http://www.travelblog.org/Bloggers/Seamus/ Travel adventures in journals and photos from Seamus en-us Fri, 04 Dec 2009 12:13:52 +0000 Fri, 04 Dec 2009 12:13:52 +0000 The village of Asirohk MALEKULAAsirohk is about 1.5 hours walking from our anchorage with Alvei in Banam Bay. Itrsquos a nice walk through lush forest some other villages and the biggest part is along the beautiful coast. The walk is a bit up and down and the final part about 15 minutes is quite steep. But itrsquos all the sweat from walking under the tropical sun more than worth. When yo http://www.travelblog.org/Oceania/Vanuatu/Malekula/blog-457550.html ldquoTwo daysvolunteerdiaryrdquo 910th of September 2009 by Franzi Rudolphi GermanyAs a volunteer of Project MARC I would like to describe my experiences Irsquove had here in Malekula this small and beautiful island belongs to Vanuatu.Originally I came to the South Pacific for sailing on Alvei and finally living my dream which appeared to me 12 years ago. After nearly two month of ful http://www.travelblog.org/Oceania/Vanuatu/Malekula/blog-457306.html The Mystical Power of Music in Malekula I recently had a most unique set of experiences I would like to share with you. It is the experience of cultural exchange and the universal power of melody and rhythm. I was lured to the small island nation of Vanuatu via email some months before by my old pal Seamus OrsquoBryan with the tantalizing idea that a musician particularly a singing guitarist http://www.travelblog.org/Oceania/Vanuatu/Malekula/blog-457300.html Project MARCrsquos September expedition could easily be called the most successful expedition of the season. There are thousands of photos taken by over a dozen volunteers that tell some of the innumerable stories from the month. As for the telling of the stories Irsquod prefer to leave some of that to the volunteers themselves. They were the ones who truly got to experience the magic of work http://www.travelblog.org/Oceania/Vanuatu/Malekula/blog-452768.html Travelblog August 2009This yearrsquos August excursions took me to around the islands but in all honesty I had very little to do with this expedition. This expedition was all about a pair of real heroes. This expedition was all about Dr. David and Heather Churcher. Dr. Churcher is a modern day Superman. Hersquos an expert sailor dentist extraordinaire and last but not leasthellipAustrali http://www.travelblog.org/Oceania/Vanuatu/blog-452767.html Travelblog July Part 5The weekend in Luganville was extremely restful and allowed me to reorganize plans for the rest of the month. Alanna left us on Monday and I sent Will and Iza to Vila where they had planned to spend the rest of the month. By Tuesday all the original expedition members had flown off to their destinations so that same day I caught a truck up to the Big Bay Bush and by Thursd http://www.travelblog.org/Oceania/Vanuatu/Santo/blog-452766.html Travelblog July Part 4ldquoIf you come across an 30 inch tall naked infant that is holding a 36 inch blade vertically over his head as he stares you in the face and cries his little eyes out in fearhellipyou may be in Sulemari Village.rdquo On our first night in Sulemari the boys in our team went to the river to have a swim and wash the road dirt from our backs. On our return to the villa http://www.travelblog.org/Oceania/Vanuatu/Santo/blog-452765.html Travelblog July 2009 Part 3On our first day in the Pareo Valley our team split forces. One group headed up the steep North side of the valley to survey the villages there while another group stayed on the valley floor for the villages there. Another group yet stayed with our newly laid camp. The hike up the North side of the valley is a very steep climb. The distance as the crow flies is less than http://www.travelblog.org/Oceania/Vanuatu/Santo/blog-452763.html November third was a rather interesting day. Itrsquos not that every day is like this for me but days like this happen frequently enough. I havenrsquot gotten around to recording many of my days this year but maybe that because Irsquom a little too busy living them up. To fully grasp the entirety of this single day in the life one needs to learn a bit about the night before. Simply put t http://www.travelblog.org/Oceania/Vanuatu/Malekula/blog-452745.html By day five it was time to move on to our next base camp. We hired some local porters to guide the team and carry some of our extra gear. Carolyn a teacher at the school and her husband walked with us for a great while and were a great help. Most of the hike that day was on flat ground or beach but the final push to get us to the Jungle Mountain Clinic was up a bit of an incline. We took our ti http://www.travelblog.org/Oceania/blog-424868.html So one little thing that happened during this first bit of the month involved a wayward canoe. I'd almost forgotten about it until the photo popped up in one of the other volunteer's picture caches. On our second day out of Luganville we were motoring up the coast to Wusi in a water taxi. Near the end of our trip I spied a dugout canoe floating idly off the shore. There was nobody in the canoe and http://www.travelblog.org/Oceania/Vanuatu/Santo/blog-424854.html All volunteers assembled we were ready to head off. Some had come before others but time was of the essence and much training was to be done on the fly. We had a firebuilding seminar on the beach the day before leaving and the camp pots had been broken in. The volunteers were fit the hikes ahead were rough and thankfully the maps were still dry.Before we drove off into the sunset and away fro http://www.travelblog.org/Oceania/Vanuatu/Santo/blog-421916.html Travel Blog 624 Luganville.Itrsquos businesshellipItrsquos business timehellipldquoThatrsquos why they call them business sockshelliprdquo I arrived in Luganville yesterday morning after two weeks in Port Vila taking care of business. I donrsquot actually own business socks but I did bring along a single shirt that would be appropriate to wear in an office. Let me tell you i http://www.travelblog.org/Oceania/Vanuatu/Santo/Luganville/blog-412354.html Well everyone itrsquos time to start up the lsquool blog once again. I made it to Vanuatu after a couple hours in transit 37 and luckily all my luggage made it through too. There was a bit of hassle at the Brisbane airport that forced me to shill out a heap of cash that I didnrsquot want to spend but allinall things worked out in the end. I guess the airlines donrsquot like it when yo http://www.travelblog.org/Oceania/Vanuatu/Efate/Port-Vila/blog-408929.html Today begins the last month of the year and many things are coming to an end. Among the list of wrapups is my time here in the South Pacific. Tomorrow I head back to the states with a short stop in Fiji for a couple of hours. I love flying East over the dateline because gaining a day always makes me feel so time efficient. I'll spend 22 hours in transit and still land 34 hours before I left. Bac http://www.travelblog.org/Oceania/Vanuatu/Efate/Port-Vila/blog-350104.html And so it ends and begins all again. http://www.travelblog.org/North-America/United-States/California/San-Diego/blog-237758.html Rivendel II is a 43 foot yacht and has been in the Project MARC family since the beginning. In the early days of the organization Rivendel II served as the main office main transport main storage facility and main clinic. Together with the Henk and Nelleke Meuzellar this boat was a founder of Project MARC and like the retiring human founders it is time for her to get a break. While Rivendale http://www.travelblog.org/Oceania/Australia/Queensland/Brisbane/blog-342211.html The first full day in Vunap had two projects running. First off the doctors held a clinic day in the village which served more than a score of patients. Several surrounding villages sent people to see the doctors as well which was nice. We didnrsquot think that the word of our presence would travel so fast but apparently it spread like wildfire. Like in Jereviu there was a scabies problem in http://www.travelblog.org/Oceania/Vanuatu/Santo/blog-337517.html Once back on Alvei we found out that the ship had been stuck out at sea for two days due to heavy weather. Unfortunately the Clinic team never made it to the Tasiriki dispensary while the Mobile team was trekking through the mountains. Strong headwinds from the South pushed against the ship forcing them to sail out to sea. As they tacked back and forth through the gale they made little headway b http://www.travelblog.org/Oceania/Vanuatu/Santo/blog-337489.html Well everyone the expeditions in Espirito Santo were quite a lot of fun as well as being great successes. We started out from Luganville with a few setbacks a full hold of medicine and three teams of doctors. The Clinic Team was comprised of Sara a midwife from the states Anish a med student from Oxford Nina a British doctor based in New Zealand Rosie the Kiwi 2nd mate of SV Alvei and H http://www.travelblog.org/Oceania/Vanuatu/Santo/blog-336291.html