Goodbye Beveridge, Hello Kingdom of Tonga
08 September 2015 | Tapana Island, Vava'U Group, Kingdom of Tonga
Megan
We arrived to the Vava'U group of islands in the Kingdom of Tonga about two weeks ago following a three and a half day voyage from Beveridge reef.
The remainder of our stay at Beveridge was lovely. We took several trips to explore the above and below water remains of a couple old shipwrecks, chased a gigantic lobster around his hiding place, dived the pass (but only lasted in the water a couple minutes as the large group of grey sharks congregating at the bottom of the pass were far too curious for our liking...), and spent time with friends (learned that when a New Zealander invites you for 'tea,' they're actually inviting you for dinner...if they invite you for a 'cuppa,' that means tea!)
On one of our snorkeling adventures, we were searching for a place to get in by dinghy when we heard a great splash outside the reef. Over the next 15 minutes, we saw a humpback (or several humpbacks?) repeatedly breach, launching their huge bodies out of the water, flipping over to show their great white bellies and landing again. While I saw lots of spouts and several humped backs and tails on the way down the west coast, this was the first time I had seen a breach and it was a spectacular experience.
The final day we were in Beveridge, a mother whale and her calf came into the 30foot deep lagoon and hung out in the middle for several hours. The mom did a few half breaches inside the lagoon (I don't imagine it was deep enough for her to come all the way out) and then the baby launched out of the water a few times. Lessons in pest control, perhaps?
Passage was pretty smooth. We're both much more relaxed on passages now than we were in the beginning. Where 25 knots was once a bit nerve-wracking, now it feels quite comfortable and almost perfect on a downwind run.
We can tell we're in the midst of the calving grounds for the Southern Hemisphere humpbacks. Friends shared pictures of two whales swimming on either side of the mooring buoy to which they were attached in Niue and breaching very nearby. Other friends have been swimming with the whales in Tonga (one of the only places you can still do this), bringing back amazing pictures of mothers and their calves and stories of watching a male chase after a female.
On our arrival to Tonga, we came around the north side of the largest island and as we approached the entrance, had several whales nearby breach and then raise their flippers out of the water and slam them down repeatedly, almost as though they were the welcoming committee, waving 'hello' to Daybreak.
Further down the coast, we saw more of the elegant tropicbirds we see frequently now, with their impossibly long, tapered tails trailing behind as they gracefully wind through the heights of the cliffs rimming these tall islands.
As I read the book "Men Against the Sea," detailing the voyage of the ousted crewmembers following their eviction from the Bounty by mutineers, I gazed upon cliffs very like those, further south in the Haapai group, they struggled to find a landing place on.
Some time in the main city of Neiafu allowed us to reprovision (though maybe the most challenging provision yet - our diet will be a bit less varied here), buy fresh produce, take showers, reconnect with friends we hadn't seen since Tahiti and before, and much more.
An anchorage nearby lent shelter while we went ashore to eat tapas and listen to jazzy blues scat singing at La Paella restaurant. Snorkeling here so far has revealed loads of sand dollars and bright blue starfish. The fields and livestock of the nearby fields remind us of a more tropical and hilly Indiana - crops planted in dark red-brown colored soil that could be the same, apart from the intermittent 60 foot palm sticking up around their edges. Piglets run around everywhere, nearly as prevalent as people.
As with everywhere we've visited, the people here are kind and generous in welcoming us. The culture here is quiet and conservative. They don't allow any businesses to operate on Sundays, other than a few restaurants that offer quiet dinners, and the voices of beautiful choirs waft down the hills those mornings. Women are always covered shoulders to knees and families don't do any work on the Sabbath, including swimming, fishing, or hanging out laundry.
We have a lot more to see and do here and we're thankful we're able to do it. Recent events remind us how lucky we are to have this chance. We're thinking of and missing you, friends.