We did our usual dawn arrival, this time into "Santo" as she is locally known and headed for Luganville the capital. It's the second largest town here in Vanuatu but was really quite a sleepy unattractive place and had none of the charm of Port Vila. The harbour is very deep here in the Segond channel so we headed for the mooring bouys at Aore Resort on Aore island, 3 kms across the water from Luganville. Luckily there was a bouy available to we hooked up and enjoyed the peace after 18 hours of engine noise! As we had a mooring we were allowed the use of the resort facilities so the kids were very excited to use the pool so I promised them a day ashore the following day whilst Charles did a dive. We took our dinghy across the 3 km to town and it was super sleepy being Sunday but we managed to book Charles in for a dive the following day and all of us on the Millenium cave tour the day after.

Diving the SS President Coolidge

I did not do the dive as there was no way I was going to go into a dark ship and not see my way out (clearly I like my dives simple) but my tough husband was game enough. The SS President Coolige was once a luxury liner but during WW 2 it was converted into a troop carrier by the American forces. Sadly it sank when it hit two of their own mines in 1942. At the time it was carrying 5000 men but only two lost their lives. The 200 meter vessel now rests between depths of 20 and 70 metres. The ships holds are still full of equipment and even vehicles and it is a big draw for divers worldwide. Charles had never done a dive of this kind and had a great day nosing in and out of the vessel. The kids and I managed to amuse ourselves by the resort pool, a tough day all round!