Ninigo Islands

Sunday 9^th December

We arrived from the Hermits on Thursday afternoon at Heini Atoll, a stunning deep lagoon surrounded by slim coconut palm, white sandy islands, with the waves rolling over the outer reef. We enjoyed meeting Lemke and his family, who lived on one of the islands. They had a lovely sago hut on the beach surrounded by coconuts and other bush. We traded for lobsters, bananas and coconuts and Gary prepared coconut crab and heart of palm salad to go with our lobsters! Delicious! Their diet might be limited but very plentiful on their tropical islands. We all enjoyed a swim with them in the warm current rushing from the reef between the sandy islands. Snorkelling not as good as we have seen, maybe getting a bit fussy, but the girls loved jumping off the front of the boat to play in the current. Jeremy enjoyed fishing with Lowe on the outer reef and was amazed how much swell there was after the dead calm in the anchorage.

This morning we motored into the huge lagoon with the many other islands of the Ninigos surrounding it, to Pihun (01.17.331S.144.20.71E). We were greeted halfway across the lagoon by Solomon, in his banana boat, who came aboard to show us the way. It seems the government has been more generous in recent years and given them banana boats, motors, corrugated iron and water tanks. As with the Hermits they seem to use the banana boats rather than sailing canoes, faster obviously, but fuel is always an issue with little source of income. The girls enjoyed a swim and providing all the local children who swam out to the boat, supported by all sorts of floating objects, with balloons.  A squall with up to 30 knot winds and rain allowed everyone a quiet afternoon of reading and playing with Lego.

Monday 10^th December

What you think will be a quick trip to an island always ends up taking ages. It seems the custom here is to never leave visitors alone and to offer hospitality in some sort of beverage! We all went ashore at Pihun Island to drop off some supplies for the school and felt like the Pied Piper with what seemed like half the village coming with us. The girls enjoyed blowing up and handing out balloons and we liked hearing about village life. Most people seem to live here but have their gardens on other islands. It was very neat with landscaped paths through the village, lawns surrounded by flowers and well swept paths and general areas. The school was well maintained and resourced and we enjoyed fresh coconut water as refreshment at the chief’s house. We left laden with sugar cane, coconut oil, fresh coconuts and noni oil. A sailing canoe race was spectacular with blue sails flying, men heaving ropes and much shouting. They took off at a great rate, a little heavy in the bow but all but one successfully arrived back at the beach. After lunch, we left for Bahana Island where we had a quick snorkel and visited Helen on the island, a lovely island which used to house a hospital run by Americans. 

Monday 17^th December

After a quiet few days at Bahana Island, we motored over to Longan Island, another lovely island with very friendly people. We were greeted by two boat loads of boys who had collected lobsters for us, so we now have a full freezer again and Hatty is looking forward to lots of lobster pasta. Her favourite!   Oscar killed a couple of chickens for us, who obviously had had too much exercise, and were extremely tough. Next time they will require hours of stewing! Very free range though! Jeremy was able to help fix a couple of outboard motors, of which there seem to be quite a few, and we enjoyed looking around their immaculate village. White coral bordered hedges of flowering bushes and followed straight pathways between the coconut and sago leaf houses. Well swept dirt surrounded their cooking fires and dried fish was stored in large baskets ready to be taken to market. We left the island laden with paw paw, greens, snake beans, eggs (many of which had more legs than yolk!) and coconuts.

After a choppy motor sail into the wind to Vanimo we were all pleased to arrive after two days and a night at sea. The girls loved watching many DVD’s while I enjoyed the lovely starry night during my early morning watch. Jeremy was a little frustrated by the wind which made for an uncomfortable ride.  Today, after very handy hints from ‘Totem’ and ‘Sea Glass’, our friends a little ahead of us, we successfully got our visas to Indonesia and checked out of Papua New Guinea.  We are dwarfed in our anchorage here by huge barges and tug boats ready to be loaded with enormous logs, destined for Malaysia. At least they are shielding us from the wind. Vanimo is not a place we need to stay for long, so we are off early tomorrow morning, to beat the westerly wind which gets up at about 8 am, for Jayapura in Indonesia. The entry process into Indonesia doesn’t sound as easy, in fact it sounds a nightmare but more handy instructions ensures we know what we are up against!

We are hoping to catch up with the other kid boats for Christmas but it is looking unlikely unless we have a quick turn around in Jayapura. Gary from Muscat, who we are still travelling with, is a very good cook so Christmas lunch will be delicious I’m sure!