Conni ahd a hankering for a cool white wine yesterday, so we went in sear ch for it. We came upon the Marina Wine Bar, for heaven's sake! We had a beer instead of wine, but bagean to talk to the owner/chef, Gunter. Gunter is a fairly dissolute Swiss ex-pat chef how dropped by Niefu and never left. Well, why not start a restaurant? And he did. He's the real deal chef, producing amazingly good sauces. I had a huge steak and pan fried potatoes, while Conni had a egg preparation with a homemade spaetzle, a potato noodle. Both were excellent and we stayed until late.

After the dinghy ride back to Wings, we enjoyed a cocktail in the cockpit and savored a tropical evening. The slight breeze was like velvet, neither cold nor hot, slightly scented with frangipani and hibiscus, the sky full of strange stars, and the sound of Tongan drummers wafting along the breeze. Words keep these senses separate, but they were simultaneous last night and created a sense of deep well being in a foreign and new world.

Meeting the local ex-pat community has been wonderful. People from all over the world have found something in Tonga that they didn't find at home or elsewhere. As we were having dinner last night, an older couple sat at the next table and we started talking as people will do. They are from Switzerland, and have sailed out of New Zealand for many years. Holy smokes! They've sailed over the entire Pacific during the past10 years. We feel like beginners, again.

We want to check out of Tonga Friday, and start to Fiji on Saturday (yuck, another 5-day crossing), but they want us leave immediately after our check out. We'll be forced to leave Neiafu tomorrow and drop the hook in some little cove for the night. Really, it's not so bad, I guess. Five days isn't so bad, but it's also the last crossing. We leave from Fiji back to AK. I paid Vuda Point Marina to dig the hole for our keel, so we're set.

I'm sure that I'll get at least one blog sent while we're underway, so we're not done yet.