attempts to capture and share this with you. I truly appreciate having you along for the ride albeit limited by my abilities to describe it all to you.

Wayne & Ruby the Wonderdog

LTY UPDATE: Thursday, September 13th, 2012

LTY UPDATE: Thursday, September 13th, 2012
Namaram Bay, Pentecost Island, Vanuatu

LTY time: 17:15 (Vanuatu time = UTC +11)
Location: Namaram Bay about mid-way up West coast of Pentecost island, Vanuatu
Position: 15 37.534 S, 168 07.368 E (you can cut & past this into Google Earth to see on map)
Wind: 3 knots (inside the bay)
Seas/Swell: flat
Air temp: 82 F 28C
Sea temp: 90.5 F 32.5 C
Barometer: 1017mm

MOTHER NATURE is SUCH a SHOWOFF!

Been a fabulous few days since I left Uliveo Island and continued making my way up north through the islands of Vanuatu. I stayed in Uliveo for a few days after my friends Teri and Philip left to head south to Port Villa and had the whole little bay all to myself. The locals all knew me by now so they were not coming by to offer fruit and ask for things so it was very peaceful. Ruby and I took a few trips off in the dingy to explore a few more deserted spots and she had her usual great time running nonstop on the beaches and in the jungle on the coastline. Tuesday morning dawned with clear blue skies and the sea was calling me again so it was up with the anchor and I motored my way on a very circuitous route through all coral and the other little Meskelyne Islands and out into open ocean again. The day cleared up and once I was clear of the wind shadow of Meskelyne I picked up the SE trades again which were blowing about 8-14 knots most of the time. The wind does vary here much more than it did in Fiji but most of my headings here are NW so this is all downwind sailing and I’ve been getting lots of practice trying out the new setup of putting my spinnaker pole out to windward and pulling the big genoa out to it so that I have what is called a “wing on wing” sailing setup with the main sail out to one side and the genoa out to the other. This presents a very large sail area to the wind coming from my back and doesn’t take too much to push all 33 tons of us along at 5-7 knots. The boat is also nice and level most of the time as there is no heeling and with the wind from behind the apparent wind (wind you feel on the boat) is much less so it is extremely calm and serene sailing.

I headed for Ambrym island which his home to Vanuatu’s other active volcano and I made my way around the west corner and then up along the NW coast of Ambrym where I was able to carefully hunt out a great little unchartered anchorage. The bottom in most areas here slopes up very steeply from the ocean and then turns to black sand just off shore of most islands with coral intermixed along much of it. Taking my best guess from the guides and charts I have I spied this little indentation just south of the very north west tip of Ambrym and crept in slowly with my eyes carefully going back and forth between watching the bottom in front and beside me and the depth gauge. The black sand makes it a bit more difficult to see compared to the white coral sand in other places but as I crept in towards the shore the depth gauge finally started to show a gradually decreasing depth and about 100 meters off shore I had about 25 feet and was right on the edge of where the coral started to grow on the bottom. Up at the bow I carefully targeted a sandy spot and dropped the mighty anchor and let the wind push me back as I played out almost 150 feet of anchor chain, locked it down and waited for the confirming tug as Learnativity stopped her backwards travel and the chain went taut. The shoreline was composed of small cliffs of black lava and it was speckled with kids who were both coming out to see the unusual appearance of a yacht in front of their small village and having a great time jumping off the cliffs into the warm water. I later found out that it was the middle of a two week school holiday and so each day was filled with the music of children’s laughter as they swam, jumped and played ashore.

I also had a steady stream of them coming out to the boat in their family dugout outrigger canoes. I must have had over 20 of them come to visit over the next few days once word got out that I was happy to have them aboard and let them look around. Many of them returned with treats for me in the form of papayas, coconuts and pamplemouse (sp?) (grapefruit) which I was most grateful for and exchanged this for chocolate, dried cranberries and some Canadian souvenirs. Mostly though they loved the chance to explore the boat, ask lots of questions, and try out the binoculars that were a big favorite with them all. I was also able to give them a few magazines I kept for just such opportunities and which they enjoy for both the pictures of new and different things and a chance to practice their English and reading. Of course teenagers are similar in many ways the world over and so one of the groups of the older ones got brave enough on one visit to ask if I had any wine! Of course they assured me this was only for their parents ;) but I declined and told them this was just not allowed.

Two boys, Amos (15) and Robert (9) were the most frequent visitors and on one of their last visits they stopped by to show me one of the more interesting if somewhat unsettling catches which was a sea turtle they had just caught and killed. They say there are lots of them here and they swim in the rocky areas near the shore and are a relatively regular catch. They were on their way to take this one home for their mother to boil and make into various meals. I asked them if they liked eating turtle and they said it was OK but not one of their favorites.

I looked after several of the boat jobs needing attention such as replacing my main alternator and fixing a troubling seawater leak into the freshwater cooling side of my diesel generator and was reminded how true it is that cruising is the art of moving your boat from one exotic repair destination to the next! Just part of the price that has to be paid to enjoy this phenomenal life of freedom and independence and one I’m happy to pay. That along with more reading, writing and snorkeling and two days and nights zipped by. The water here was finally nice and clear again after being rather murky in the Meskelyne Islands and other spots so far in Vanuatu plus the water was finally back up over 30 degrees Celsius so I enjoyed more snorkeling time though the coral and fish life wasn’t too spectacular.

What WAS spectacular though was the night time entertainment from Mother Nature. I was completely unprepared for the spectacle that awaited me when I came up on deck as part of my regular night time off to bed routine. The night skies are so fabulous when I am anchored in these remote spots partly because I’m the only boat and light source as the small villages don’t have power and so it is completely dark and when the skies are clear of clouds they are filed with more stars and galaxies than I ever imagined possible. It is so black that you can see the galaxies very clearly and they almost look like “cloudy” areas out in the cosmos as they are so dense with such far away billions of stars of their own. I’ve become relatively accustomed to this, though always amazed and in awe of it all and so I’ve made it a habit to come up on deck each night as I’m making my way to bed and check out this cosmic show each night to send my hopes off into the cosmos and to enlist the help of the stars to bounce special thoughts to some of the special people in my life.

Two nights ago though, it wasn’t the distant stars that took my breath away but the land based one. As I looked southwest the whole sky over the rising hills of Ambrym Island were ablaze in the most intense shades of orange and red I’ve ever seen. I’ve seen some pretty amazing sunsets in the past five years but nothing to match this. What I was witnessing was the smoke billowing out of apparently VERY active volcanic cone and spreading for miles above and beyond that was coruscating with the light from the fiery cauldron of lava below! I just stood there on deck with my mouth agape and tried to take it all in. As my awemazement lessened a bit in time I again turned my gaze upward and out into that deep starry starry space over the open oceans to the north when I saw not one, but TWO shooting stars in quick succession. My my, Mother Nature was really putting on quite a show for me tonight and as I was about to discover, she wasn’t done yet! As I was looking upward at the more stationary stars and bouncing my hopes and wishes off them, there was suddenly a whole series of fiery stars zipping around down below the horizon! No, I didn’t have THAT much wine with dinner tonight, they were fireflies! The most enormous ones I have ever seen. As I watched this spectacle for the next long while I was able to see some of the ones that flew close enough to me in the light of the stars and the volcano and I could see that they had large wings like those of a moth and their bodies must have been two to three inches long with this huge glowing end section. I’m not sure what I could ever have done to be so blessed with such spectacles but there I was completely immersed in the fiery side of this incredible cosmos we are a part of as Mother Nature showed off and shared with me what she has going on below me, around me and above me. All this in ONE night! Could I lead a more charmed life? I think not!

This morning sun dawned a bit later than usual as it took a bit longer to make it above the mountainous topography of Ambrym Island and reveal an increasingly clearing and blue sky and an ocean that looked more like a lake as there was not a breath of wind and not a wave or ripple in the water. Hoping that there would be more wind once I cleared the top of the island I felt it was time to continue north and make my way up along the west coast of Pentecost island and perhaps all the way up to the south end of Maewo island where I’ve been told there is a great anchorage and some fabulous snorkeling in Asanvari Bay which is about 50nm away. However my departure from Ambrym was delayed a few miles off shore when the new alternator decided to throw both belts off. With no wind I just shut off the engine and spent the next hour figuring out this newest problem which turned out to just be used fan belts that were not up to the strain of this high output alternator and after replacing them with new ones I have in my well stocked “spares” department, I soon had it working again. But just as I fired up the main engine again the sea water pump alarm went off and I found that its belt had suddenly become too loose! Fortunately that was a quick fix of readjusting the belt tension and I was underway again at last. Better yet the wind filled in a bit later and I was able to setup my spinnaker pole again and have that wing on wing arrangement I mentioned earlier. The SE trade winds were very light and varied from 5-12 knots but with all that sail area this was enough to keep me moving forward at 4-5 knots and enjoy a leisurely and peaceful sail along the west coast of Pentecost Island.

By mid-afternoon I was about half way up Pentecost and the skies were increasingly overcast so I started looking for a good spot to anchor while I still had some good light above me and headed for another small unchartered anchorage by the tiny village of Namaram where I writing to you from now. Similar to the previous anchorage off Ambrym I crept in slowly and found an indentation in the rocks and coral where there was just black sand rising up close to shore and was able to drop the hook in about 25’ off water. This spot is very sparsely inhabited but there are a few homes ashore and I headed ashore in the dinghy to ask permission to stay. There were only a few buildings nestled into the jungle a ways back from the shore and at first it seemed to be deserted but I finally came across some young boys ages 3-7 I would guess and they led me to an adult who then took me to the local chief. Chief Roman was up to his elbows in grease as he was repairing the villages chain saw and after a quick introduction I was able to help him figure out that the carburetor gasket was cracked and letting in too much air so it wouldn’t start. He had some material that could work to make a new gasket and he felt he could do that himself and told me to go enjoy walking around the area. One of the challenges in these small villages is the lack of much skills or tools to maintain things and so they do tend to do without more than with. It makes for a good source of interaction and bartering for me in many places where I am able to help out with my floating tool shop and a reasonable set of skills in mechanics, metalworking and wood working.

With the blessing of the chief to anchor here and explore the area, I went back to LTY and picked up Ruby and headed back ashore where we were soon mobbed by about ten young boys ranging from about 3 to 13 I’d estimate. As usual they are initially equal parts fascinated and fearful of Ruby but once I assure them she won’t bite or hurt them she soon wins them over and they are all petting her, calling her name and having great fun running after her. After lots of fun doing that I was launching the dinghy to head back to LTY when the oldest boy asked if I could give them a ride in the dinghy. So I soon had a dinghy full of ten VERY happy young boys and we were off at high speed for a quick trip around some of the outlying rocks and then back down to the shore in front of their village where we dropped them off and headed back to LTY. I could still hear them laughing and excitedly telling all the other kids in the area about their fun and fast ride in this strange ruby boat. Such a fun way to end the day.

It is now well after sundown and very dark up here in the cockpit, and my thin tropical blood is getting chilled so I’ll sign off for tonight. Depending on how things look in the morning I’ll probably head north again and make the jump over to Maewo Island and what is supposed to be a spectacular anchorage in Asanvari Bay. I’ll be back with an update for you on just how that turns out to be from my perspective and wish you all a good night for now.

Wayne & Ruby the Wonderdog

LTY UPDATE: Sunday, September 9th, 2012

LTY UPDATE: Sunday, September 9th, 2012
Uliveo Island, Vanuatu

LTY time: 17:35 (Vanuatu time = UTC +11)
Location: SW bay of Uliveo Island, part of Meskelyne Islands, Vanuatu
Position: 16 31.833 S, 167 49.716 E (you can cut & past this into Google Earth to see on map)
Wind: 5-12 knots (inside the bay)
Seas/Swell: flat
Air temp: 86 F 30C
Sea temp: 85 F 29.5 C
Barometer: 1020mm

LIVING LARGE in ULIVEO

I had a boisterous but fast sail from Port Villa to Uliveo on Tuesday night. Both the wind and seas were quite a bit more than forecast with winds at time over 35 knots and seas up to almost 5 meters at times. The wind was also almost directly behind me which makes it a bit tricky to sail as I’ve described before, but with the winds being so strong and the following seas so large I was able to sail at 6-8 knots with just the main sail up which worked out quite well. The seas were not quite directly behind me so they would roll dear Learnativity all the way from one side to the other, at times well over 45 degrees so it was a very “active” ride but not overly bothersome or problematic.

I did have one nasty problem for a few hours when the outer cover on the main halyard wore through and jammed in the clutch. This is the line that goes up to a pulley at the very top aft side of the mast and pulls the main sail up so it is one of the more critical lines and the boat and takes some of the most stress and strain. In my usual “thrifty” ways I’ve been trying to eek out every last nautical mile from this now six year old line and over 30,000 nm, and I finally succeeded in doing so about midnight on Tuesday. However I’ve been planning on this event for some time and so I’ve had 200 feet of a new high tech halyard in my stores and all ready to go. Most of the lines we use have all their strength in the inner core and then are covered with a different material, usually poly based, woven covers that are better in your hands, protect the inner core from UV and take the wear and tear from the clutches (line holders) and winches. So what happened was that the common spot where the “teeth” of my clutch jaws clamp the halyard when the main sail is in the fully raised position, wore through in the high winds and stress they were experiencing on the sail on Tuesday night. This created two problems; one is that the inner line was now able to slip through the clutch so the main sail slid down the mast a few meters and then the outer cover material bunched up and jammed the clutch jaws. This in turn gave me two problems; a flopping main sail in a full down wind run and no ability to raise or lower it due to the jammed halyard. Both of these conspired to then have the upper part of the flopping main sail to tangle with the shrouds (stainless steel wire line that holds up the mast) and were threatening to tear the main sail.

With no other choice I could see, it was time for me to take a trip up the 70’ mast and free the main sail before it ripped on the shrouds. Fortunately I installed mast steps all the way up the mast shortly after I bought Learnativity for just these type of situations and so I’m used to climbing the mast. However doing so in 30-35 knot winds and with the boat rolling from side to side in the big seas did make it a bit more challenging. It took the better part of an exhausting hour to do so, but I was finally able to get the sail free though not before the batten, a fiberglass rod that slides inside a horizontal pocket on the sail about every 2 meters up the main sail to help keep its shape) snapped in two. Nothing much I could do about that in these conditions and if I could get the sail back under control it wouldn’t likely cut through the sail pocket material. I spent a good while then cutting about 4 meters of the outer cover of the halyard off and managing to tape the ends tightly to the inner core such that this jury rigged line would now be able to feed through the clutches and mast pulleys. With this all done I was then able to reef/drop the main to have less area in these higher winds and then tighten up the luff (edge that goes up the mast) and pull down the boom such that the sail was back to flying properly and we were soon back to sailing along at a good pace. This held just fine all the way into the bay at Uliveo island and the main sail all furled up into the boom just fine to my great delight as we pulled in just after noon time. Best of all, I was greeted by Philip on the VHF and he came out in his dinghy to be show me the way around some of the big bommies and corals here in this lovely little bay.

It has been a salubrious time tucked in here in the small and well protected little bay on the SW corner of Uliveo Island which is one of the small islands that make up the Meskelyne Island group on the SE tip of the large island of Malakula here in Vanuatu. Lots of factors contributing to this welcomed condition, primary amongst those being here with my dear friend Philip and his new mate Teri on their Outreemer catamaran “Blue Bie”. Philip and I first met over four years ago when we both happened to be making our entry into Ecuador at the same time and place and had to wait for several hours before the authorities could process us. We just seemed to hit it off immediately and our friendship has grown more and more with each year as we continue to find ways to meet up as we make our very different ways around the sea.

Best of all I managed to get here in time for Philip’s birthday on Friday which made the time even more special. We spent part of the day on a nearby beach with them enjoying the kite surfing, Ruby enjoying beach time and me learning the details of kite surfing, catching up with Philip and getting to know Teri.  I got some shots of Philip and Teri out kite boarding and one fun thing was the juxtaposition of old and new as some of the locals would paddle over in their dugout outrigger wood canoes and you’d get shots like the one on the right here with this centuries old canoe paddling beside 21st century kite boarding.

Then it was back to Blue Bie to celebrate with champagne and then we joined forces to make a fabulous birthday meal topped off with freshly ground coconut cake with Swiss chocolate icing and complete with a full set of Happy Birthday candles thanks to Teri’s great foresight and caring while they were in some shops in Port Villa a few weeks ago.

Over the past few days together we’ve had more kite surfing, beach walks, a trip with the locals to their giant clam farm and ashore for a Kustom dance and ceremony and mostly just lots of time spent being together. Unfortunately Teri’s time is almost up here in Vanuatu and her flight back to Maui is in a few days out of Port Villa so they sailed off yesterday (Saturday) afternoon heading for Port Villa and to be there in time for Teri’s birthday present to Philip of a scenic flight over the islands in a small sea plane. So we had one last late lunch together with hamburgers grilled on my BBQ a few last licks and cuddles with Ruby and they were off into the late afternoon sun heading south. Vanuatu turns out to have amazingly high quality beef, for reasons I’m not completely sure of and while I’m not a big beef eater the fillet mignon we had for Philip’s birthday (he is a BIG beef lover) and the hamburgers, were truly delicious.

The Vanuatu culture continues to be filled with lots of new learning for me and quite different that others I’ve experienced. For example they prefer to life in very small groups and so even on this small island of Uliveo there are at least four separate small villages rather than one large one. It is also quite common that each village will have its own language or dialect and in some cases these are so different that people on the same island don’t understand each other’s language. However they also all speak Bislama, a form of “pidgin English” as well as English so communicating amongst themselves and with us is not a problem. They are all very proud of their culture and traditions and quite anxious to have “show and tell” events referred to as Kustom ceremonies. “Chief Jim” of the nearby village invited us ashore for their such a ceremony on Thursday night after visiting the giant clams and it was most entertaining. This is the third one I’ve been to and the most informal of them all. The dancing was performed only by the men, which is more traditional but on Aneityum both women and children participated which is quite rare apparently.

The only slightly disappointing aspect of Vanuatu I’ve come across is that they have the most focus on charging fees and seeing us as a source of cash income of any of the places I’ve been so far. All quite understandable and reasonable I might add as they have increasing needs to buy thing such as gas for their outboard motors and their sources of income such as from copra (coconut oil) have dropped off precipitously in the last 20 years. Fiji was notable to me in part because some how they continue to avoid the “wanting” or lust for material goods and the deep contentment with other riches they have such as friends and family. Having been living in this culture for over two years I’d become accustomed to it, though always marveling at it and learning more about it, so the contrast here in Vanuatu no doubt seems stronger to me.

The other nice change is that the clouds have cleared off and I’m back to being spoiled once again by blue skies, sunshine, starry nights and increasingly warmer temperatures. From others I’ve talked to and what I’ve read this is an unseasonably cold and wet year so far and it may also be because I’ve dropped down to almost the limit of my preferred “20/20” living (between the two Tropics) zone. However I’m now headed in the “right” direction for my warm weather body, which is north towards the equator so I’m hoping this warming trend will continue as I go and I’ll soon be back to the heat and humidity I’ve strangely come to prefer these past few years. I don’t expect any “sympathy” from anyone but I have the luxury of living wherever I’d like to and I choose to live where neither sea nor air ever goes below 30 C and where I don’t need to wear socks, pants or much clothes at all thank you very much!

I’ve now got the new halyard reeved up inside the mast and through all the pulleys and clutches so that should be good for at least another six years I hope. I have a piece of new batten material that is too short to fully replace the batten I need but I’ve been able to fashion a repair that will hold me till I can get a new one in Majuro in a few months and so all is good to go for the next journey. I’m not quite decided just where that will be as there are lots of great spots and attractions in the many islands to the north and east of me and so I’ll probably just start doing some short day sails and hop scotch myself up north till I get to Luganville in the big island of Espiritu Santo where I will checkout of Fiji and either head up to Santa Cruz in the Solomon Islands or just start making my way on the long passage north to the Marshall Islands. I’ll keep you posted as the sailing goes and as with life, create the path behind me one nautical smile at a time.

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: 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

Farewell Fiji; Hello Mother Ocean!

Well, the time has come to finally cut the dock lines, both literal and figurative and leave the country I’ve become SO fond of; Fiji.  On Friday (Aug 10), ELEVEN months and five days after I entered and with the help of some of the great friends I’ve made, I slipped the dock lines and motored out of Vuda Point marina.  This was the fabulous spot where I was able to do a complete “20 year” repaint and refit of Learnativity and spent almost the entire past year enjoying a very different kind of land based life with Learnativity out of the water for nine of those months and then tied to a dock for the remainder.

As seems to be the norm for me the whole thing was a serendipitous and phenomenal experience.  I originally thought I was going to be there for a few weeks and ended up being there almost a year, I met and got to know some wonderful people who are now dear friends, both fellow cruisers as well as the gift of getting to know many of the local people who I worked shoulder to shoulder with every day on Learnativity as well as several who worked at the marina.  I was invited into their homes and truly shared life with them for the past year.  What a rich and charmed life I lead!

As for Learnativity she is quite literally a whole new boat and I’ll simply let the before and after pictures tell the story for now.  Thanks to my friends Volker & Michaela on La Gitana, who have been in Vuda Point even longer than me, I have these before and after shots of Learnativity on the day she sailed into Vuda Point and then the one where she went back in the water.  Just a bit of difference as you can see!

 

And you are only seeing the outside!  In addition to sandblasting the whole exterior, which required removing EVERY part that wasn’t welded on and even a few which were, she now has all new solar protected triple thickened glass, new prop shaft, new solar panels, new nav system, and a very long list of other improvements and rebuilds.

While an immense task, it has been a labour of love and I’m VERY happy with my “new’ boat and looking forward to making the transition back to sailing and life on the water.  I have an equally long list of people to thank for making this all possible.  The truly wonderful team from Baobab Marine who worked with me every step of the way to get this all done and who did the lion share of the work.  My special thanks to Lorenzo for his constant supervision and assistance and to my “boys” especially Isikelly, Jim, Imran, Daven, Nadeem and the many others who worked with us at various stages.  I also received lots of help from other cruisers especially Volker and Michaela on La Gitana and who were instrumental in me coming to Vuda Point in the first place, and then a few special others who became friends along the way such as Terry & Christine on Teka Nova, Steve & Selena on Windward II and Tony & Carolyn on Tuaki.  I’m leaving out many, many others, so my apologies to all.  Just know that my time in Vuda Point was so special because of the people I met and befriended more than anything else.

Through it all Ruby the Wonderdog truly lived up to her name and became the social butterfly of the entire marina.  She was easily the best known entity in the marina and many people had no idea who I was other than “the guy” who was usually with Ruby.  Ruby is a great teacher on how to live life well as she simply assumes that every living creature she meets is there to play with her and to be loved.  And guess what?  They do! 

 

 

 

So Ruby had an even better time in Vuda Point and is leaving with at least as many memories as I am.  She particularly wants to thank Christine & Terry for her time being spoiled aboard Teka Nova with custom made gourmet meals, lots of snuggles and most of all for walks on the beach at low tide where she worked on her crab digging techniques. 

And for the past few months Ruby has spent more time aboard Summer Spirit that was docked beside us as she was adopted by Colleen and Ian.  Most days I barely saw her as she spent all her time with them including many “sleep overs”.  As you can see in just this one interior picture and the big black & white boat docked beside Learnativity in the other picture, Summer Spirit is a pretty fabulous boat to be on and Colleen and Ian became her favorite Aunt and Uncle.  So much so that they are now busy making arrangements to find a Spoodle pup in Australia that they can bring over and have a “Ruby” of their own.  I think Ruby should be a Spoodle ambassador as this is about the fifth time she has been the catalyst of others we’ve met getting their own Spoodle after falling under Ruby’s spell of pure unconditional love.  It was no easy task getting her back on board Learnativity with just me but Colleen did make up some treats for Ruby’s withdrawal (and some for me too!) so I think we’ll manage.

And so it was that I slipped the dock lines at Vuda Point marina on Friday after over ELEVEN months there and am now anchored off the Customs wharf in Lautoka, the western most check out spot in Fiji.  I’m finishing up the last bits of getting LTY all ship shape, shopping ashore for the last of my provisions for the next few months and using up all my internet time for uploads and downloads like these.  It is now Monday morning here and I’ll row ashore in a few minutes to do my official check out of Fiji.  Though I’m not supposed to, I may stop at one of my favorite little deserted islands west of here for one last night to say goodbye to Fiji.  Winds are forecast to be VERY light for today and tomorrow so waiting a day or two may help out.  In any case the islands of Vanuatu are calling my name the loudest so my first landfall will be Anelghowhat Bay on the SW corner of Aneityum island which is also sometimes called Anatom island.  It is about 450nm from here and also the southernmost island in Vanuatu and just became a PoE so I can check into Vanuatu there.  The bay there is supposed to be very nice and the check in is very easy as there is almost no one on the island and you get good personal service from the lonely customs guy!   My kind of spot! 

My overall plan is to just start island hopping making my way north up through the various islands of Vanuatu.  There are active volcano's on Tanna and Ambrym islands where you can hike up to the top of the cone, lay down on the edge and poke your head over to look down into the lava pools so of course I HAVE to go experience that! ;)  Will stop at the two big cities of Port Villa and Luganville to avail myself of some good French influenced supplies with the likes of great cheese, breads, cafés and WiFi.  Otherwise will just live and sail by whim and weather as usual and keep sailing north till about the first week of October when I will start my sail NNE to Majuro in the Marshall islands.  I can get duty free diesel when I check out of Vanuatu and so I’m going to run my tanks as low as I can by then and do my annual fill up with considerable savings before I sail up to the Marshalls.

I’ve decided that I WILL fly back to Canada and the USA see friends and family at the end of October.  On the one hand I can’t really afford it after blowing SO much of my overall “life” budget here in Fiji but on the other hand it is a no brainer as I need my annual “fix” of family and special friends.  Plus Ruby already has her Bat Dog costume (really!) and how can I break my 12 year record of Halloween of being in the US for Halloween?  Still making those arrangements but will most likely spend November and December in North America and fly back to Learnativity in Majuro about Xmas time.  I’ve decided that the Marshalls are by far the best option for me, both to leave LTY safely as I did before, plus take one last advantage of a good US Post Office there for any last rounds of boat stuff as well as easy flights in and out. 

When I was there in 2010 I didn’t get to see many of the outer islands of the Marshalls which are phenomenal and it puts me in a great spot geographically for the start of sailing season up north of the equator.  Never plans of course, but my sailing intentions from there are to explore some of the Marshalls as I make my way west over through Micronesia (Kosrae, Pohnpei, Yap, Palau) towards the Philippines but I also have Solomon’s and PNG calling my name louder and louder so I think I may head south from wherever I am in Micronesia about April and go spend the sailing season (April-Nov) down there and then head back north of the equator to pick up where I left off in Micronesia.  All WAY too far ahead for me, but fun to do this kind of what if scenario thinking.

COMMUNICATIONS:

I’ll put a full list of all the various ways of communicating with me at the bottom of this post and just remember that when I leave Fiji in a few hours I will mostly be relying on my satellite phone for my internet connection and therefore I’ll be back to just sending and receiving text based Emails.  Therefore if you are sending me Emails please copy me on both my [email protected] and [email protected] with any Emails you send.  I’ll likely find some WiFi or cellular connections from time to time in the larger ports in Vanuatu but I spend most of my time on small remote islands or at sea so I won’t be on FaceBook or Skype much for the next while.  However I will get back to doing daily blog postings on the sail over to Aneityum like I’ve done in the past and frequent updates on my experiences sailing north.  I have it set up so there are automated updates sent to FaceBook and Twitter each time I post to the Learnativity blog so you’ll see those as they happen and can follow us as much or as little as you like.  Note that I put in the lat/long coordinates for each update report and you can cut and paste these into Google Earth or Microsoft Bing to see where we are in those satellite photos.  It will be a lot of open blue water for the next week or so but once I’m in Vanuatu you can have some fun flying around the sat photos of the various islands and bays to get a feel for these spots I’m in.

And with that I’ll bid you and Fiji a fond farewell for now.  Learnativity is in GREAT shape (better be!) so no known issues yet and everything is working well so far!  Should only be about 4-5 days passage over to Aneityum so a nice easy sail to get started and let me remember how to sail (or at least my version of it) again after being away from it for almost a year now.

Hope you will join Ruby and I as we set sail for our next round of adventures in life and that you too are living, loving and learning every moment of this grand experience called life and enjoying the gift of the present.

Vinaka Fiji and friends!

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
Off Course – On Target blog:   http://waynehodgins.typepad.com

World Phone Voicemail:        +1-501-492-9634   (has voice mail that is forwarded to me via Email)
Text Messages:  (to my sat phone)
send short 140 character Text msgs via Email to:  [email protected]

Other contact info:
Skype:    Whodgins
Twitter:        WWWayne

Kava & the Simple Joys from Nothingness

Friday night I had an extremely special experience when Isikelli one of the guys on my Fiji paint crew from Baobab Marine (left front behind Ruby in this photo) invited me to his home for a visit and some kava.  Kava as you may know from my previous posts over the past two year’s I’ve been in Fiji, is the ceremonial drink here in Fiji and many of the other Southern Pacific islands.

This Kava drink is made from the dried and aged roots of the Kava tree which are then pounded or ground into a fine powder and mixed it with fresh water. Kava is part of a ceremony and historic cultural tradition called “Sevusevu” which is what I experience each time I first anchor off shore from one of the small inhabited islands here in Fiji. 

As soon as I have my anchor down and inspected so I know Learnativity is secure, I put the dingy in the water and row ashore to meet with the chief and ask for his blessings and permission to be there. When I arrive ashore I am usually greeted by a gaggle of giggling children and seek out an adult to ask to take me to their chief.  I bring with me about a pound or half kilo of kava roots which I have purchased previously in one of the bigger city vegetable markets and keep a stock of onboard.  Usually my adult guide takes the kava from me and talks with me as we walk to get a bit of background on me, where I’m from, where I have just sailed from, how long in Fiji, and so on.  They introduce me to the chief and give him a summary of from this conversation and I am then invited to sit across from the chief sitting on a large hand woven mat.  I present the chief with the kava and he places it in front of him as we sit cross legged he then says a prayer in Fijian, we clap three times when he has done so and the then welcomes me to his island and we chat for a bit more before I take my leave and return to the boat. More informally, Kava is also the traditional drink that Fijian men usually have at the end of the day when they get home from work and is similar to having a beer or wine after work.  Several times while anchored for longer times off one of these islands I've been invited ashore to join them which has been a great gift and treasured experience.

On Friday however I had a whole new and even more intense experience with kava and the Fijian people and their way of life when one of my regular Fijian paint crew and friend Isikeli invited me to join him at his home for such a drink of kava. I was not sure what I could bring as a gift of thanks and appreciation but I remembered that I had about 2lbs/1kg of kava root still on board in my stores from sailing here last year and so I wrapped this up with ribbon into a bouquet like form that is the tradition here and took that along with me. Moreover, he had expressly invited Ruby to come along as he had been telling his daughters about Ruby the Wonderdog for months and she is also a "gift" for most people we meet. 

 

 

 

Isikeli lives with his two daughters Vani (2) and Marica (4) and his wife Salome who unfortunately was not able to join us as she works nights at the neighboring First Landing resort which is next to the Vuda Point Marina where I’ve been since September.  They live only a kilometer or two away and he and his oldest daughter, Marica (Fijian for Martha), met me at the marina and we walked over to their home. They recently moved into a new rental property that is situated in the middle of a large set of sugar cane fields and it was a perfect evening and just starting to cool off as the sun was starting to set (about 6:30pm).  Their home is an adjoining half of the landlord's home and he joined us for the last half of the walk to the house where Ruby and I were introduced to the kids playing in the houses and yard and Isikeli's sister in law. 

The kava roots need to be pulverized into powder and they fetched a large tall cast iron or steel urn that they used for this purpose. It needed to be cleaned out of rust and water so they wiped it all out and then lit some newspaper on fire inside it to burn off the remainder, wiped it clean and it was ready to use.  Isikeli, his older son and the man who owns the houses where they live all took turns in pounding the kava with a long heavy steel rod that was about 4cm in diameter and 2.5m long until the kava roots were transformed into a fine powder.

 

 

My offers to assist were politely declined as the men took turns raising the rod high overhead and then bringing it down as hard as possible onto the kava roots inside the urn.  This process took quite some time, almost an hour or so by the time it was fully pulverized and was a significant and sweaty effort in the hot humid night air.  All the while I was invited to sit on the woven grass mat, enjoy a tea and some biscuits as Ruby and I played with the 3 young girls who came and went from inside the house to the covered porch we were sitting on, and the yard.

 

 

As has been surprisingly common, the kids and even many adult men are quite fearful of Ruby at first as they have never seen anything like her. There are LOTS of dogs here but they are mostly roaming free and not in very good health as the concept of having domestic pets is not common in Fiji. With her strange curly black hair and small size many think she is some kind of wind up or electric toy! It took a while for the little girls to get closer and closer to Ruby, reach out and touch her and finally end up sitting with her, petting her and their initial wary squeals were transformed into that joyous giggling of little girls.

 

Kava has a very distinctive smell that is hard to describe but has a very earthy, spicy smell much like you might expect from a root. They were very pleased with the kava I brought as apparently it was very good quality and this was a very large quantity for them as it made enough kava powder for several months of drinking. Isikeli then brought out his kava bowl and his son put a few heaping tablespoons full of kava powder into a cloth bag which he then kneaded in the large bowl of fresh water. It is a bit like making drip coffee or tea in that you do not want the kava powder itself to be in the water you just want to extract all the flavour out of the powder into the water. Isikeli continued to knead the bag in the water for about 10 minutes to extract all the flavour from the powered kava.

 

Once it was all mixed to his satisfaction, Isikeli brought out the traditional kava “cups” which are hollowed out halves of a coconut shell and offered me the first drink. You accept the bowl with both hands and while the other guests toast you and clap three times you then drink the kava in one steady go and when you are done they all clap three more times and you pass the bowl back to the “chief” of the ceremony. In our case it was just Isikeli and myself and once we had both had a cup Isikeli would place the lid back on the big bowl and we would talk some more and then he would serve another round about every 15-20 minutes.  Kava is apparently mildly intoxicating but I have never had enough to feel any such effect and it just makes your lips, tongue and throat a bit numb. The bowl is then filled and passed amongst all the guests and then you usually sit around, chat for a while, and then repeat the whole process. It is a very old tradition and very special to be a part of.

I had my pocket camera with me and the girls were all quite intrigued with it and wanting to see pictures of themselves so that along with Ruby provided lots of fun for all of us throughout the evening as the girls got closer and closer to Ruby, petted her and worked up their courage with this very strange creature. 

Isikeli had even brought out a small can of tuna and some crackers for Ruby which Vani (the brave one of the two) served to her as you can see in this photo.  I also used several bites of soda crackers to entice Ruby to perform her full repertoire of entertaining tricks like standing on her hind legs, sit, down, dancing and giving High Fives all the accompanying music of giggles and laughs from the girls. 

 

And so this most wondrous and simple time passed with Isikeli and I talking, sometimes just the two of us, sometimes with his two girls and older son.  Fijian families usually speak Fijian in their homes and with their kids and then they learn English “immersion” style once they start school, which is usually when they are about five years old and start half day Kindergarten classes.  So the young girls don’t speak much English yet but as usual it was no problem to communicate these simple pleasures of looking at pictures and playing with Ruby.  The time passed in that oxymoronic way where it is all luxuriously slow and peaceful and yet in the end seems to go by in a blink.

 

We stayed until almost 9 o’clock, which is quite late here, and then walked back to the boat. Isikeli and Marica walked us out to the end of the sugar cane fields and then Ruby and I walked the last km back to the boat under a beautiful starry sky. The moon is rising and setting very early now so it was not in the sky at all so the sky was even darker and the stars shining even brighter than usual.  It took a while for my eyes to adjust to the darkness and find my way along the dirt roads but the road is quite wide and not a problem to walk along as we made our way back to our little nest in the trees.  I was not sure if we would be eating as part of this visit and I had been so busy with all the painting that I had not eaten since breakfast so I made up a quick snack back on the boat and was soon nodding off on the settee as I was pooped from a hard hot week of painting. I awoke a few hours later and stumbled my way into the aft cabin and was soon fast asleep in bed with Ruby curled up at my side and we were off to dream land here in this magical land called Fiji.

While it fails miserably to capture the magic of the evening, I have done my best here to describe what this evening was like.  As with all experiential learning, this is not something that can be explained well in words and as the saying goes, "You really had to be there".  It may sound to many like a very simple and even "boring" evening where “nothing” happened.  Yet for me it was truly magical and memorable time.  To be invited into the home and lives of these simply beautiful people, to have even just a few hours to become part of this moment in time was such a deeply authentic and Oh so real moment for me.  I seem to be blessed with gifts like these all the time out here on this grand sailing life adventure and you can see why I say that I lead a truly charmed life.

Many of you ask what the heck I do with all my time out here “doing nothing”.  It is a very reasonable question and one can fully understand as I often wonder myself where all the time has gone.  But as you read more and more of my stories perhaps you can begin to understand just how full my time “doing nothing” is!  I’m actually fascinated by the whole concept of “nothingness” and is why I have been devouring books like Stephen Hawking’s “Universe in a Nutshell” and Lawrence Krauss’ “A Universe from Nothing” that I am reading now.  Turns out that as best these physicists and cosmologists can figure out, everything from our very selves to the entire cosmos around us has been created from "nothing” and how over 90 percent of the energy in the cosmos exists in the “nothing” that is left when you remove every atom, electron, proton and quark of visible matter.

In a similar way, I live a life of profound joy that seems to be similarly created out of “nothingness” with the eclectic range of activities that include sailing from one magical destination to the next, experiencing the wonders of Mother Nature, endless boat repairs and maintenance juxtaposed between equally endless sunrises and sunsets, and then truly living IN life’s moments when snorkeling or laying under a full night sky or sitting with some of the local people I meet along the way.  To badly paraphrase Al Green’s “Use me” song, If this is what it feels like to do nothing, then nothing me up please!

LTY UPDATE: Sunday, July 25th, 2010 Niuatoputapu, Tonga

** Photos added July 29th  see below

 

LTY UPDATE: Sunday, July 25th, 2010
11:30 LTY time (UTC +13) = 22:30 (Sat) UTC
Location: Anchored by village of Falehau, NW lagoon of Niuatoputapu Island, North Tonga
Position: 15 56.485 S, 173 46.180 W (cut & past this into Google Earth to see on map)

TERRIFIC TIMES in TRUE TONGA

** See photo album at http://picasaweb.google.com/wayne.hodgins/NiuatoputapuTonga# for more pictures

As usual I’ve extended my stay in yet another spot, this time the northernmost island of the Kingdom of Tonga, Niuatoputapu Island where I’m anchored in a nicely protected lagoon on the NW side near the small village of Falehau. I arrived last Wednesday (21 July) and yet again the whole experience of the past 5 days has been serendipitously super, and so I wanted to get you a brief update on some of the details that made this adventure so memorable.

It is these situations when I really miss having an internet connection sufficient to add photos to these postings, but since arriving in Tongan waters last month, internet connections ashore have been few and far between and even when I do find them they have not been good enough to support uploads the size of photos or Skype calls. I am however taking lots of photos and will do my best to post these, likely next month some time when I get to Fiji I suspect.

* July 29th: photos now added to this and several other posts

This has me rethinking and reexamining my budget to purchase one of the new stabilized satellite based broadband options so I could have broadband internet wherever I roam, but that will have to wait for another day yet. In the interim, I’ll do my best to use my limited writing abilities to paint some pictures for you.

As I’ve mentioned and as you can see above and if you have checked the lat/long coordinates on a map or Google Earth, this is the northernmost of the many islands that make up the archipelago of the Kingdom of Tonga and is apparently the most remote and least visited of all of Tonga. There is actually “Tin Can Island” of Niuafoou which is a bit further north yet but it is completely inaccessible by boat so can’t call there. Here on Niuatoputapu from what I’ve read and experienced this is about as close as you can get to what “true Tongan” culture is/was like, and I’ve been so I’ve been very warmly welcomed into a group largely unaffected by external forces, other than natural ones. They were for example hit by the tsunami I was in last year and are still busy rebuilding homes, roads, etc. But I've been very fortunate and pleased to be invited into their homes and lives and will be heading ashore in a few minutes to join in a Sunday Tongan feast that Cici and Niko are putting on. There is now one other boat that came in on Friday, “Navire” out of Wellington NZ with a very interesting couple, David originally Canadian but grew up since he was 13 in NZ and Janet. We had a fun afternoon hiking up to the highest point here on the island (some great photos to follow) and we've had each other over to our respective boats to enjoy the last 2 sunsets, some wine and good food. (she's an ex chef!)

Everyone ashore, population about 800 are a bit shy but very much want to engage and talk, the children especially. They speak their native Tongan language of course but all but a few are also extremely fluent in English and so the conversations are deep and rich. I’ve been able to barter some of my skills and tools for all their kindness helping Niko diagnose a poor V6 that was running as about a V2 and then pull the camshaft and crank pulley on a diesel van that has blown a timing belt. Fortunately I’m a bit of a travelling tool shop and tools are one of the biggest limitations here. The monthly supply ship came in yesterday and so it was a big day on the island for everyone to get their various supplies from food to building materials to diesel. Several large pallets of building supplies from the Red Cross also were unloaded as part of the ongoing rebuilding after the tsunami. The locals explained how the government workers who are here are busy repairing the roads, which are actually in quite good shape while most of the people are still living in tents or with tarpaulins over the remains of old buildings! Seems to be an all too typical mismatch between what the officials think priorities should be and what the local inhabitants do. Some things are rather universal in this world aren’t they!

I’m now just back from a delectable Tongan feast compliments of Cici’s long hours and ably assisted by Janet who was able to spend most of the morning, after church of course, learning some of the tips and tricks of Tongan dishes and cooking methods. We had a veritable feast of fish and pork (Iots of domesticated pigs running around here) that was done up in coconut milk wrapped in papagayo leaves then in banana leaves and cooked in a fire pit, along with tapioca root and breadfruit that was simply cooked as is in the fire pit as well. And then plenty of a papaya and coconut dish to add even more flavor and color. We ate this all, Cici, Niko, Janet, David and myself with some of their boys coming in and out, on the floor of the excellent new first part of their new home which Niko has built from the wood and other materials they were able to salvage from what was left behind after the tsunami waters cleared away.

So as you can see, I continue to lead an unexpectedly and undeservedly charmed life and am doing my best to wallow and live within each of its moments. But now it is time to head out for the next adventure, I’m leaving in about an hour to sail up to another small remote spot of a pair of island groups known as Wallace and Futuna, about 14S and 176W if you want to hunt them down. These are French overseas territory tied administratively to Noumea, New Caledonia with a total land area of about 93 sq. miles and a total population of about 15,000 spread out over many islands. One interesting thing about them is that the people of Wallis, or Uveans as they are called after the main island, are descended from Tongans, whereas those of Futuna originally came from Samoa. It will be most interesting to see the differences as I visit each one as they are equally different geographically as well apparently. I’m leaving late this afternoon (Sunday here) as I don’t want to get there and go into the rather tricky pass at Wallis until daylight and it should take me somewhere around 36-40 hours depending on the winds and currents. Forecast looks very good for the next few days with wind and seas mostly behind me and little chance of rain, so the window is open and I’m jumping through it.

Hope you are enjoying an equally great weekend wherever you are and whomever you’re with. I’ll post some updates while underway as usual and report back to you about my experiences in Wallis as they happen. I gain a day and lose 2 hours in the process due to the odd fact that Tonga uses Fijian time zone but I’ll likely head for Fiji later on as well so it will wall work out.

Wayne & Ruby the Wonderdog
Aboard s/v Learnativity
15 56.485 S, 173 46.180 W
Falehau, NW lagoon of Niuatoputapu Island, North Tonga

Email: [email protected]
Email @ sea: [email protected]
FaceBook page for updates @ www.facebook.com/wayne.hodgins
Learnativity blog @ www.learnativity.typepad.com
OCOT blog @ http://waynehodgins.typepad.com
Skype: whodgins
Twitter: WWWayne
Send (short 140 character Text msgs via Email to: [email protected]

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LTY UPDATE: Wed, July 21, 2010 anchored at Niuatoputapu, Kingdom of Tonga

 
Wed, July 21st, 2010
17:30 LTY time (UTC +13) = 04:30 UTC
Location: Anchored at Niuatoputapu, northern most island of Kingdom of Tonga
Position: 15 56.485 S, 173 46.180 W (cut & past this into Google Earth to see on map)
Wind: 15-20 SE
Seas: bit of wind wave inside harbor
Air temp: 85.2 F 29.6C
Sea temp: 83.3F 28.5C
Humidity: 76%
Barometer: 1019mm

NORTHERNMOST TONGA

** See photo album at http://picasaweb.google.com/wayne.hodgins/NiuatoputapuTonga# for more pictures

I finally finished up all the repairs in Vava’u. The weather was back to being gray, overcast and rainy so it was a good time to be down in the engine room and I spent two whole days down there doing a number of jobs that I’ve been meaning to get to for a long time. Of course I finished installing the newly welded SS exhaust pipe and then tracked down a small exhaust water leak that had been avoiding me for months. Turned out to be some small pinholes on the welded seam of a SS 90 degree elbow that goes through the aft bulkhead. After trying some spot repairs I ended up just cutting the whole thing out and replacing it with a new fiberglass elbow and some new 3” exhaust hose I had on hand. Then I tracked down a transmission oil leak that had also been eluding me for months and finally found it on the hose to supplies pressure for the shaft brake that keeps the propeller shaft from turning when sailing and the engine is off. A very weird problem as it appears that there has been a fitting missing all along and the maintenance guys that did the overhaul when I bought the boat had somehow just threaded the hose into the transmission case. The proper fix requires a new fitting and hose which I don’t have but I was able to repair it with some epoxy “steel”, some SS wire and a hose clamps to be holding well so no more transmission fluid dripping into the bilge!! At the end of the day I was a greasy grimy mess from head to toe but an hours worth of scrubbing with lots of citrus hand cleaner had me back to being clean and smiling, though I was sure rather beat up with lots of scrapes and cuts on both hands and my upper body from squeezing into the transmission and exhaust area. Will be good to get back to sailing and beat myself up in different ways!

And so yesterday, Tuesday here, and as per the other updates you can see, I released the mooring ball lines and motor sailed out of Neiafu and out the NW pass into open ocean. I used the motor to give it a good run and be sure all the leaks were gone, which they were, and then shut it down and settled in for the sail up to Niuatoputapu, the northernmost island of the Tongan archipelago.

As we left the lee of Vava'u the wind picked up and continued to build the whole trip. The forecast had called for 15-20 but in the end it was up to gusts of almost 35 knots by the time I got to Niuatoputapu. I had sun for leaving Vava'u but the clouds continued move in and by mid-afternoon it was fully overcast and looked like rain storms up ahead to the north and west of us. The wind and seas continued to build all night, nothing too bad but certainly a fast, wet gray ride with wind over 25 most of the way. This speed had us arriving in Niuatoputapu just about 13:30 which was what I had hoped as I wanted to have good light overhead for the entrance through what is a narrow and shallow pass but I was a little bit concerned as the weather really closed in with rain and low visibility as I sailed up the eastern coast of this tiny island. However as if on cue, a long blue patch of sky came along just as I was approaching the NE corner and stayed around for the rest of the afternoon and made for perfect lighting as I negotiated small but well-marked little pass on the NW corner. The small natural harbor offers reasonable protection from the SE trades that are really blowing right now, but the land is mostly just coconut jungle and so not too much height and the wind is blowing quite strong where I'm anchored, but we are well protected from the seas and the wind is all the better for the wind generator. With my new bank of solar panels (now have six for a total of 780Watts) plus the wind generator I only ran the generator once since leaving Niue almost 3 weeks ago and so my new energy setup is working very well.

Once inside the harbor here at Niuatoputapu Island, I motored over to the very small concrete dock that some of the guides said you could tie to while checking in but it was too small and the wind was too strong to tie Learnativity up there so I just anchored in about 35 feet to a nice sandy bottom. This is a VERY small island with only about 800 total population and they lie off the beaten path for most cruisers with Western and American Samoa off to the East and Vava’u to the south and I wasn’t sure what they would have ashore for officials. I tried to call them on my VHF radio but didn’t get any response so was busy tidying up the cockpit from the passage when someone called “the big sailboat in the harbor” and it was a gentleman who introduced himself as “Nikko” and could he help me with checking in? So ashore I went in the dingy and Nikko picked me up in his 4x4 and took me into “town”. It was a big help as it turned out for the official building was about 4 or 5 kilometers away and would have been a bit of a walk. There really isn’t a town per se, just a lot of people living along the one main road here in small houses and shacks with lots of pigs, horses and dogs about. The official buildings are all grouped together including the school buildings for about 400 students apparently, and I had a great conversation with the people who were looking after immigration, customs and health and soon had both my check in and check out papers all done and my passport stamped for leaving Tonga. Not sure how long I’ll stay here, will depend on how the weather up ahead but you can’t check out on weekends so I wanted to get my exit papers looked after today and be able to go, likely either Friday or on the weekend.

As he was driving me around Nikko mentioned, not that he needed to, that his truck wasn’t running very well. Basically it seemed to be running on about two of its six cylinders and he wanted to know if I knew anything about motors or if there were other cruisers headed this way that might. After all the checking in was done we stopped at his house and I had a look and was able to find out that his distributor cap and rotor were a real mess with only two electrodes left showing inside the distributor cap. I cleaned it all up as best I could and wrote down the parts he would need and he will try to order these and have the next supply ship that comes about once a month bring them for him.
During this time I met his wife and three teenage boys. They try to help look after the yachties that arrive here; only about 100-125 annually he says and they try to help find some local fruit and vegetables if they can some well water and also offer pot luck on Sundays at their house. As I said this is a VERY small and remote spot so no stores or services to speak of. But tomorrow Nikko offered to take me around to the other side of the island where his plantation is and get some papaya and bananas. He assures me he has more than enough for him and his family and if that’s true I’ll take some on board for the next passage up to Wallis and Futuna islands.

Well, I’m a still feeling aches and pains and bruises from the repair work down in Vava’u and the raucous passage up here so I’m going to head down below for a quick diner and then off to bed with Miss Ruby. Will explore here more in the next few days and enjoy what is apparently one of the only genuine Tongan islands and population left. Great to be back underway and I’ll be back with more after explorations here and when we take off for Wallis, another very remote and rarely visited country island NNW of here.

Wayne & Ruby the Wonderdog
Aboard s/v Learnativity

Email when near shore : [email protected]
Email @ sea: [email protected]
FaceBook page for updates @ www.facebook.com/wayne.hodgins
Learnativity blog @ www.learnativity.typepad.com
OCOT blog @ http://waynehodgins.typepad.com
Skype: whodgins
Twitter: WWWayne
Text (140 character max) messages to: [email protected]

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Non Stop Novelties on Niue

After an early morning arrival in Niue (June 21, 2010) I ended up putting in a very full Monday to Friday work week looking after the priority boat jobs that needed attending to after the fast and furious sail up here from Whangarei NZ and this was just much too dangerously close to resembling a regular work week so i decided to take the weekend off to explore the wonders of this small island country.  As it turned out I needed to get back to work on LTY to get a rest as the weekend was non stop hiking up and down coral trails, trekking through dense jungle growth, climbing up and down caves and snorkeling in pools and coastal caves. But more on that in a separate posting to follow.

NIUE INFO:

Niue (see this link for a good overview and map) is referred to as the largest uplifted atoll in Polynesia and is about 260 square kilometers in area and about 65km in circumference. 

Niue is absolutely gravid with fascinating facts and places to explore.  For example, Philip and I have been discussing and pondering just how this island formed and how to account for the very unique “ground”, which consists of nothing but broken up pieces of very sharp and rough old coral. Some of these pieces are huge boulders, some are the actual island base itself that makes up the whole coast and some are smaller sizes down to fist size or so.  This coral is literally ALL there is everywhere; every trail, every cliff, every jungle floor and every part of the coast. 

If you are interested in more, I was able to find some of the answers on a fascinating and extremely informative web site at http://www.seafriends.org.nz/niue/geo.htm which included this graphic of the most likely scenario.  This site is extremely informative and I’m still in the process of learning from it.  Did you know for example that the surface of the ocean is far from flat or even and has very large dips up to 10m depending on what is below it?  This is apparently caused by the difference in the gravitational pull between the water and the earth in different locations.  From the site here’s what that means:

 

One of Seasat's instruments was a radar altimeter, able to measure the ocean's surface from an altitude about 500 miles up, with a precision of 5-10 cm. Surprisingly, the surface of the ocean proved to be curving and dipping, often by as much as 10m up and down (for 5000m bottom relief). When mapped, the dips corresponded to dips in the sea floor and the bumps to sea mounts and ridges. The precision of the measurements allowed computers to make precise and detailed maps of the entire world's ocean floors.
The reason these dips and bumps occur in the ocean's floor, without ships ever being able to notice these, comes from the force with which two substance attract one another - the heavier earth's crust attracting the lighter and fluid water. Thus undersea mountains pull water towards them, resulting in a surface bump, whereas ocean trenches have the opposite effect.

  Who knew? And how cool is it that “we” can measure and map, in part, the ocean floor by measuring these dips and changes in level of the ocean by satellite.  NOW do you understand why I called my boat Learnativity and how seriously fun it is to be learning a living?!!