Busy Busy!
31 August 2010 | Neiafu, Vava'u, Tonga
Alison
I've forgotten how to be a Type A. This is good, except when I need those organizational and time-management skills to efficiently accomplish a pile of tasks and move on to more important things, like returning to the islands, to the lovely anchorages with whales blowing in the distance, fabulous snorkeling at our feet, empty white beaches, gorgeous water, and nights as quiet as a breath.
But first, a quick run to town for Internet bill-paying, ordering things I want my mom to bring to Fiji in 10 days, blurb and photo posting, grocery shopping, towels to the laundry, and more more more. So, in preparation for our last week in Tonga, we decide to do the Type A Hustle and do it all in 30 hours.
Day 1 goes pretty well. We leave anchorage #15, get to Neiafu by 11am. Do some work online on the boat since the connection seems pretty good. Move to Aquarium for lunch and more Internet, meet up with the collective gang from Curious, Serenity and Paikea Mist for a walk to the T-shirt shop, where we've decided to order custom whale t-shirts to commemorate our mother and calf experience. Spend a long, hot hour-and-a-half sorting through colors, styles, logos, and fonts and finally come up with a pretty good design, which will be ready the next day. Squeeze in a quick nap and shower and head for The Giggling Whale, where we're all meeting to spend a last evening together since Curious is off to Fiji and then home to England to be around for the arrival of their first grandchild.
The Giggling Whale evening is as enchanting as the previous Wednesday, with a terrific group that does a blend of traditional and modern Tongan music, some hauntingly beautiful a capella songs, a little Elvis and a bit of Appalachian hillbilly music, all sung from cross-legged positions on woven mats on the floor around the ever-present, always flowing kava bowl. At 8pm every Wednesday the kids from a local village come to dance, and they are fabulous. We cap off the evening with an ill-advised trip to Tonga Bob's, the local bar where a bad karaoke transvestite show happens weekly. Lots of people love it, but we're just not into the smoky bar crowded with drunks hooting and hollering and stepping on everyone's toes, so we chalked it up to a worth-a-try event and headed for home.
The next day is where I totally blew my Type A planning skills, as evidenced by the photo above, which says it all much better than I can. It started out when I flooded the dinghy motor and found myself adrift halfway between the boat and the market. Just as I was pondering putting the oars in the oarlocks and getting a little exercise, up came Paikea Mist on their dinghy to rave about the New Zealand apples that just came in on the supply ship, followed a minute later by Serenity, on their way to breakfast. So Serenity towed me to the Aquarium dock, leaving me with their dinghy to do my shopping. Michael and Gloria went back to Fly Aweigh to retrieve Allan who started the now-unflooded dinghy with ease and went back to gather our genoa sail and take it to the sail maker for miscellaneous repairs.
I got the apples, and zucchini, and all the other greens I crave at the produce market and joined Serenity for coffee. After awhile I remembered my produce, baking in the Tongan sun in Serenity's dinghy, so I raced back to the boat, stashed them in the cockpit in a shady corner for washing later, grabbed my computer and raced back. Meanwhile, Allan and Ross the sail maker had our genoa spread out on the dock in the steaming sun, working on threading the leech line back into the trailing edge of the sail, a tricky task that required unstitiching the hem at times. I finished my blurb, posted a photo, shopped for a camera, caught up on the last of my email for a few days, checked our finances, and, hours later, Allan showed up with mild heat stroke and a re-sewn and re-leech-lined sail, nicely bundled in our dinghy.
Meanwhile, Steve and Trish from Curious were coming and going, preparing to check out of the country and looking a bit stressed despite the British stiff upper lip and all that, because the fuel truck here in Neiafu has broken, the part won't be in for two weeks, and anyone needing diesel for their boats has to get it in 5 gallons jugs. So he was working out those details and borrowing jugs from various boats for his fueling adventure the next day. Meanwhile, a chaotic series of events and mis-planned meet-ups ensued in which we were trying to decide, as a group, if we could make a trip to the grocery store 2 miles away that was reputed to carry a lot of hard-to-find items, including Kirtland products from Costco. But we weren't sure when their shelves would be restocked with the recent acquisitions from the cargo ship, and rumors vacillated from "this afternoon" to "not until Friday." Ultimately, we bagged that idea for another week.
Still languishing at the Aquarium at 2pm, having completely lost track of time and all focus, I realized we still had 400 things on the list. Our custom t-shirts were ready to be picked up, the laundry was done, the mooring and the sail guy needed to be paid, we still needed some groceries, and we were now getting a bit desperate to get out of town.
Allan drove me down to the laundry and waited on the dock while I ran in to get the towels, where I realized I didn't have enough money. We zipped back to Fly Aweigh to get more cash, and realized the forgotten produce was still in need of washing and storing, and now sitting in full sun in the cockpit. I did a quick de-bugging (all organic here, and loaded with critters) and chopped and crammed most of it to fit in the freezer, fridge or hanging baskets, tossed the empty bags willy-nilly into the cabin, and zoomed back to town, where we were late for a rendezvous with the gang at the t-shirt shop. We picked up our shirts, paid the mooring and the sail guy, went back to the laundry, bought some beer and frozen hamburger, and zipped back to the boat again to get our 5-gallon fuel jug for Curious, who we were all supposed to meet in 10 minutes. But the fuel jug was full of fuel, so we got waylayed pouring it into our tank, which required getting the funnel out from under the settee and trying to avoid making a mess all over the deck or getting diesel on our new t-shirts. That task accomplished, we broke the 5-knot speed limit zooming down to Curious, where we all posed in our new shirts on their bow, said our farewells, and returned to our boats.
Town tasks accomplished, bills paid, goodbyes said, veggies stowed -- we had reached full frenzy, peak stress and anxiety, and, along with Paikea Mist, were desperate to get out of town. Back on board, I glanced down into the cabin, and laughed out loud -- it's so unlike me to leave a mess like that, but I must say, it was rather liberating. Never mind; clean it up later, but not until I get a quick photo -- and then I realize I've left the camera on Curious. We dropped the mooring lines and started moving, feeling instant relief and cool air wash over us, spirits lifting within minutes. We made a quick pass by Curious, launched our dinghy, Trish handed the camera down while Allan hovered in Fly Aweigh nearby, and off we went. By the time we dropped anchor around the corner at Anchorage #6 thirty minutes later, everything was ship-shape in time for sundowners.