Mark on deck at Felefesia Island |
Coral head closer than it looks |
Anne relaxing on cabin top |
Scenery at Kelefesia anchorage |
Prior to beginning this sailing season, we hatched a plan to leave “Three Sixty Blue” on a mooring in Vava’u, Tonga for about six weeks in order to fly to the States for a family memorial service following the passing away of Mark’s mother. Our time there would also be spent helping his sisters prepare her house for sale and give us a few weeks to enjoy some Northern Hemisphere summer time at our home in the Idaho mountains. The plan necessitated hustling north through Tonga’s island groups in order to get the boat moored and prepped for our absence. Fortunately, we had made arrangements with an American ex-pat couple who are former delivery skippers and have, for years, operated a floating art gallery in a protected bay with moorings. They would baby-sit “Three Sixty Blue” in our absence.
We broke up the trip north to Vava’u with overnights at lovely Malinoa Island where we enjoyed the island all to ourselves and did a swimming circumnavigation of it sampling the surrounding coral reefs. Another splendid day sail took us to Kelefesia Island, regarded by many as one of the most beautiful islands in the world. That point would be hard to argue considering the spectacular, palm-covered topography, white sand beaches and crystal clear water. In fact, the water was so clear that, even though anchored with sufficient depth above the coral “bommies”, we could look down on them from deck level and they appeared close enough to reach out and touch. It was a tad bit unnerving to say the least. A day was spent there snorkeling and reveling in the beauty as changing sun angles added even more character to amazing scenery.
With our departure date rapidly approaching we decided to leave the following day and do an overnight sail for the remaining 130 miles to Neaifu, Vava’u. Following seas and winds aft of our beam insured a pleasant passage and by first light the next morning, we were threading our way through Vava’u's passes on our final approach to town. Once in the harbor, we secured “Three Sixty Blue” to a mooring and headed ashore to check in and see what had changed since we were there in 2012.
Neiafu, Vava’u Tonga is a very busy place crowded with tourists once the migrating whales start arriving in July but by this time in early June it is still pretty sleepy. On quick examination, we noted that a few of our old haunts had either changed hands, gone out of business or had yet to open for the season. The usual Chinese stores were still the primary source of staples but the open air produce and craft market seemed to have a better selection.
While in town and able to connect with internet, we retrieved an email from Fiji Airways informing us that their twice weekly flight from Neiafu to Nadi, Fiji connecting to the daily flight to Los Angeles had been cancelled on our departure date and that we were re-booked 4 days later. That sent us into quite a tizzy since it would mean making our family memorial service nearly impossible. This set in motion 24 hours of fairly frantic visits to a local ticket agent and numerous Skype calls and emails to the airline itself in order to move our departure flight ahead rather than back. Our efforts were finally rewarded and our final 24 hours in Tonga were spent moving to our longer-term mooring in the Tapana anchorage, prepping for departure, packing and briefing the folks that would be taking care of our boat while we were away. Whew…what a hectic couple of days!
Leaving “Three Sixty Blue” on a mooring in a foreign country rather than in a marina berth was a little surreal but we felt confident in the mooring tackle and, once we dinghied ashore to catch a taxi to the airport, we had to accept that we had done all we could to insure her safety and security. As we boarded our taxi, we took a final look back at our boat sitting peacefully in the beautiful bay feeling as confident as we could that all would be well upon our return in 6 weeks.
This is broker Phil Berman. I built this boat in Brazil and have some questions on the changes made to her for a customer. Can you contact me. Phil
ReplyDeleteHi Phil, we are home in the States and would be happy to talk with you about Dolphin catamarans and answer any questions you and your customer may have about the changes we made to Three Sixty Blue. By the way, the need to be home caring for elderly parents has necessitated closing the chapter on our 8 year cruising adventure and our cat is now listed for sale in Pittwater, Australia just north of Sydney. She is represented by David Renouf and your old friend Rod Waterhouse of DBY Boat Sales.
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