Today's highlight was buying petrol for the outboard engine. This may not seem very exciting, but let us explain.

Fuel of all kinds (petrol, diesel and zoom (premixed two stroke)) arrives on the monthly supply ship, and very few places down here have any to spare. Ogea is the only place in 100 miles that has a supply that is available for sale to outsiders.

The best way to get to the village is by dinghy through the channel that divides the island. The forest track is lovely, but takes about an hour - too far to walk back carrying 25 litres of petrol. The dinghy route takes about ten minutes but can only be done at high water, as the village lies at the head of a big, drying expanse of sand. High water today was around 0930, so we headed off at 0900, to make sure we didn't get stranded. The high speed route through the little islands and channels would be worthy of a Bond movie.

Once we arrived, we tied up to a small landing stage. In a nearby house we found two rugby-sized men sitting on a pandanus mat drinking tea from a pink thermos, and asked where we could buy petrol. œHmm - "Fio is out fishing right now". We gathered Fio was the man with the fuel, and if he was fishing probably wouldn't be back till the tide had turned. "Never mind - come with me."So off we went to a locked wooden hut at the water's edge, full of four-foot oil drums and petrol cans and gas bottles and containers of this and that. While we waited, children peeped round the door to see who we were. Our new friend hand-pumped the petrol from one of the big metal drums into a measuring jug five litres at a time and then poured it through a battered green funnel into our jerries. Once we were done, we totted up the balance and our friend was astonished that G had the money, rather than K "œAh, he's the boss!". K felt she had let the side down rather. The cash was given to one of the children - Dina, the nurse's daughter - who took us down to hand it her mother who also runs the village shop, and then to the medical centre (we'd been asked to give some hand sanitiser to the visiting doctor), then finally back up the other end of the village so we could give some empty wine bottles to a lady who makes coconut oil.

Then it was back to the dinghy with our fuel cans, and away back through the channels and islands to Barracuda before the tide turned. A successful trip - but not quite as simple as filling the car back home.