Friday 14th September

Pangaimotu,
Tonga

21 07.471 S
175 09.750 W

More waiting, the weather looks like it will begin to clear tomorrow so that may be our leaving day but again we will be checking in the morning. The worst thing is that the weather clears here and 3 days out it is bad again around Fiji; as the sail will take 3 days we don’t want to arrive there in bad weather any more than we want to leave here in it.
Yet again our day comprised of eating, sleeping, reading and discussing our travel plans. We are trying to be extra careful with the water rationing because although we have full tanks we haven’t been running the water maker so we aren’t replacing what we have been using; it will be so nice to have a Hollywood shower when we get home!

Thursday 13th September

Pangaimotu,
Tonga

21 07.471 S
175 09.750 W

Well the weather report and grib charts showed sustained high winds for the next 48hours so we will be sitting tight and waiting for the calm after the storm. Once we had checked the weather we got down to the business of relaxing whilst waiting for the weather window. We ate, slept, read, ate some more, slept some more and read for a change. Meanwhile the wind howled around us and it spat with rain a couple of times.
This waiting for a weather window sucks! One boat left and went into the harbour today and another yacht arrived and took its place – not very exciting but it was the event of the day where we are!

Wednesday 12th September

Pangaimotu,
Tonga

21 07.471 S
175 09.750 W

The horror of the day was that we ran out of water. We hadn’t been making any in the harbour as it doesn’t look too savoury to begin with; luckily we had our spare 5 gallons in the container on deck so we poured that into the tank to get by until we could fill the tanks later in the morning. Around 09.00hrs we were just about ready to leave, we started the engine up and I cast us adrift from the boat that we have been rafted up to for the last few days. Our first top was at the fuel dock where we filled our jerry cans (having emptied them into the tank before leaving) whilst at the same time we ran a water hose from the tap to fill our water tanks. The water must have trickled in, it took forever but at last we had full water and fuel tanks and spare cans on deck. Gerry paid the fuel bill and we cast off from the dock motoring out of the harbour and across the bay to Pangaimotu Island, a distance of 4 miles. Once we cleared the harbour we were surprised at the wind, the forecast had been for 20+ knots and we had been so protected in the harbour that we hadn’t noticed that the wind was blowing that hard. Once we were in the lee of the island though we were once again protected from the blowing. We dropped our anchor and it set immediately, we then sat in the cockpit eating lunch and making sure that we weren’t going to drift off unexpectedly. There were just 3 other boats anchored nearby so there was plenty of room for everyone to swing in wide arcs if the wind got up higher as the forecast was suggesting. The rest of our day was spent reading, checking on our weather charts for the best time to make our crossing to Fiji and just veging out. Gerry offered to take us ashore for dinner but the hassle of putting the dinghy in the water off of the foredeck was beyond either of us and we elected to stay on board and eat at home. As the evening closed in the wind began to pick up speed and was averaging around 27knots, happily our anchor was very firmly planted and we didn’t move at all. Our latest weather report makes it unlikely that we will be leaving here tomorrow but we will be checking again in the morning for the update.

Tuesday 11th September

Nuku’alofa,
Tonga

21 08.317 S
175 10.867 W

A very happy birthday Jean, many happy returns of the day.

We planned to do the restocking and checking out stuff today in the hope that we would be able to get away from here tomorrow. This was the last day we would have the car so we had to make sure that all the running around stuff was finished before returning the car. We headed out first to the customs office; found that we had to pay the harbour master first so that meant a trip to the bank as we weren’t sure how much it was going to cost. Once we had some money in hand we decided that the day couldn’t proceed without a coffee so we went to café escape and spent half an hour there having a decent cup of coffee. As the supermarket was close by we stopped in there next and loaded up with the few things that we had run out of, by now I’m sure I don’t have to tell you that chocolate and snack bars were at the top of the list. From there we went to the market and loaded up with fresh fruit and vegetables, the market was excellent and the produce better than a lot of places that we have been. We made a detour to the bakers and bought some pies and cake – well you can never have too much pre prepared food! Finally it was time to go to the harbour master’s office and pay him, surprisingly the fee was only about $30 so we didn’t need half of the money we had drawn out of the bank. We tried a couple of times to pay the car hire place but the lady that runs it was out each time, we gave up and returned to the boat to unload the shopping before trying a third time – this time with success, it was arranged that we would leave the car at the wharf and she would pick it up in the evening – a good arrangement as it meant we had the car for the rest of the day. Our next stop was for lunch at Friends café where we also checked our emails, the internet on the boat had been out of action for 2 days so there were a few things to answer and sort out. Late in the afternoon Gerry returned to the customs office and got our final clearance papers – we are set to go now as soon as the weather clears; there has been some bad weather around Fiji that we want to miss if possible. A final trip into town to try and fax our arrival details to the Fiji customs people (they want to know at least 2 days before you arrive that you are coming). This was un unsuccessful episode as the fax machine in Fiji just didn’t pick up and the file was too large to attach to an email; in the end Gerry emailed them a short version of the information they required along with an explanation of the difficulty he had sending the form they require – we aren’t sure how everyone else manages to send it but it definitely isn’t easy! Having done all the essential stuff we went back to the boat locked the keys in the car (as instructed) and then walked across the road to a Korean restaurant. This was a first for us, having never eaten Korean food before, it was a mixture of Chinese, Thai and Vietnamese. We enjoyed it immensely, leaving the place full but with the feeling that given an hour we would feel hungry again! We read a bit before going to bed; hopefully we will have internet in the morning so that we can check the weather before leaving here to spend the interim at anchor behind one of the small islands.

Monday 10th September

Nuku’alofa, Tonga 21 08.317 S 175 10.867 W A very happy 17th birthday Joshua, we hope that you have a great day. Here it was the day I’d been dreading for a while – Abigail was leaving today and flying home. We were up early and ready to take her out to the airport for the 10.00hrs check in. Abigail’s luggage seems to have doubled in size since arriving on the boat, the bag she took home was gigantic, full of all sorts of mementos (some of which I had bought for her along the way from Jacksonville through the Caribbean etc – at least they aren’t cluttering up our boat any more!). We left the boat around 09.00hrs (incase we got lost on the way) and did a detour to the cemetery so that we cold take a coupe of photos of the adorned graves – they are a sight to behold. Next we stopped at the car hire place to make certain that we had the car until tomorrow – we do so that’s no problem. Next stop was the International Airport; it wouldn’t even make the grade as a regional airport in the USA but at least the planes go in and out of it. Abigail checked in, paid her departure tax and then we all went up on the observation deck to await the arrival of her plane. There were 3 flights going out at roughly the same time and none of the planes had arrived yet; they all turned up within half an hour of each other and just 40 minutes before the flight to Sydney was due to leave. Abigail’s flight was the last of the three to leave and by the time it finally took off Gerry and I were the only people watching from the observation deck. We waited until we saw the plane rise into the sky, waving Abigail and Bear off on what we hope was a safe and comfortable flight home. Gerry and I then stopped off in town for some lunch, exchanged our books at the book exchange and then went on the hunt for a pharmacy as I needed to fill a prescription. It took us a while and 2 stops at different places to get the medicine but I now have sufficient to get me home. Gerry checked us out at immigration whilst I was finding out about my medicine; we are planning to leave here as soon as we have a good weather window, which at present looks like being maybe 5 days away. We intend to move away from the harbour area and anchor off of a nearby island for the next few days until we are ready to go. After running around for the medicine we tried to find somewhere that sold club soda in cans and eventually had some success at a service station, it’s difficult to find sugar fee soda here of any sort so we were lucky. Having found the soda we stopped for ice cream and then headed back to the boat for a couple of hours so we could run the engine and charge the batteries before going out to Friends café for dinner. It seems very strange not to have Abigail on board with us tonight, very quiet and not altogether right; I miss her and Bear already.I have tried to attach a video of bear steering at the end of this blog - hope it comes out!

Sunday 9th September

Nuku’alofa,
Tonga

21 08.317 S
175 10.867 W

All the tourist type books that we have read said that Tonga “closes down” on Sunday, we were about to find out for ourselves if this was true. We expected to hear the church bells ringing from some horrendous hour in the morning (they are reported to begin at 04.00hrs) however by 08.30 hrs we still hadn’t heard any ringing – this was our first surprise of the day. After a leisurely breakfast we decided to go and see if we could find the famous Ha’amonga – this is a man made stone arch on similar lines to the ones at Stonehenge in England. Our car ride to find this monument took us through the center of town which was indeed dead – there wasn’t a car to be seen on the road anywhere except outside of the churches which were obviously doing a roaring trade, and through several small villages where again every church seemed to be full to overflowing. We counted 5 churches in one town which appeared to have only 20 houses and we wondered how they all survived, maybe they take it in turn to be the church of the week. Anyway our drive took us out along the east road and we hoped to see the terraced tombs on our way but somehow we missed them – as I have said before it is not a well signposted island and finding places is extremely difficult and asking for directions is the biggest waste of time ever as the Tongans give answers that are open to all sorts of interpretations. We did however manage to find the Ha’amonga; we chanced upon it as we rounded a corner and it was off to the side of the road. The car screeched to a halt and we piled out to read the information board and take some photos.
There are a couple of theories as to why the Ha’amonga was built, the most popular being that it acts in the same way as Stonehenge is thought to act – as a seasonal calendar. There was actually a small tour bus at the site when we arrived so obviously some one works on Sunday! After taking our photos we trouped back to the car and continued round the east coast, our plan was to try and find the Stalactite cave. We traveled the road but couldn’t find the turn off for the cave – again no signs anywhere and when we reached a village with a name posted on the church outside we realized that we must have drive right past the turnoff without noticing it, we voted not to go back to find it, these roads were pretty bad on the suspension and not so hot on the bodies sitting in the car either. We drove back through town and found the other business that was open on a Sunday – the bakery, where we bought fresh bread and doughnuts and made our way back to the boat for a late lunch. Our afternoon was spent quietly onboard, with me typing blog notes and loading photos on the computer whist Gerry slept and Abigail began organizing her stuff ready to pack – this was her last day with us, she flies out in the morning. Dinner time came round and we went across the road to the café reef which we had discovered yesterday; we had a very nice dinner there before returning to the boat to help Abigail finish packing her bag and copy the photos onto disc for her. We all went to bed late, making the most of our last evening together for a while.

Saturday 8th September

Nuku’alofa,
Tonga

21 08.317 S
175 10.867 W

Another slow start to the day – everything is very laid back here, no one seems to be in a hurry and everything starts in “island time”. After breakfast we had planned to go and look around the museum and then go on to the flea market just a bit further up the road. The road was quite congested around the whole area from the museum to the market and as we got to the museum gates we found that they were locked – the place was closed even thought the signs said that they were open on Saturday mornings! Our first stop was a washout, so we went a little further to the flea market where hundreds of people were trying to park, cross the road or get by, Gerry parked the car whilst Abigail and I began to make our way into the market – at around the same time that it began to rain. The stalls were full of stuff we didn’t need or want – it was more like a car boot sale and I feel sure that most of the clothing for sale was second hand. There wasn’t a single craft item for sale and no food what so ever. We walked every isle to be sure we didn’t miss anything and then headed back to the car in disappointment. So what next? – lunch of course at a different café with equally good food and service (incase you are ever here the 2 cafes are Friends and café Escape). Following lunch we thought we would try to find the blow holes on the west coast road. We followed the map as best we could; at this point I think that I need to explain that the map is a tourist map of the place with very few roads marked and nothing in perspective, it is the only map available whereas all the locals know where they are going! It seemed simple enough and we thought there would be enough road signs to get by. Road signs? What road signs? We found ourselves on what we would consider farm tracks or outback roads with potholes and craters to drop into and allotments lining the sides of them. We kept going; after all, the island is only about 22 miles long and we must, by reason of it being an island, end up back where we started eventually. The gods must have taken pity on us as we suddenly chanced upon a sign that said blow holes; a quick turn and of we went down another rocky road. Success! We arrived at a clearing above the blowholes, parked the car and took in the experience.
The wind was blowing quite a bit so the “blows” were quite spectacular. We took a few photos and watched for a while before making our way back to town via the Mormon Tabernacle road. We knew when we had arrived there as everything suddenly looked very westernized, clean, tidy and organized. The whole area, houses, school, church, admin buildings etc look like they have just been transported there from the USA; they make all the local dwellings around them look like unkempt dumps. Anyway we found the right roads to get us back to the boat and after a short nap we elected to try and find a Chinese restaurant for dinner; we had been told of 2 but one of these no longer existed so we were going to find the only remaining one. From the outside it looked terrible but the food was OK – not brilliant but quite edible. We ate our fill and then thought we would repeat last night’s coffee and dessert at the café, only to be thwarted as the café closes early on Saturday! We made our way slowly back to the boat and on the way noticed that there was a small café on the wharf, a quick detour followed and we found Café Reef which was open and had delicious coffee and cake. Once we were done with coffee it was time to return to the boat for the night.

Friday 7th September

Nuku’alofa,
Tonga

21 08.317 S
175 10.867 W

Abigail and I had a plan today – we wanted to go to the market whilst Gerry did “stuff” on the boat. We were a little slow getting moving – catching up with our sleep but eventually we got Gerry to take us to the laundry where we dropped off everything that needed washing and then he dropped us off at the market at about 10.30hrs. Our plans were a little thwarted as the guy we were rafted up to intended to leave today, this meant that we had to be on hand when he was leaving to disconnect our lines from his boat and then tie back up to the big ship once he had moved out of the way – this was going to be a job requiring at least 2 of us to be on hand. The guy let us know that he was planning on leaving at midday so we had to be back at our boat by then to assist. Anyway Abigail and I wandered around the marketplace for an hour whilst Gerry went to check out the supermarkets – he was looking for somewhere that sold cheap hydraulic fluid a we were going to need a bit more to get us as far as Fiji. The ground floor of the market place was full of fresh fruit and vegetables which we didn’t need just yet but it was good to know that they were available at all times here and the quality and variety seemed to be really good. The upper floor contained the craft work and the material and clothing. We looked at everything, were pestered to buy all sorts of rubbish that we didn’t want and came away after an hour having bought nothing – there was always another time! As we were leaving we noticed that at the back of the market there were a few more stalls with craft stuff – these had a great deal of Tapa cloth and carvings which seemed better quality than we had seen upstairs. Abigail fell in love with a bag (there’s a surprise – she is the bag queen after all!) but we put off buying it for the moment. When the hour was up we met Gerry at the appointed spot and drove back to the boat. Our neighbour was just getting ready to leave so we organized our lines and maneuvered the boats so that our neighbour could leave and we took his spot. Once we were securely tied back up we drove into town for lunch at one of the popular tourist cafes, it’s opposite the New Zealand high commission so naturally it was full of Kiwis. Following lunch we returned to the boat so that I could catch up with loading the blog and Abigail and Gerry had a sleep. Around 16.00hrs the pair of them went to collect the laundry; unlike everywhere else we have had laundry done it came back to us just stuffed in the bags, not folded so we spent the next half hour or so straightening out clothes and folding them before storing them away. It was now time for some dinner so we took off in search of somewhere to eat. We though we would try the sports bar and grill, but once we got there we found that it was just a watering hole and only served burgers which we didn’t want. We had one drink there and then proceeded down the road to a nice looking restaurant called the Waterfront (Italian, supposedly) We went in and ordered drinks then perused the menu – it was a short menu with prices beyond belief for what they were serving, a scotch fillet (no size or weight) cost $45 plus 15 sales tax! We decided that we weren’t particularly hungry at those sorts of prices and both Abigail and I settled for a bowl of soup whilst Gerry had a fish dish. Now don’t get us wrong here; if it had been in the Ruth’s Chris league we would happily have paid out that sort of money but it really wasn’t anywhere close! The service was appalling and when Gerry gave them cash for the bill he had to ask for the change as they weren’t going to give him any. Now you may think that they must have been busy but there were only 2 other tables (5 people) apart from us n the place and there were 4 wait staff – so now that I’ve had my say you will realize that we are voting with our feet – we will never go there again and we are letting everyone know how it was. To make up for the lack of dinner we went to a café for coffee and dessert, which was just fantastic and then we returned to the boat for the night.

Thursday 6th September

Nuku’alofa,
Tonga

21 08.317 S
175 10.867 W

We are here and very glad to be so! All of us slept fairly well and woke up needing a pancake fix for breakfast which I made. Gerry went to run the generator and was dismayed to notice a dreadful sound coming out from it; a little investigation shows that the frame has cracked YET AGAIN! I’ve no doubt that a rude email will be winging it’s way to the maker, meanwhile we have to contend with no generator, it’s a good job that the freezer is almost empty. At 09.00hrs the taxi that Gerry had arranged to collect us and take us to town arrived and we gathered up our documents, bank cards and wallets and headed off to the bank, after a bit of hassle my card did work and we got money then I had a go with Gerry’s card and got his to work too – the machines here are old and you have to go through several screens to achieve anything but it did eventually work with no problems. Our next stop was the car hire places and after a tour of them all we finally settled on one and hired a car for 5 days, that way we can get around, see the place and take Abigail out to the airport for her flight home on Monday. Our next stop was a café for lunch – very westernized place but the food was great. Now that we had our own wheels we visited the port authority, the hydraulic repair place (they advised we were better to get it done in Fiji) and the airport (so we knew where we were going). On our trip to the airport we took in several places of interest – Cook’s tree at the place where he landed, the Princess’s residence, the crown Prince’s residence, the royal tombs, the royal palace (not that you can see much of it from the road), hundreds of Churches of all denominations (the Tongans are very religious) and loads of grave sites.
I have to comment on the grave sites as I have never seen anything quite like them, the bodies are interred in a tomb above ground, the mound is then festooned with all sorts of things from silk and plastic flowers to bed quilts on frames, garden lights, statues and headstones – they are a sight to behold. We also located the shops, laundry, market places and the museum. We found out that there was a cultural show on at the museum in the evening so we booked to see it. We returned to the boat for an afternoon nap and at around 18.00hrs got ready to go back ashore to eat and then see the cultural show. Our dinner was at a nearby restaurant called The Billfish and we had an excellent meal there before rushing off to the museum. We arrived just in time for the show (it was a dinner show and we had opted to miss the dinner); all of us were happy that we had made the effort to go as the show was superb, it was very different from the Polynesian shows that we had seen previously and although both were music / dance exhibitions they were nothing alike. We took more pictures and video clips and even a couple of pictures with Abigail and some of the dancers in costume.
At 21.00hrs we headed back to the boat where we ran the engine to charge the battery and run the fridge prior to going to bed.

Tuesday 4th / Wednesday 5th September

Nuku’alofa,
Tonga

21 08.317 S
175 10.867 W

We managed to sail for the rest of the night, at times the wind reached speeds of 30+ knots but the swell was relatively small so it was fairly comfortable (or we are even more used to it!) As dawn broke the winds dropped a little and we put out a small amount of the jib to try and stop us from rolling so much, we put the fishing line in the water and then took turns in trying to catch up with some of the lost sleep. Just before lunchtime the cry went up – Land Ho! (Thank God!) Our approach to Tonga was through the reef and as soon as we got in the lee of the first little island we furled the jib away, started the engine, turned into wind and dropped the main sail. Back on track again we unfurled the jib to see if we could sail in most of the way – there was still about 7 miles to go through the reef at this point. As the wind bent around the first little island it came around on our stern and we were sailing comfortably with just the jib so we turned off the engine until we got to the tricky harbour maneuvering. We tried but were unable to raise anyone from port control and ended up motoring in and finding our way to the med mooring spot. It was still blowing a gale and would have been impossible to med moor under the conditions without some help from some one on the shore so another yachtie got us to raft up alongside him – he was rafted to a fishing ship that was docked for repair work. As soon as we were securely rafted up Gerry raced ashore to the bank and to try and get us cleared in whilst Abigail and I did the tidy up on the boat and recorded the log information. Gerry returned with an hour with the news that he had experienced a problem with trying to withdraw money from our Australian account – the machine wouldn’t take his card and kept saying that there were no funds available on mine which was rubbish, it meant a trip into the bank was going to be the first order of the day tomorrow. We were all very tired and couldn’t be bothered to go ashore for dinner so we ate on board, had showers and went to bed early.
You will have notice the date at the top is 4th/ 5th – although we technically arrived here on the 4th we have in fact crossed the international dateline as we entered the harbour at Tonga. The date line apparently deviates around Tonga so we crossed the date line at 175 west rather than the 180 west that it should be.