In Tonga

We left Samoa 10 September and had a fairly rough sail to Tonga. The wind was forward of the beam for the first time in the Pacific and neither of us were used to the motion so we didn't feel particularly well. As we left the channel between Apia and Savaii and, just after sighting a whale, the deck block for our main sail broke which meant we could no longer use the main. We sailed the majority of the trip with just our genoa and staysail. Even so, we made very good time and arrived in Tonga in the evening on 12th.

We anchored overnight at one of the outer islands, Port Maurelle, and had drinks and a fire on the beach with Barbara and Michael from Astarte and a number of other cruisers. The following day we sailed the remaining distance to Neiafu the main town in the Vava'u group and cleared into the country. A long process with 4 people visiting us and a lot of dirty feet over the boat. The main harbour is full of moorings so we picked one of these up and recovered from our trip. Our generator was not working and we discovered we had the same problem with fuel lines as we have had with the main engine. Fortunately, there is a workshop here that could help us out with a spare part and Mike was able to refit the fuel line. They were also able to rebuild our deck block so that we can use our main again.

We moved back out to Port Maurelle for a few days before heading back into town for our whale watching and diving. We had our first days diving on Friday and did 2 dives off the outer islands. We saw lots of soft corals and went into caves but saw very few fish. Saturday we went whale watching with Colin, Liz, Zinnia and Cosmo from Pacific Bliss. The boat took us a long way south and eventually joined up with another boat that had found 2 whales. We took turns getting into the water with them. They would sit on the bottom for a while and we could just see their outline through the water. Eventually they would both come to the surface very close to us. It was scary and exciting at the same time, they are such huge creatures. We had 2 goes in the water before heading back. It was a grey day and the water is quite cold so we were both OK with not swimming any longer. Monday we did our second day diving which we both enjoyed more than the first day. We went into caves and through split rocks and saw amazing corals. There were lots of fish but nothing big and we didn't see any sharks.

The Vava'u regatta started the same day we were whale watching and had a full calendar of events for a whole week. There was a fancy dress pub crawl the first day and it was amazing to see the costumes cruisers carry on their boats! Sunday we went to a dinghy raft up. This is exactly as its name suggest, we went to the end of the harbour and all the dinghy's raft up together. We all took food to share and drinks and spent the afternoon socialising. Towards the end we let go of the mooring and the dinghy's stayed attached and we all drifted down the harbour back to the boats singing as we went! Tom from Barraca provided the accompaniment on his guitar. We discovered that we had met Tom in St Martin 3 years ago so had a good catch up!

There were several talks during the week on the Humpback Whales and on New Zealand which we attended. Wednesday evening we had arranged to take Zinnia and Cosmo to the Baby Grand Theatre to see 'Augustines Circus Spectacular'. This is run by a guy called Billy who is from Bristol. The theatre holds 12 people but unfortunately 16 turned up for the show. We all squeezed in and we had to have the children on our laps which made a very hot theatre even hotter. The show was very funny, its a 'flee' circus, and the audience participation made it a fun evening.

There were a number of yacht races as part of the regatta but due to our rig problems we did not participate in them. We did go to the 'full moon party' which was on a beach at one of the anchorages. It was a fun night with a disco and traditional dancing and a great end to the week.

After all the socialising we escaped to one of the outer anchorages on the east side of the group called Kenutu. The weather has not been good in Tonga, we have had lots of rain and it has been windy and cold. This has meant we have not been in the water as much as we would have liked. Kenutu was very pretty but we were boat bound by weather most of the time. We did catch up with Pacific Bliss and Colin organised a treasure hunt for the children. We had a treasure map and cryptic clues and had to dinghy around the anchorage finding them, including the treasure (beers for us and sweets for the children) at the end. It was very clever and we all had a great time doing it. Afterwards we had a party on the beach and a number of other boats that had arrived that day, joined us.

We left Kenutu after a few days and headed for Lape Island. There was great snorkelling at a site called the coral garden and we also continued our socialising! Lape island held a Tongan feast to raise money for the island and we had arranged to go to it. As the days progressed more and more boats arrived and by the day of the feast the anchorage was full. There were 94 people at the feast and we were amazed they had enough food for everyone. There are only 32 residents on the island normally so we completely out numbered them and it turned into a big cruisers social gathering.

Chris and Rani from Ladybug finally caught up with us at Lape and the four of us went to the coral garden so that we could dive the outside of the reef. We had to swim through the surf from the inside which was not easy with dive gear but it was worth it as the coral on the outside was amazing and some of the best we have ever seen. There were also lots of fish, many which we haven't seen before. We spent a fairly short time outside and then had to swim back through the surf. This was very tiring and by the time we returned to the boat we just wanted to relax!

The day after the feast we left Lape and headed back to Port Maurelle so that we could go to Swallows Cave. Chris and Rani came with us and after anchoring our boats, the 4 of us dinghyed to the cave. Its a large cave that was big enough for the dinghy and there was also another smaller one near to it. We also snorkelled inside the cave and along the wall on the outside. There was little coral but a surprising variety of different fish

The last few days in Vava'u we checked out and stocked up on fuel ready to head to the Haapi group. The Haapi are 60 miles south of Vava'u and are where we will leave from for NZ.

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