How in the world has a week gone by already since our last blog entry?!!! Yikes! I guess we are truly living on "island time!" Let's see, what have we been up to in all that time... We enjoyed the last few days of Ray's visit in a beautiful anchorage called Tapana (or #11). There are over 40 anchorages within the Vava'u group, so the local Moorings Charter Boat service numbered them all to make them easier to find on their charts. Ray didn't like us calling them by numbers, though, so we'll use their long names just for him! :)

Unfortunately, the weather hasn't been the greatest here in Tonga - lots of heavy rain and occasional high winds, so we didn't make it to the Blue Lagoon (fairly exposed anchorage) while Ray was here. Tapana was very calm, and it was good to get away from the town of Neiafu for a couple of days. While there, we snorkeled around a tiny little island close to the anchorage where a few other boaters had found some rock scallops. Glen was able to get 6 the first day and then went back the next day armed with a hammer, crowbar, and the hooka rig (air compressor in the dinghy with a 60' hose that hooks up to a regulator to breathe through!). They were very hard to get lose, but he managed to get enough to have scallops with pasta for dinner. They were a lot of work to get out of the shells, but were pretty tasty. The picture shows us holding a few - they look just like rocks with a zig-zag mouth. Also in #11, uh, I mean Tapana, is a little floating house that serves as an art gallery. We met Sherry, the artist, and her husband, Larry, who moved here from Oregon and enjoyed checking out the artwork. I bought a painting of a very cute turtle to hang in our forward head (bathroom!). Ray wanted to see what a "village" here looked like so we landed the dinghy on Ano Beach and walked (and walked and walked) up and down hills until we got to the closest village. It was actually a pretty good sized town with at least two little stores (but no beer), several churches, and lots of pigs. It probably wasn't what he expected as a village, but it felt good to get some walking in.

We came back to Neiafu on Friday so Ray could do a little last minute shopping and make arrangements to get to the airport Saturday morning. We had all thought his flight was on Sunday and were very sad that we lost a day of his visit (but happy we caught our mistake so he didn't miss his flight - Jean wouldn't have forgiven us)! Saturday morning, we had a nice quiet breakfast at one of our favorite places, The Aquarium, and said farewell to Ray. It rained a lot both Saturday and Sunday, so we didn't do too much of anything except to go to a friend's 60th b-day party. We wore our new dirt shirts (dyed with Tongan mud so we can take a little bit of Tonga with us!) in honor of Tom (Warm Rain) turning older than dirt! :)

On Monday, we went walking to explore more of Neiafu and found what the locals call "The American Store." It's called that because they sell things that Americans are more likely to buy. They also had several Kirkland items. We splurged and bought the first salsa we've seen since Mexico - a big bottle of Pace Picante that cost $22.95 Tongan - about $13. US! It's funny all the little things we've missed so much - who would have thought one would be salsa! It was funny when Ray was here, he kept saying it would be great to have Italian sausage for breakfast, or this or that with dinner. We agreed and made sure he knew that if he could find it anywhere, we'd be happy to get it and cook it! Our eating habits have totally had to change with what we can (and can't!) find available. Monday afternoon, we both had our first "professional" haircuts since leaving home from Billy, the ex-circus performer (I won't even tell that whole story!). It was a little scary, but he did a great job. I've been cutting Glen's hair and had finally trimmed my own bangs, but we both needed a good "shaping up." Now where does one go in Tonga to get a haircut? Well, the Bounty Bar, of course! They set a bar stool right outside the back door whenever Billy comes into town! Very fun... a line quickly forms and you wait with beer in hand! After getting home from "shopping," Steve (Orca III) came over to help Glen fix the generator. It kept overheating and shutting itself down. It seems the impeller (a little rubber water wheel thingie) had disintegrated within the salt water cooling system. Thankfully we had a spare and they had it up and running again just in time to go back to the Bounty Bar for Monday music night. It's been so cool walking around town and having people come up to shake Glen's hand and tell him how awesome he plays. I proudly have to agree!

Tuesday saw us going to pick up our head sail at the repair shop - the leach line (a sturdy cord inside a casing on the top angled edge of the sail) had broken. We didn't have any replacement cord or a tool to feed it through the casing, so took it in to have someone else deal with it. Arriving at the canvas shop, we were greeted with a big smile from the repairman saying how glad he was to see us and that he was going to save us hundreds of dollars by putting us to work feeding the cord through ourselves! He had the cord and had created a needle out of a bicycle spoke, but he didn't have the patience to do the feeding. It took us several hours of teamwork - me feeding the needle through the casing a little at a time while trying to scrunch the thick sail fabric together, then Glen using pliers to keep the needle from slipping backwards while we pulled the cord through - but we finally got it done. We both have raw fingers and sore hands, but the sail is back in shape. We are thinking we will need to have a new jib made while in New Zealand. This one is looking very tired.

It was dark and overcast with intermittent rain showers all Tuesday afternoon and evening, so we had a fun time watching movies on our new "big screen" TV. One of the other boats, Sand Dancer, just changed their electrical system from being 110 to 220 (they are taking it to Australia), so they were getting rid of all their 110 stuff. This is the boat Ray helped out by bringing a new navigation system with him from SD. Anyhow, they gave us a deal we couldn't pass up. We are so spoiled! We now have the TV Dione brought us from Canada in our cabin and the big one in the salon. We borrowed "The Bucket List" from Orca III and laughed and cried through the whole thing. What an awesome movie! Word is out about how many movies we have (thanks again Darlene and Larry!) so we have become quite a good lending library for DVDs as well.

I'm finishing this entry on Wednesday morning (I got too caught up in the movie Glen was watching last night, Coal Miner's Daughter, while I was going to get this entered - oops!). We are heading in to town soon to pick up laundry (yeah!) and hopefully find some butter and eggs. We're excited we are going out for a steak dinner tonight on Mala Island (getting there by taxi,then power boat). We haven't had the kind of steaks like we would get back home in months and are really looking forward to it! We're hoping we can pry the source of these rare gems out of Sean (the manager and guitar player).

In just an hour or so, we'll have guest bed sheets back from the laundry. We wonder who will be the next to use them?!!! :)

(PS... The picture is before our haircuts and yes, I've quit dying my hair!)