the kingdom of tonga - where whales and pigs meet for a chat on the beach.

wow - where to start?

we had a long nice break from sailing and waves here in the vava'u group...and a lot of things happened.

to start with: we helped pulling an aluminium yacht of a reef near lape island.

the poor couple somehow managed to get the yacht so high up on a reef that on low tide it was lying on its side surrounded by only 15cm of water.

thanks to Paul and Mary from Bela Via, who did the coordination and support for the two shipwrecked, Mark and Charles, who came up with the masterplan, the superyacht dorothea III who did the muscle work and a crowd of helpers, we managed to get "paje" (so the name of the yacht) of it's unfortunate drydock - and amazingly, she still swims! 

it was a real wake up call to see how quickly you can get into strife! as tonga does not have a proper coast guard rescue service in case of an emergency you are completely relying on the help of other yachties around, and it was reassuring and heartwarming how many were there to help and offering their gear.

luckily paje is an aluminium yacht - with a fiberglass boat like maloo there would have been nothing worth rescuing.

so much excitement for the first week.

we saw the king of tonga at the agricultural fair, which only happens every 5 years - we did a tongan feast on lape, a small island inhabited by the nicest and most humble people we have meet so far - we snorkeled the most colourful reef we have seen on our trip until now, while hearing the humpback whales sing and we also did one of those whale swimming tours - unfortunately we only got o short glimpse of a mother and her calf. after having seen though how these "shows" operate i am not soooo sure if it is all for the good. there are surly some operators out there that do it well, however, if you have the same people on your boat for the 4th time round paying lots of money and there has been no whale, then the 5th attempt could be a bit stressful for all involved parties as we experienced. we had lovely whale encounters with maloo though and i am still amazed by the sheer size of these animals.

what to say about tonga? to answer the question i asked myself in the last post: yes, it is a long lasting relationship - tonga is simply wonderful.

it is a quiet home with little excitement, a lot of peace and calm waters, where "time" is just a word.

the country itself is very poor and the villages very rough around the edges but still taken care of in their own means. rumors have it that the local wesleyean christian church has more money than the whole kingdom - and looking at the states the churches are in compared to houses and schools i am almost certain this is true.

the church definitely has a huge influence on everyday life. tongans are very religious and you can hear their beautiful singing at the church service almost every morning at the break of dawn. sunday everything is closed (something quite normal if you read this blog sitting in austria/germany and are older than 15 - something unimaginable if you read this blog sitting in australia or the us) and even on the hottest days, ladies are never seen in less than calf-long pants and elbow-sleeved t-shirts.

despite the little resources people make ends meet with growing their own crops and repairing cars to a state of an engine being ducktaped to 4 seats and 4 different sized wheels - but they go!  some foreign aid organizations from mostly NZ/AUS and the churches in the US are here to help out. china and japan support too, trading rights to catch a couple of fish in the tongan waters.

the old and strict system of hirachy with the king on top and then lots of nobles etc. makes progress slow, but maybe this is what keeps the local culture healthy and adapting.

children speak english at a very young age and are happy to try a couple of words whenever they see a "palangi"  - the tongan word for us non tongan-people, which at the moment still has a positive meaning here. and that might be the key to why we enjoyed tonga and it's people so much. 

and being greeted by locals in the streets who just know you for only a week like, as if you were an old friend, might add to that.

the chicken running around, like on all pacific islands are outnumbered here by the pigs roaming the streets and beaches,

heaps of dogs are around too, and like on most pacific islands, in desperate times... or really special ones, dog is on the menu as well.

lots of sailors got stuck here and started up businesses - some unfortunate sailboats rotting away in the harbor are proof of that and i can't blame them to make tonga their second home...i'm tempted too:)

all in all we had a great relaxing time in tonga. it was nice to stay at one place longer (and by far longer than we expected) as we for once had the feeling to really visit a place instead of just quickly stopping by.

after a rather uneventful (don't forget "uneventful" is generally good on a sailboat ;)) 3nighter we will arrive in Savu Savu/ Fiji this morning where we will hopefully find some internet to post this and a couple of photos.

and as usual i finish this post with the promise to myself that i will one day return to tonga - a place where the nights are calm, gentle breezes ripple the water's surface and the distant sound of a whale courting a mate is lulling you to sleep.

ps.: in fiji we are delighted to take temporary crew on board - Shannon and Pete are going to join us for the 2 weeks we plan to stay. unfortunately that will most likely be our last longer stop between here and australia as we run out of time and the cyclone season approaches ever so quickly....can't believe that we're on the water a bit over a year now!

pps.: it took us a bit longer to get fast internet - we arrived on the 29th of ausgust in savusavu.

riding the whale....or taking care of the towing rope for the yacht rescue

paje at almost low tide - photo shot by Michael of  S.V. Galactic

Charles - sitting, Mark - standing and the owner Todd in the back as paje is pulled off the reef

....and she swims!

one of the many school bands

how to transport coconuts

playing solitaire...?

the famous kava-root 

kava-root made into powder 

going for a swim after school

the king of tonga

...and i am in heaven! 

the spit pig at the tongan feast in lape

schooluniform

beach pigs

at the agricultural fair

mhmmm - moray eel!

everyday's market

boring market day

drying vanilla beans 

vanilla plantation

humpbacks

the massive mahi mahi mark caught on the way to fiji