Hi Again, sitting at Nambawan waterfront café drinking coffee and using free internet to update the photo gallery so have a gander if you like and lets know what you think of Leanne's new hairdo !
Well we are here , for many hours of many months over the past 5 years I have daydreamed via the internet for info about sailing and destinations in the SW pacific and this harbor in Port Vila was one that I was particularly attracted too. I wondered, are we capable of sailing our boat 1200nm (over 2000klms) in the open ocean to get there? What would it be like to be moored there? What the town and people would be like? It really was all just a dream that I hoped we would achieve but also doubted that we would so you can probably understand how elated I am to actually be here.
Port Vila is a place busy with many tourists buying and many locals selling. Open back trucks feature in the traffic that congests the main street carrying men in the back many of whom are laughing loudly and who wave and smile at us making you feel very welcome and relaxed in these sometimes familiar but largely foreign surroundings.
There is such a mixture of commerce and affluence , walking the street you pass by the Sebel apartments complete with Jupiter's casino , ANZ & WESTPAC banks , restaurants and stores selling designer apparel and yet just a few hundred meters away mothers, their mother s, their children, and it appears in some instances their children's children are spending all day every day (& half of the night) selling produce or clothing and crafts from a market stall, whilst presumably the men folk tend to the task of farming & delivering the produce to the market, it is a way of life so far and away from that we are used to and take for granted.
How extraordinary I find it to be able to experience these places and the people of them and then just jump in our dinghy and return to Migaloo, have a cold drink out of the fridge, start the generator and water maker and view it all from the comfort of our floating home surrounded by many other yachts and yachties all doing the same, no wonder so many spend years enjoying this lifestyle.
As the pacific cruising season in rapidly drawing to a close due to the approaching cyclone season we find ourselves faced with the decision of where we will spend the cyclone season. Options that are available are to return to OZ , head north to the Solomon's, or south to New Zealand. Both Leanne and I feel we are only just getting into the groove of this cruising life and would love to spend the summer in another country and we would both like for that to be New Zealand, the challenge is that NZ is 1200nm (7-10days sailing) south of us and the passage is a difficult one as far as weather predictions go, it is more than likely that we will experience a gale of some degree during the voyage and whilst I know that in reality we would be safe I am very apprehensive about such a voyage, what to do ??? , then a funny thing happened, we had noticed that in the harbor were a number of yachts flying the same flag embossed with a logo containing the letters ICR and whilst we were in the office of Yachting World making arrangements for our mooring I over heard a fellow talking with the office staff , he was finalizing the departure of 30 odd yachts and as the mooring we had been allocated was quite a distance from the town I thought that we might be able to move closer when these yachts departed , I asked him if he had been happy being close to town and we got talking and it turns out he , John & his wife Lyn are the directors of Island Cruising Regattas (ICR) and that for the some years they have been running a Pacific circuit rally departing from and returning to NZ each year and that they are on the way back to NZ via New Caledonia. He kindly invited us to a BBQ that they were holding at the home of a local couple so we could meet some of the participants and learn some more about what they do on rally. So off we went and as is the way we were on arrival immediately made feel welcome and part of the group. We talked with many couples who have been joining the rally and doing the SW pacific circuit each year all of whom were once like us apprehensive about the NZ passage but as a result of being part of the rally and having people assist with weather routing and passage planning they were able to make the voyage not just safely but in relative comfort. So maybe we will join up and head for NZ in late October early November with the ICR ??.............. Stay tuned to find out what we decide.