Churches of Ouvea

During our walks and bike ride on Ouvea, we were amazed at the large churches on the islands that have a total population of only 3500 people. They were all founded around the mid 1800’s and are highly visible from the sea. Some are sadly now in disrepair.

Loyalty Islands - Lifou and Ouvea

Wednesday, 14 September to Saturday, 24 September, 2016

On Wednesday, we started the day with a walk around the village of Drueulu. It is modern by Vanuatu standards but most people still had a traditional hut as well as a western style house. There was a small store that sold lovely fresh baguettes.

Chiefs (Skippers) in front of the Chief's compound

In the afternoon, the rally had organised a bus to take us to We, the main town on Lifou to restock our eggs, fruit and vegies etc. Warren and I also walked to the small marina to check it out.

In the evening, we had a feast organised by the locals who showed us how to weave palm leaves while the kids sang along to our talented guitar players. It was a great night.

On Thursday, most of the fleet headed west 40nm to Atoll D’Ouvea.

Lots of ways to get to the same place!

This is one of the highlights of the Loyalty Islands with crystal clear water and white sandy beaches. We anchored off the resort at Lekiny for 5 nights.

The resort is very yacht friendly – we swam in the pool, had lunch and hired bikes for a ride to nearby villages.

We rode south to the end of Mouli Island and then north to Fayaoue where we were surprised to see a new yacht club. After 40 km I was wishing we had packed our bikes.

Warren also had some success fishing at last - 2 Blue Maori Rockcod that were very tasty. We have had no luck trolling unfortunately.

Some boats had headed up to Ile Beautemps Beaupre but were told that yachts are now banned from visiting here after they found rats on the island. The locals thought the yachts had brought them though that seems highly unlikely. We headed further north in the lagoon to Passe Faasi for 2 nights.

A great spot to kayak but we decided not to swim after seeing lots of large sharks in the area. We stopped at St Joseph on the way back to Lekiny to try to buy some pawpaw or other fruit. None of the shops seem to sell pawpaw, probably because it is grown so readily and the locals would never spend money to buy some. The lady in the shop spoke no English but took me out the back of the shop and showed me some pawpaw trees. We knocked a couple of ripe ones off with a broom but she wouldn’t let me pay for them.

Lekiny Lagoon

By Friday, we were the last rally yacht to leave Ouvea in a light northerly for the trip south east to Ile des Pins. We carried the spinnaker all day and the wind hung in until 2230 when we had to start an engine. By 0600 we were sailing again and enjoying the perfect conditions. We passed through the reef protecting Ile des Pins at 0830 and dropped anchor in the outer anchorage at Gadji at 0930. 139nm in 25 hours – not our fastest trip by any means but we had enjoyed the flat seas and gentle breezes that were a change from our last couple of overnight passages.

Return to New Caledonia

Sunday, 11 September to Tuesday, 13 September, 2016

For the first time this trip, the alarm went off at 0500, Warren silenced it, and we both rolled over and went back to sleep. Luckily only for half an hour, but we still had the entire fleet ahead of us when we got under way at 0630. By 0730 the wind was south of east and up to 25 knots and we had a double reef in the main. We were making good progress towards Lifou in the Loyalty Islands, 200nm away. The wind angle was about 60 degrees and the moderate to rough seas made for an uncomfortable start to the trip. The winds and seas moderated slightly overnight but we were still averaging over 7 knots. At 0640 we shook out the reef in a 15 knot easterly as Warren tried to catch the one yacht still ahead of us – Serenity 5, a big Beneteau who had rocketed through the night with single hander Steve at the helm. On entering the Baie du Santal, Steve radioed to ask us to keep clear as he had to drop his genoa on the deck as he couldn’t furl it. No wonder he was galloping along all night!

We anchored off the village of Drueulu at 1030 on Monday, 28 hours and 203 nm later. Our best 24 hour run was 182 nm (an average of 7.6 knots). Clearing in to New Caledonia at Lifou had been organised as part of the rally and the officials were flown in on Tuesday morning to check the yachts and stamp passports. This proceeded in a very orderly manner and once cleared in we were allowed to go ashore, look around and buy a few fruit and vegies. Only 1.7kg of foodstuffs were confiscated from the 16 yachts that cleared in (including 2 joining the rally from Fiji). This was an indication of the thoroughness of the briefing we had received from John and Lyn and the size of the breakfast cook up we all had had that morning!

Lyn and John with the chiefs

The rally presented the chief  "La coutume", a gift as a sign of respect and so that we could anchor and explore ashore.

Back to Port Vila

Saturday, 3 September to Saturday, 10 September, 2016

With the winds forecast to ease and move to the east, on Saturday it was time to head back towards Port Vila. We left early in company with Varakai - a 30 tonne steel yacht. She certainly relished the conditions, punching through the sloppy seas that were stopping us regularly. We put in a double reef when the wind got to 25 knots but Varakai soldiered on. Nigel was pleased to record a PB of 10.7 knots and we both averaged 7.6 knots for the passage back to Port Havannah (not that we were racing). We anchored in Esema Bay for the next 3 nights and were sorry to see that Blue Gold was still aground nearby.

A pretty village

We took the last of our donations ashore at Tassiriki village on Moso Island. A long boat followed us into the beach and we discovered there was a chief’s meeting this morning (Monday morning team meeting). There were 3 chiefs in the boat and Chief Carl and his wife Elvin were most welcoming. When we said we had some donations for the clinic he told us his brother (Kemi) was the chairman of the clinic.

Warren explained to Kemi he was a Broncos fan

We also had some donations for the school where another brother, Paul, was principal. The school was built with European Union funds and was in good condition.

Only 2 teachers for 90 students at the school

Alvin was only second in charge of the Women’s Group which received more donations.

Cyclone proof building built with climate change funds

Carl explained that the island had 5 chiefs and one “Paramount Chief”, David above them in the hierarchy. Each island has its own system. Nigel had explained that on Ambrym (which we didn’t visit) chiefs were ranked from 1 to 12. This was small village with about 300 people and 4 churches.

Small but cheery clinic built with Canadian funds

On Tuesday, we sailed back to Port Vila to prepare for our crossing back to Lifou in New Caledonia. We reprovisioned, bought duty free fuel and alcohol and cleared customs with the other rally boats on Friday. We are now at Mele in preparation for an early start tomorrow morning.

Maewo, Pentecost and Epi Islands, Vanuatu

Thursday, 25 August to Friday, 2 September 2016

We left our mooring at Aore Resort at 0645 planning to anchor at Vanihe Bay on Ambae Island and then going into the volcanic crater anchorage of Lolowai on the high tide the next day. Unfortunately, the light SE wind turned to the NE as we approached Vanihe and the anchorage would have been uncomfortable and unsafe. We looked briefly at Lolowai but the back lead in could not be seen so we decided to keep going to Asanvari on Maewo Island. We had been told this was ok to enter after dark which we did at 1900.

Waterfall in Asanvari

Next morning, we awoke to rain but went ashore in one of the breaks. The chief was away at Lolowai with the school teacher and nurse. Lizzie, the nurse aid showed us around the village and also accepted the donations from home for the clinic.

Both the clinic and the school had lost part of their roofs in a mini storm that hit the island earlier this year. The hospital could no longer have maternity patients or others requiring a stay in the clinic. They were transported 10nm to Lolowai hospital in a long boat – not a pleasant trip if you are in labour I suspect. On the way back to the boat the teacher, Charity and nurse, Olivett arrived back from Lolowai and we arranged to bring some more donations in the next morning.

Lizzi with some of the donations

The school and clinic were definitely the poorest condition we had seen and the villagers were very appreciative of the donations. We left the anchorage at 1000 on Saturday morning for Homo Bay on Pentecost Island. We wanted to make some progress south before the next SE change in a few days. We had a good run, even getting the spinnaker up for a couple of hours. We had no sooner dropped the anchor at 1600 when Chief Sam paddled over to see if we wanted to buy some freshwater prawns. He had them netted off in the creek in some way because he was back in short time with a bag full for 1500Vatu and was keen to demonstrate how to cook them.

We ate them hot and they were delicious. He then offered to take us to see the land diving tower in the village (for 1000 Vatu) – Chief Sam was a good salesman. We gave him some rope and donations for the village clinic.

The land diving happens in April, May and June only as this is when the vines are strong enough. In 1972 Queen Elizabeth II came to their village in July and they decided to demonstrate the diving. Sam was present and unfortunately one of the young men was killed.

From Pentecost Island we motored down the east side of Ambryn Island heading further south to Lamen Bay on Epi Island. Steam and smoke from the 2 active volcanoes on Ambryn were very easily seen on this beautiful clear day.  We dropped anchor Sunday afternoon and watched as boatloads of villagers returned from Lamen Island where they had had a 3 day festival organised by the church. Crowded long boats with the occupants happily singing were wonderful to see. Sunday night the anchorage was calm in contrast to our last visit here.

Emily is 13 months and already learning some life skills

On Monday morning we went to see Chief Sam and Mary again and take more donations to the schools and clinic. Clothes we gave to Mary to take to the Women’s Group to distribute to those in need. After lunch we decided to head 10nm south to Revolieu Bay, which is rated a better anchorage in the SE winds expected over the next few days. We spent 5 nights in Revolieu Bay, moving further in behind the hook in the reef after the first night. This proved to be a great anchorage in the 25 knot SE that was blowing and we enjoyed our time here. Another yacht from the ICA fleet, Varakai, joined us in the anchorage after the first night.

The Varakai crew met Lucy while ashore and arranged for us to visit the chief the next morning. We gathered some donations for the clinic and some goods to trade and ventured ashore. Lucy explained that there were 2 chiefs in Masimia – Chief Barron and Chief Willie. After trading for some fresh fruit and vegies we did a tour of the village and arranged to come back the next day to buy some bread (Lucy is also the local baker).

Tree fell on the church while we were doing our tour

Next morning, we were met ashore by someone who was concerned that Lucy had received goods that should have gone to the chief. We explained that Lucy was going to take some donations to the clinic which was located at the next village. We met with Chief Barron, signed his book and gave him a gift. We explained about the goods for the clinic and also that we had some things for the Women’s Group (which Lucy ran). She is also opening a small store so is quite the village entrepreneur. It seemed to end well however the politics of the village was interesting to say the least. We later found out that Chief Barron is Lucy’s brother-in-law!

A nice walk through the old coconut plantations

On Monday, we went for a 40 minute walk to the village of Mabfilau where the primary school is to deliver some more donations. Chief Gideon explained to Warren about the coffee they are now growing. They have 7000 trees and plan to expand to 20000 by 2020. They harvested 50kg this month and hope to have 100kg next month. The beans are blended into Tanna coffee. It is easier work than producing copra and much more rewarding for the village. Here was a village with one chief who had a clear vision of where he wanted it to go.