First week or so in Tonga
Nickanddenisesailing
Fri 13 Oct 2017 04:39
Wow the time has been flying while we have been here. Its an amazing time of the year as for many of the boats that have been on the trip across the Pacific this will be their last lot of islands that they will visit before heading to NZ.
We headed into the customs and immigration dock early the day after arrival. 'Due West' were already there and we passed the time that it took for all the officials to come out to the boat chatting with them and a couple of other yachts that were waiting. The whole process took a while but all the officials were nice and friendly and just after lunch we were able to go and find one of the illusive mooring balls just off the main town.
We managed a bit of exploring around town - including a funny instance where I came across an advert for T shirt printing and found a picture of my whole family from 8 years ago (when Mum and Dad sailed through) doing the advertising! We then saw this picture in a few other places around town - much to the amusement of our friends.
Jenny and Paul (from Due West) had us around for dinner that night - this started with shots of a coffee liqueur, which was really how the night continued. After such a fun night we were feeling a bit worse for wear when in the morning we heard a shout for 'Sold the Farm' and when we popped our blurry heads out we realised that we were actually on a private mooring ball and the owner was back. We hastily moved - to another private one, - that some other friends had been on (knowing that we would only be there for another night), as there were none others left and our heads were pounding.
We spend the day getting jobs done around town before heading out for a nice tapas dinner with Jenny and Paul again. We then made our way to the 'lady-boy' show in town which was a good laugh. We didn't stay long as we are getting old and boring and cant seem to do 2 nights in a row anymore :)
The next few days were spent in great company with Due West and our Dutch mates on Riffiki. We had a night off an island that used to house a famous cannibal - thankfully not active anymore. From this bay we headed around the corner with Jenny and Paul in the 'dream dinghy' to Swallows cave. It was great snorkeling and the light penetrating into the cave was beautiful. We found a smaller cave around the corner with a nice little swim through into another cavern.
Some friends of Due West had invited us all to a Tongan feast on a near by island for the next night. Riffiki joined us there and after some cheeky beers hidden behind a boat (the Tongans are very conservative and we weren't sure drinking was allowed....) we headed to the hosts house. He really had put on a feast of all kinds of food - some with an interesting Asian influence. His young daughters were encouraged out in front of us to do a dance before we packed up and headed back to our boats.
So with the 3 'young'un' boats - Riffiki, Due West and ourselves - there had been a lot of big talk of drinking and getting rowdy - I think we forgot that we are not 21 any more..... So a beach BBQ/drinking-fire party was planned for the next night. So after a lunch time picnic on the beach,Jenny, Paul, Nick and I headed over to another lovely beach to scout it out for the evenings activities. From there Nick and I clawed, kicked and swam our way out through some small breaking waves to a nice snorkeling spot. After our underwater exploring we collected some wood and prepared for the evening.
We had such a great night - one that will never be forgotten. A deserted beach, great friends, nice food (although only a fraction got eaten as by then we were well into the drinks), a large blow up blue sofa, great music, a nice fire and some fantastic chat. Such a great group - what I loved most about it is how varied it all was - talking bit coin and large financial plans to rolling around in the sand with fire torches yelling 'king of the north!' haha! Yes we have been watching too much Game of Thrones! It was great fun and I found myself on many occasions (normally on the way back from having a pee) just brimming with happiness - thinking 'this is what life is all about'. The night ended with some irresponsible dinghy driving home (dinghy armarada) and lots of whopping and yelling. Nick and I decided to jump in for a night swim around the boat before heading to bed.
The next morning was pretty brutal - mostly for Paul who didn't really surface until well into the evening. Nick and I managed some exploring before retiring down below to be lazy.
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