First; another beautiful place. The anchorage here is very serene and large enough for quite a few boats. The village is remote and the people more reserved than in Fiji. Partly this may be due to the size of their country and partly because they are remote.
When we say “hi” or wave as they pass they respond in kind. The comment one elderly women I met years ago speaks volumes here: “You get more than you give, if you give bad you get more bad back, if you give good you get more good back”.
There is one store here that is stocked better than most remote villages. The owner (a Western Samoan married to a Vanuatuan) has SIM cards for Digicel and Top Up codes. The internet is 3g during the day and nothing at night. Just guessing it is powered by solar and the batteries are going bad. About 9 am it comes to life and works to about an hour after sundown. (In the last 24 hours it appears to have been fixed).
As this is not a normal clearance port- we wait for the Customs and Immigration officers to come when a cruise ship checks in. We emailed the authorities earlier and received permission to arrive here and completed the paper. Other wise we would need to sail a daysail N to Port Resolution and pay to have the officials come across the island for clearance. Other cruiser didn’t even get cleared there; visited the volcano and then had to clear in at Port Villa due to weather and the officials deciding they couldn’t make it. The Capitol of Vanuatu; a 150 nm North of where we are.
We will head N once we have all the paperwork in hand and again the weather hopefully smiles on us.
Go Slow
Sail Far
Stay Long