14/09/09

The rains have continued.  We did have a few hours of sun and went to another anchorage where we found the tiny house boat called “The Ark Gallery”  with an American couple living aboard year round .  She is a primitive artist and does miniature paintings.  The have moorings and look after several unoccupied yachts.  The Ark is about 3 x 5 meters.  They’ve been here for years and seem very happy.

We also explored a couple of caves.

There is a restaurant on another  small island called “La Paella” run by a women from Valencia and her husband.  They arrived by yacht 20 years ago and never left.  They have leased 8 acres of land  and are totally self sufficient;  They do a paella feast with lots of different tapas and only cook to order. Saturday night they had 10 diners.  He rounds the evening off  by singing passionate Spainish songs in a slightly well oiled state.   The next mourning she took Demetra and I for a tour of their kingdom which included 5 different beaches and substantial amounts of fruit and local vegetables.  One of their pigs was suckling ten  2 day old piglets. 

The story on the boat with the thatched roof is that the owner lost the mast and sold it to a local for $1.00.  He put the roof on and lives on it.

Unfortunately Tonga has been a bit of a washout for us and we will head off for Fiji tonight.