Boats Tied Aft to Riprap

Sunday 29 July 2012

After turning into breeze and anchoring at Rua Sura spent most pleasant night in weeks as air came through V-berth hatch with no rain. Beautiful, calm, clear and private except for 3 boys in dugout canoes who hung around until twilight for a little talk and, in typical fashion for Solomon's, to stare. Takes a little getting use to, but guess we're a relatively rare sight even without an extra head or third eye.

Monday 30 July to Saturday 4 August 2012

Unexpectedly found Honiara interesting. Besides having a good yacht club, sufficient reprovisioning potential (including duty free liquor) and good restaurants Gotham of the SI is a hive of activity for 7 August Marine 70th anniversary landing on Guadalcanal to stop the Rising Sun's advance to Oz. American monument park details the campaign on stone tablets and is free. Japanese one on adjacent hill and perhaps even more attractive talks of peace and costs 50 Sol dollars to enter. Have yet to decipher possible meaning therein.

Betel nuts are about half the produce sold at street vendors, but also available are bananas, eggs, island cabbage (spinach tasting greens), beans, lettuce, tomato, limes, various tubers, melons. etc. Bought two remarkable stone carvings, one with an octopus and the other with a crocodile wrapped around the talon of an eagle, which are highly unwieldy and completely out of place on a boat. Jan, spurning my example, purchased a more practical wooden walking stick with carved crocodile handle. When people see her wearing a knee brace they get told she busted her fetlock, can't race anymore and was put out to pasture. We bonded so didn't have the heart to put her down.

Small harbour here, being unsuitable for cruising yachts, currently contains 15. Dropping anchor in the middle and carrying 50 to 100 meter sternlines over shallow coral to shoreside concrete riprap through a spiderweb of everyone else's before ramming them is fun not to be missed. After the effort seems appropriate to stay awhile.

Partly due hard-earned July solvency being reversed while here plan to leave Wednesday the 8th for Florida. Solomon's have one too. No Disney.

Jack