Australia

August 23, 2007
Fannie Bay, Darwin, Northern Territory
12.25.517S,130.49.3433E

A quick respite in Australia and return to civilization. It always amazes us when we can smell the land long before we see it. Here it was the smell of campfires or what we now believe were the controlled burns that they regularly do to protect the land from fires and rejuvenate the soil. Our check in at Thursday Island went swiftly and smoothly. They are amazingly friendly and trust us, the Australian Coast Guard is good. No one is getting into or out of that country with out them knowing about
it. From there it took another few days of passage and we timed the tides just right to let the current help to suck us into the Darwin, Fannie Bay. Here we were reunited with some friends on the s/v Luna and s/v Pelikaan. Two more kid boats which was a great big deal and great fun. We haven't really seen a kid boat in nearly 3 months. They are heading to Indonesia and beyond as well so we'll have even more company along with the Kelly's as we travel.

What was meant to be a week stay easily turned into two while we got all our paper work for Indonesia ready to go. Never fear, we found plenty to do and kept well entertained. You can find a open air market or street fair nearly day of the week if desired. We certainly found it quite a few times. We mastered the Northern Territory bus system, completed our projects and repairs, caught the new Harry Potter film at the lovely air conditioned theater, witnessed the last performance of the "Amazing
Drumming Monkeys" puppet show at the Mindle Beach Sunset Market (the best), and of course reprovisioned. Best of all we are the proud new owners of a bull-roarer, boomerang, and a nice long didjeriydoo (imagine those music lessons on a sailboat). We had a great time looking at Aboriginal art and culture. Definitely a place we hope to come back and explore by land at great length some day. For now though we are off to Indonesia. A quick relaxing crossing of 4 days are we are nearly at our starting
destination of Kupang, West Timor.
Coordinates 10.09.385S,123.34.466
until next time,
your Ohana Kai crew

Australia

August 23, 2007
Fannie Bay, Darwin, Northern Territory
12.25.517S,130.49.3433E

A quick respite in Australia and return to civilization. It always amazes us when we can smell the land long before we see it. Here it was the smell of campfires or what we now believe were the controlled burns that they regularly do to protect the land from fires and rejuvenate the soil. Our check in at Thursday Island went swiftly and smoothly. They are amazingly friendly and trust us, the Australian Coast Guard is good. No one is getting into or out of that country with out them knowing about
it. From there it took another few days of passage and we timed the tides just right to let the current help to suck us into the Darwin, Fannie Bay. Here we were reunited with some friends on the s/v Luna and s/v Pelikaan. Two more kid boats which was a great big deal and great fun. We haven't really seen a kid boat in nearly 3 months. They are heading to Indonesia and beyond as well so we'll have even more company along with the Kelly's as we travel.

What was meant to be a week stay easily turned into two while we got all our paper work for Indonesia ready to go. Never fear, we found plenty to do and kept well entertained. You can find a open air market or street fair nearly day of the week if desired. We certainly found it quite a few times. We mastered the Northern Territory bus system, completed our projects and repairs, caught the new Harry Potter film at the lovely air conditioned theater, witnessed the last performance of the "Amazing
Drumming Monkeys" puppet show at the Mindle Beach Sunset Market (the best), and of course reprovisioned. Best of all we are the proud new owners of a bull-roarer, boomerang, and a nice long didjeriydoo (imagine those music lessons on a sailboat). We had a great time looking at Aboriginal art and culture. Definitely a place we hope to come back and explore by land at great length some day. For now though we are off to Indonesia. A quick relaxing crossing of 4 days are we are nearly at our starting
destination of Kupang, West Timor.
Coordinates 10.09.385S,123.34.466
until next time,
your Ohana Kai crew

Crossing again

July 19, 2007
Departing for Australia
The old sailing superstitions states that you never want to leave for a crossing on a Friday, bad luck. So we figured maybe we could double our luck by departing for Thursday Island on a Thursday. We shall see. An 11 day crossing to reach Torres Straight and then another 4 days to reach Darwin. Much can happen in that time. The weather reports look like good strong steady winds for the duration so under grey skies and many water drops we are on our way. The best luck of all may be that we inadvertently
found the answer to our engine trouble. Bruce knew all along in his gut that it was a fuel delivery issue, we just couldn't seem to find it. The prospect of how many hours and how much money it was going to take to find the problem in Australia was secretly getting us down. Well happy day and good news. We think the kill switch cable somehow had a kink in it that was not allowing it to fully disengage, thereby not allowing the flow of fuel needed to throttle up as necessary. Hopefully the fix
is true and will hold for good. If that is the case we bought ourselves a little more time for sightseeing along the way and relieved a lot of pressure off the captain. It seemed like such a quick and easy fix until we realized we had been battling this issue for an entire year. All in good time.

If Bruce doesn't have his projects to keep him busy he would go stir crazy I believe, so our girl Ohana Kai is much obliged to keep him going. He spent the morning harnessed up and strapped to the bow amid wind and waves while he did some maintenance repair stitches in the head sail. By night fall we had lost our auto pilot due to a sheered off bold on the arm of it. Thank goodness for dork lights and spare parts on a boat. The prospect of hand steering for the next 9 days was a bit daunting.
Never fear though, our captain can fix anything even if it is in the dark and upside down with 25 knot winds scooting us along.
until next time
your faithful Ohana Kai crew

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Espiritu Santo

July 13, 2007
coordinates 15.31.391S,167.09.912E

Our next destination was Espiritu Santo Island and just far enough away that we didn't want to do an over night passage so we made a stop back at the north end of Malekula Island. A quick overnight sleep tucked behind the little island of Wala and we were ready for our final push the next day. Regrettably our last stop in Vanuatu would be Luganville. We were running out of time and there were so many more outlying islands to visit. Once anchored in the bay of Luganville the weather turned very
wet and rainy. We spent the next 4 days dodging rain drops, resupplying the boats and finishing our paperwork to clear out of the country. Of greatest interest on Espiritu Santo Island is the role they played during WWII as a base for the US. There are many a relic of old war planes, cannons and such to see. Perhaps the most interesting though is Million Dollar point. The story goes as such, the war was over and the US was pulling out. They had a ton of extra equipment left there and offered
to sell it to the local government for a very good price at the time. Thinking they could get a better deal the Vanuatu government held out hoping to get the lot for free. The US said no way jose and dumped every piece into the ocean where it still rests as a marvelous dive site and now home to coral and sea creatures. There is also the USS Coolidge which sank here and is now a spectacular dive site as well we hear.

Luganville and Port Vila are really the only two towns of industry especially since they are both shipping ports. Therefore, the only few jobs to be had throughout the islands of Vanuatu are there. It you ask anyone on any of the other islands what they do for a job you will get the most perplexed look. Are you silly? There is no shame in not having a job and there is no desire either. Certainly not because they are lazy or have no desire to work. Quite the contrary. First it is too expensive
to live near the city for the amount of money you will earn, and there just aren't that many jobs. Outside those two ports of call the rest of the villagers are too busy tending their gardens to have a job. They are busy living life, surviving on what the earth has to provide them.

The running joke on the boat is that when we set sail for the islands we didn't expect to find natives in loin clothes with bones through their nose, but neither did we expect to find cell phones, satellite dishes and weed whackers in every yard. Maybe rather naive of us. Again, not that they don't deserve them, we just didn't think they had made it there yet. And we had hoped to travel the world to simply experience these other cultures in their own environment, not look like walking dollar signs
ready to hit every tourist trap possible. Though it took crossing the entire Pacific Ocean, we believe we have finally found this and much more in Vanuatu. They are happy making their way in their own world and they are happy to introduce you to it as well. There is an obvious respect and care for their world and land. They have all they need and they have dreams they are working toward, one coconut shell at a time. Always happy for assistance or a donation, as a rule you never felt pressured
or obligated to give. But who wouldn't want to share with such a generous and genuine people. We will miss Vanuatu.
until next time,
your faithful Ohana Kai crew

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Ambrym

July 10, 2007
coordinates 16.08.445S,168.07.169E

Ambrym, home to two active volcanos, Mt. Benbow and Mt. Marum. We anchored in front of the village of Ranon. The weather was with us again as we had a marvelous day sail there. Maybe just to celebrate our anniversary of 2 full years at sea, we had the luck of catching our very first wahoo. Actually we caught 2 of them, at the same time and they were each 4 ft. long. whew. Not wanting any to go to waste, we let one go and kept one for ourselves. There is enough meat on these massive creatures
to last us quite a while. Even with that, we gave half of it away to some local villagers out fishing, gave a bag away to the local harbor master Jeffrey and a bag to the Kelly's. What we had left, we feasted on for 2 or 3 days.

The weather was also on our side in terms of the anchorage. Due to the two volcanos so close to the shore, when the winds blow out of the S/SW, the air quality can become so bad with ash and fumes that we heard you may have to wear a cloth face mask in order to tolerate it. They can even have difficulties with acid rain that destroys their crops we heard. Our goal here was to head 45 mins. inland to the town of Fanla and witness the ROM Dance, exclusive only to this village. With light winds out
of the N, we would have no troubles.

Once anchored here you are immediately met by Jeffrey, the "harbor master". His house is the closest to the anchorage and he can get to you first in his outrigger, which is one reason why he got the job. Not to mention he speaks wonderful English and is quite a good will ambassador. Australia has a very significant volunteer force and had been instrumental in this community with helping them set up a visitor information center, and outlining various events and guided outtings that you can participate
in. It was here that we met Able, a kind young man who became our guide for our hike to Fanla. Enthusiastic and eager to tell us all about his island he was happy to do the talking, which was good. Our less than fit "yachty" bodies, which have spent more time sitting on boats than walking, focused on our breathing while hiked 45 mins. up through the jungle to the village of Fanla.

Vanuatu itself is famous for big and small namba dances. Namba refers to the woven pouch that fits over a males genitals, and big or small refers to how large and fancy the decorations are on that pouch. The Rom dance adds a new costume to it with men dressed from head to toe in giant costumes made of panadus leaves. It is difficult to describe except to say that they look like giant trees of sorts with intricately woven face masks that are pointy on top. Men throughout the islands go through
different "grades" as they call them. Usually by proving your strength and worth by how many pigs you can deliver. They go through different grades to reach the Rom dancer status. In the village they also did some exhibitions with playing their "tamtam" slit gong drums, bamboo flutes and sand drawings. Each act is used to call to and or appease the appropriate spirits for the occasion needed, such as a good yam harvest in December.

After the performances were through, we realized they had laid out all their hand made wood and stone carvings for us to purchase. It was difficult to decide as there were so many spectacular items to choose from. It seemed like we were encircled by the entire village while we contemplated how much money could we spend and how much room did we have on the boats to store trinkets. We would have taken it all if we could. As we chose our items, the maker and craftsman of that particular item stepped
forward. We didn't really put two and two together in the beginning that they were watching us appreciated or pass over each of their own artifacts. It broke our hearts to not take one of something from everyone. Each as deserving as the next. The joy though is getting to watch the money go directly to families and villagers that desperately need it. Especially inland, they live by such meager means, torn clothes, and barely cots on hard dirt floors for sleeping. We gladly left the village
a heavy purse and hiked our way home with fresh coconut milk to cool us on our way. It was amazing to see that as we walked out of the village, the women were already back at work, cutting more pieces of bamboo with their hack saws, in order for the men to begin carving more flutes. There is no wasted time or effort in these neck of the woods.

Once back in town, as the sky grows dark, the volcano can be seen glowing a red crown over it's crest. Impressive. We spent dinner on shore with Jeffrey as our host. We are growing quite a palate for laplap by the kerosene lantern, while sitting on woven mats on the ground. Always happy to sit and discuss each others cultures, they are generous and giving spirits.
until next time,
Lisa and the boys

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