Month: September 2019

Caves and Feasts in Vava’u

We left the Ha’apai group in Tonga and headed north to Vava’u. Where there was a lack of many cruising boats in Ha’apai, we found them all in Vava’u! This seemed to be the cruising hub in Tonga, and we initially had a hard time even finding a mooring in Neiafu, the main harbor. There are also a lot of charter sailboats here, and with good reason. Vava’u has such a variety of anchorages to explore and easy sailing. There is a beautiful anchorage within a couple of miles of anywhere you are, and the conglomerate of islands together block any swell creating calm seas.

After checking in at Neiafu, gathering some provisions, and catching up with some old friends, we headed out to explore all Vava’u had to offer. As we pulled into our first anchorage, a protected bay sheltered by islands and reefs all the way around, we dropped the anchor in the middle of about six other boats. We were contacted by one of the boats at anchor as we came in, who informed us that some locals were holding a traditional Tongan feast on shore that night and we were invited.

At sundown, all the boats in the anchorage dinghied to shore where are local hosts had set up an outdoor shelter with homemade picnic tables where they did a local feast for cruisers each Saturday night during the season. Of course, this was a business making venture for them, but the price was more than reasonable, and we are always wanting to help support the local communities in the islands we visit.

As our hosts began to lay out the dishes in a buffet style, the roast pig was just finishing up on the outdoor fire adjacent to where we were eating. We have been to quite a few “traditional” meals in the South Pacific, but this was by far the best one we have had so far. There was such a variety of dishes, from the roast pig to raw fish, teriyaki chicken, sweet yams, a taro leaf dish similar to spinach, and a curried tuna dish. It was all delicious. And, we made quite a new few friends from several different countries.

We explored several other bays in the coming days with lots of snorkeling, searching for lobsters, finding beautify cowry shells, trying to fish (with no luck), and just overall enjoying the beautiful scenery and nice weather. But, the best thing we did was to visit Swallow’s Cave. This is really a must-do in Vava’u, but more than worth the hype.

We were anchored in a nice bay called Port Mourelle less than a mile away from the cave and made a plan with our friend Roy on a boat anchored nearby to head out in our dinghy in the late afternoon to find the cave. As the cave faces west, we had read that the light was best in the afternoon to really get a good experience. As we had been hearing about this cave so much from others, I was initially skeptical about how great it might be and afraid it had just been talked up as some sort of tourist experience. I was delightfully surprised.

First, the cave is HUGE. I was expecting something small that you could just fit your dinghy into, but as we came upon the cave and started motoring in, we realized how far back it went. And, the opening was so tall with all kinds of stalactites and stalagmites where fresh water continued to drip creating great effect. We’ve seen caves like this where the bottom was land you were walking on, but this cave just continued on below the water for about fifty feet down to the bottom. The afternoon light coming in the cave created this amazing glowing blue color through the water that reflected up on the cave walls. Its almost difficult to describe, but we loved it.

After securing the dinghy inside the cave, we all jumped in to explore below the water. Freediving down to check out the underwater cave was just as exciting as seeing what was above water, and when you swam to the opening of the cave, you were greeted by a coral reef teeming with fish that then rapidly dropped off into the deep. As we were swimming through the opening, we noticed a school of about eight rather large bluefin trevally. As we sat and watched them, suddenly a dogtooth tuna joined the group as they patrolled back and forth across the cave opening looking for a meal. This is not something you see everyday, and we couldn’t believe we didn’t have the speargun with us!

We spent a couple of hours playing around in the cave until the sun started to descend. There aren’t too many places that I definitely want to make a point of seeing again, but I’m already ready to go back and do it again!

Alas, our cave diving will have to wait a bit. As we started to think about the trek south to New Zealand in a short time, we realized we really needed new anti-fouling paint on the bottom of the boat. So, we made arrangements in Neiafu to haul the boat out of the water to be painted. We are sitting in the boatyard right now waiting to be finished and dreaming of being back in the water soon.

~katie

The Friendly Islands

We left Niue on a two day passage for Tonga. It was an uneventful and easy passage, which we were pretty grateful to have had after some other boats we know that had some rough passages in this area of the South Pacific. We were also very excited to catch a yellowfin tuna on our first day out providing a delicious sashimi dinner!

We arrived in the Ha’apai group in Tonga, which is essentially the middle group of islands that comprise Tonga. Tonga is known as the Friendly Islands, and indeed the people we have encountered have been genuinely nice and helpful. The Ha’apai group is not very heavily populated, and most people living here live in small villages on remote islands where they do not see many outsiders and supplies are hard to come by. We traded some t-shirts and fishing gear for bananas and papayas with local fishermen. And, Mike in his usual Pied Piper manner made friends with all of the children in one of the villages playing on the beach and jumping out of a tree.

We were surprised not to find too many sailboats in the Ha’apai group, other than our friends Marcus and Diana on Allora, whose daughter Maddi was visiting them. So, most of the time we were two boats alone in the anchorage which suited us just fine. Although some of the anchorages are a bit challenging, the effort was certainly worth it to see some of the most beautiful islands and sunsets we have seen to date in the South Pacific.

The challenging conditions meant we had to be willing to anchor in spots where we dropped anchor up close to reefs, which is only ok in the right conditions. If and when the wind shifts we had to be ready to move on a moment’s notice to not end up with our boat on the reef! In one anchorage we kept watches all night to make sure the situation didn’t get dangerous. And, on another occasion we had to pick up anchor at midnight and move when the wind did a 180 degree shift. In that case, a squall came through and the wind shifted around bringing big waves pitching the boat up and down and putting us way too close to the reef. Luckily, we got the anchor up without any problems and made it to a safe anchorage by 2am. Not the most pleasant night, but sometimes you have to be willing to take a chance in order to see some of the most amazing places.

This time of year is also whale season in Tonga. The humpback whales come north from the Antarctic during winter to mate and calve. And, in the Ha’apai group the whales were everywhere. We had whales come by our boat in anchorages, next to our dinghy when we went out exploring, and breaching out of the water to put on a show every time we sailed between anchorages. We could not get enough of these magnificent creatures all around us. We especially loved the young ones that were just learning to leap and splash and play. They were the most curious about us and our boats.

In addition to all the whale watching, we loved the untouched and unspoiled nature of the Ha’apai for the excellent diving. The water is colder here and that means new and different corals and reef fish. We’ve loved all of the soft corals with their different colors and textures. There are also lots of anemonefish (like Nemo!), and we even saw our first zebra shark!

For several weeks, we jumped around from anchorage to anchorage, snorkeling and diving and whale watching. It would be impossible to describe each of the unique places we visited, so I’ll describe what was definitely one of the most memorable days.

We anchored with our friends on Allora near an island called Fonoifua which is surrounded by other smaller, uninhabited islands and reefs. We started the day by doing some exploring in the dinghies to try and find a good dive spot. We had whales around in the distance and it was a perfectly calm and sunny day. We jumped in the water at various spots to check it out, which is where we saw our first zebra shark and also some painted lobsters. (I didn’t get pictures of the lobsters, but they are worth googling.) We finally decided on a plan to do a dive at a nearby island in what looked to be a good spot.

After getting all the dive gear together, the five of us headed out to dive. The random spot we picked turned out to be spectacular. There were interesting coral formations with all kinds and colors of coral. The fish life was great, including spotting a giant trevally. And, one of the best things was hearing the whale songs on the entire dive. We didn’t see the whales on the dive, but we could hear them. They weren’t too far off, because the sounds were pretty loud under water. The most amazing was the deep sounds made from some of the males which was so loud that it vibrated in your chest, almost like someone had the bass on the speakers turned up way too loud. It was fascinating.

We all emerged from our hour long dive thrilled and wanting to do it again, but one tank was all was had time for that day. Mike had brought along a fishing rod and planned to troll back to the boat from the dive, which was about a mile trip. We weren’t really expecting much, but about half way back to the boat, the line started pealing off the reel, and we knew we had a good fish.

I yelled “fish on” at our friends who zipped back over to catch the fish action on video. It was clearly a strong fish, and at first we worried we might have hooked a shark. As Mike started reeling it in, we peered over the side of the dinghy and could see it was some kind of tuna. But, just as we started to see the fish, I also started to see a shark following the fish up. We have lost more than one fish to a shark in the past, so Mike started trying to reel it in as fast as he could. Our dinghy was full of all our scuba gear, so it made it a bit challenging for him to maneuver in the boat. But, soon enough we had a good size dogtooth tuna in the dinghy! We were all so excited for a good tuna dinner. And, it was a fantastic end to a perfect day.

We were only given a visa for 30 days upon arrival in Ha’apai, so after a few of weeks we had to leave to go up to Neiafu in the Vava’u group to get a visa extension. It was hard to leave Ha’apai, but we were excited to check out a new part of Tonga. More on that next time…

~katie