Sunday Continued……

Its still blazing hot even though the sun in well over the yardarm. .Jumping into the dinghy we set out for the far end of the harbour where we have been told there are Turtles and coral.

                         Medusas head ??                                                                                          Kay (Bridgend), stray and hubby.

Snorkel gear on and in we jump though the water itself is 29.6C its cooler than the air, just. Refreshed we motor our way around

the shore of the harbour and suddenly we disturbed a roost of Fruit Bats who had been hanging from the branches of a large tree at the water edge.

                                     Fruit                                                                                                                              Bats

They are enormous and a squeaking black cloud wheels around above us before returning to hang like fruit from their tree.

A little further along we spot a bright blue Kingfish. Switching off the engine we sneak up and photograph him before he spots us.

                                                Kingfisher

As we return passing theAustralians’ yacht sporting a large yellow fin tuna they caught in between the islands, so we know what they’ll be eating tonight!

              Yellow fin tuna

20130520 Monday

A quiet day, Customs told us to come back tomorrow, so Lars and I wander around town and bump into the ex fireman who used

to work with Mark and is now running a Whale watching and Diving school. Then we end up in the Tropicana café meeting up with Fred and Grete.

Doug is there having breakfast and offers his services to deliver them to the Supermarket.

                                                 Alistair Coldrick former E6 Green fireman.

Off they go and we meet up later for lunch at a nice place overlooking the Harbour. Back aboard we read and laze generally until happy hour and decide to have a farewell dinner at the Mango restaurant.

                             Mango restaurant.                                                                                                    Charlie  eating like a pig.

After nearly seven months Fred and Grete have decided to leave us and go to Australia to meet up with Doug’s brother.

A lot of new yachts have come in over the weekend, mainly French, so the restaurant is pretty lively.

We set about our respective Lobsters or Steaks with great enthusiasm complimented with a nice little Sauvignon Blanc, Chardoney or Merlot depending on taste.

                                    Lovely lobster.                                                                                                                 Super pepper steak.

There’s lots chatter as people float from table to table meeting and greeting gleaning information about the islands they have or will be visiting or just making new acquaintances..

Finally we dive into the dinghy and return to base.

20130521 Tuesday

Fred is sorting out the accounts and Grete is busy packing followed by the inevitable visit to customs and immigration before we bid them farewell.

The Ferry comes in tonight which will take them to Nuku’alofa the capital on the most southerly island in the chain  where they can get the plane to OZ.

Having consulted the charts and copied relevant pages of a Pilot book Andre has lent us we plan our route south to Ha’ano in the Ha’apai group

of Tongan islands. Once we have cleared tomorrow morning we plan to move out to one of the outer islands so we can have a bit of a head start.

This should reduce the distance down to 60nm or about 12 hours sailing depending on the wind.

The waters were heading for from now on, contain many reefs and uncharted areas so day sailing where possible is advisable.

Also approaching anchorages through the reef at night is not recommended! Especially when you hear tales of disappearing islands that mysteriously pop up again then vanish, uncharted.

Lars disappears into the engine room yet again and emerges triumphant with a bucket full of jelly fish from the engine and refrigerator filters.

He’s somewhat black and oily having dropped his screwdriver down into the bilges but announces he’s has managed to recover it along with a selection of other bits and pieces and both machines are running again.

As the Sun slips slowly in the west, Lars degreases and showers off the stern and I finish Blogging and attend to bar duties. It’s Happy hour!

Bob the Blog