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Published: August 7th 2006
Today has been the most amazing day. It started early and ended late and has been full of laughter and adventure.
The day started at 6AM Vanuatu time. The big task for today was to clear customs and immigration into Vanuatu. We are anchored in Port Resolution on Tanna Island and customs is across the island Lenakel. Normally, Paul just does customs while I wait on the boat, but not this trip. I’m going to Lenakel!
At 7AM we assemble at the “Yacht Club.” There happen to be two sailboats here today that need to clear customs, Ladymink and us. Ladymink is captained by David, with a crew of two others, Amanda and Carol. Anyway, as traditional island time, our “taxi” is late. We only get the taxi today because we arranged it yesterday. They need a days notice for trips across the island. Our “taxi” is really a 4WD pick up truck, with benches in the back. There is a metal rack over the bed, not for safety but just in case in rains and we have to cover the bed with the tarp. Paul and I both brought cushions from the boat. Stanley, our guide, recommended this
to us. Unfortunately, Ladymink did not bring cushions… poor them.
The trip starts off, down the equivalent of a single trek for a 4wd pickup. First we pass through the village with their speed bumps and “slow taun plis” sign. (That isn’t bad English. It’s really Bislama or Pidgin English, the official language of Vanuatu. Pretty much everyone here speaks Bislama, English, French, and local dialects.)
We go on pass the trumpet flowers and out of the village. Then the real fun begins, and we can’t stop laughing. We are all holding on like monkeys to the bars over our heads. The goal is to get your head evenly between the bars so you don’t hit either bar, and try not to bounce to long. Every couple minutes someone exclaims “Look at those Banyan trees”, “Look at that view”, “Look at the little pigs”, “Look at those flowers”, “Look at the kids”, or “Oh a horse, I think it would be more comfortable to ride that horse bareback than this seat.” Everyone we pass is smiling and waving. The kids mostly line up when they see the truck coming and then chase it as we drive by, laughing
and screaming. Of course we are no better than the kids. We can’t help that we are acting just like little kids or Japanese tourists. We are up waving, and yelling, and laughing. Occasionally someone gets brave and tries to take a picture.
Then suddenly the scenery changes. No longer are we on a single lane dirt road surrounded by trees and flowers and small villages with grass huts. We are no on a huge open plain of black volcanic ash. We actually pass another truck on this ash plain. The road, well it looks like there are some old tracks here, but for the most part the truck can go wherever it wants. Oh yeah, the oohing and aahing starts again. The landscape is like being on the moon. You can see where the wind blows across part of the volcano and has made a ridge/ash dune along the edge.
Along the ash plain we pick up or first hitchhiker. Not sure where the guy was going, because he didn’t say much. He just stood on the back bumper and smiled, with his hat pulled down over his eyes. After he gets off Paul decides that standing
on the back bumper is the right idea so he tries. He claims it is more comfortable, and his legs and knees are better shock absorbers than his backside.
After the ash plain, it is time to climb the mountain. At one point part of the road is paved and we are all amazed by this. The views from up on high are amazing, even though, it is partly cloudy. After the high pass, it is more villages, schools, people, trees, and flowers. As we start down the hill towards Lenakel, we pick up Mrs. Tabby. As she is getting in she asks the driver if these are her customers. Turns out she is the immigration official. It is good we picked her up or we would just have to wait at her office. At immigration, the poinsettias that are in bloom enamor Carol. I thought they were cool flowers until I found out they were poinsettias. We have those at home.
After immigration we continue on into Lenakel, to customs. Well first we stop in the town “center.” Here I go to the bank to get some more Vatu. There isn’t an ATM here, but I’m able
to exchange my Fijian and NZ money for Vatu. I also get some post cards and stamps. The bank and post office are the same place. Along with the bank is a store that sells amazing bread, a restaurant, and an airline office. Not sure if the airline office was open but the other shops were. These are all housed in a small, concrete structure. While Ray, the driver changes the oil filter in the truck and gets it working again, we wander around the town center. Behind the buildings are peoples huts. It is all very quaint.
After the bank stop, it’s off to find the customs guy. He wasn’t in his office when we went by, so we go to his house, and he isn’t there either. Looks like we are going to wait. We all head over to the market to see what we see, while Stanley and Ray go and look for the customs guy. The market is small, but the produce is amazing. They have green onions that are almost 1 meter long, the largest kasava I’ve ever seen. I get some peanuts and lettuce. David gets this tree limb full of oranges and
a bunch of carrots. The carrots are huge and cause me to say, “You look like Bugs Bunny, carrying around those carrots.” Amanda gets a pineapple that she is able to carry around by the stalk; it almost looks like a club. And we all gorge on other individual fruits and the sweet bread they have.
After awhile we tire of this and decide to go and wait for the customs guy at his office. The office door is closed but the sign is funny. It says come inside for business but stay out if you have personal inquires, or something like that. Paul and Amanda start up a game of soccer with an old Fanta can. The rest of us lounge and watch the Preying Mantis. Finally, Stanley comes back and says, we go. He will call Port Villa, tell them we tried to clear customs, but couldn’t find the guy. We will go through customs in Port Villa. How amazing is that, “We tried, we’ll do it later.” FYI: That just doesn’t happen in the world of government and customs and officialdom. Customs did get done however, as we found the guy as we were leaving town.
Now for the ride back. It is much the same as the ride over. We stop at some little market along the way. The food here is the same as in town, but the setting. Once again under a Banyan tree just out in front of a little village, on top of the mountain. Paul is still hanging out the back like he’s on a garbage truck, and the rest of us are still laughing like little kids.
On the way back, it does start to rain. So we stop the truck and pull out the tarp. This is really just an old canvas sheet, think old, canvas, army, tent. It gets draped over the racks in the back. It isn’t tied down at all, just tucked between the rack and the cab of the truck. Boy does it stink and hold in the diesel smell. Paul is the smart one, hanging on the back. I don’t remember if Paul lost his hat, before or after the tarp went on, but he had to go running back for that. That taught him not to turn around in the wind. Once it stopped raining, we all started banging on
the truck sides to get them to stop so we could take the tarp off and get our heads out in the open again.
We made two stops on the way back, for photos. And photos we took. Everyone, out of the bus to take your picture of the volcano from a long way away. The next stop was on the ash plain. We didn’t all get out of the truck this time. Some just stood up. It almost looked like we were on safari looking for lions.
Finally, about 1:30 we were back at the Yacht club. The mornings adventure was done…. But oh, wait, that was only half the day.
4PM finds the crews of Dreamweaver and Ladymink back at the yacht club. Tonight we are going to visit Yasur volcano. Yasur is an active volcano and one of the most accessible in the world. It is the main draw for why we came to Tanna Island in the first place. We decided to try the volcano trip this night because, A) well Ladymink had to leave tomorrow, B) the weather was supposed to change with winds out of the NE soon and nobody wants
to be in the anchorage with NE winds. But we still debated, it was still cloudy over the volcano, and maybe it wouldn’t be good. On this expedition we picked up two newbies, Karen and Mluce (Pronounced Loose, she is French). They were both staying in the bungalows at the yacht club. By 4:30 no truck and we are wondering if our guides decided that the weather wasn’t good and just weren’t showing. Never fear we just kicked the soccer ball around the yard. I’m amazed that nobody kicked the ball off the cliff and into the sea.
Just after 5PM, Ray showed up with the truck. Poor guy, he had had to make another trip to Lenakel in the afternoon, which was why he was late. Anyway, the 7 of us all piled back into the truck. In the village we picked up some of the local men. They were going down the road to drink kava while we look at the volcano. The truck was full this time, with all kinds of people hanging off the back. Amazingly, the laughter hasn’t stopped. Paul loses his hat again. And ducking for the limbs seems a bigger challenge as
it is now starting to get dark. We drop the men off at the kava “bar” and get sshhhed. Not sure if it was the noise or that fact that we had women there. Women aren’t allowed around kava in Vanuatu. Oh well, we meant no disrespect and we quieted down.
Then it’s the road up to the volcano. If we thought the morning road was bad. This road really is a single trek. There were a few times, I thought we might have to get out and push the little truck up the hill. But we make it to the top. It actually turns out as a blessing that we are late. All the other people are on their way back down, so it will just be our little group at the volcano.
Ray parks the truck at the flat parking lot in the ash plain. He stays with the truck while the rest of us start the short hike to the top of the volcano rim. None of us are sure what to expect or even what we will see, or how far to go before we have to stop hiking. We are just following the
trail. Suddenly there is a loud explosion, like thunder and we all jump. We are on the ridge of the crater, hiking to the best observation point, but we can’t really see anything yet. Finally, we get to the top, and I have to say that at first I’m disappointed. Visibility is shite. The whole crater is covered with a cloud and it is cloudy above us.
We sit and stare at the crater and listen. You can hear the lava down below and it sounds like a raging class V river. It is so loud. Suddenly there is another clap of thunder and everyone jumps again. Those of us that had ventured to the edge really jump. I don’t know how many of these explosions there are but they are fairly regular. Some of them send lava and rocks well up into the air, high enough that we can see them. These explosions really make us move back. I mean I think that lava rock is going to land back in the crater, but if it doesn’t then I’m disintegrated. And when they land you can hear them thud and hiss in the mud. The most spectacular explosions
look like small fireworks displays, with red as the only color. And while that description is visually accurate, it doesn’t do justice to the feeling of watching these live fireworks and being awed by the power of this place.
After staring into the abyss and not seeing much for about 5-10 minutes, something happens. I’m not sure what but the clouds/smoke has started to lift out of the cauldron and we can see down into it now. Now we can actually see more rocks and lava being thrown into the air, and can see them glow red in the mud after they land. Sometimes we hear or see something sail above our heads. Our first thoughts is that this is flying ash, but it is actually bats flying around.
After about 5-10 minutes of being clear, the smoke settles back in and the whole thing repeats itself. Smoke filled, clear, smoke filled, clear. Seems to be a 20-minute program. One can’t help but be awed by the power and the eruptions. Some are big and long and make lots of noise, think fireworks grand finale. Others are just solitary explosions, some with lots of lava and rocks and
some with a few. You can tell the difference between the lava and the rocks because you can see the rocks spinning in the air. The lava bombs tend to just move like a big blob. Both are glowing red.
Finally, its time to go. Amanda and I can barely drag ourselves away from the edge. Every time we hear the slightest pop we go scurrying back to the edge to catch one last glimpse. It is funny that when the night started we ran from the edge at each sound, now we run to it.
Back in the truck, Ray has put the tarp on. Thanks Ray, its starting to rain. We all jump in and start cackling and talking about the volcano and the ride and the amazing day. On the way back we pick up the guys from the bar. They are all quiet now, after drinking kava, so that tends to make us be quiet. We do all notice how quiet it is. Oh yeah, when we dropped Stanley off at the bar, Paul asked about us drinking kava. So Stanley had gotten Paul a liter jug filled with kava. Kava to go.
Back at the Yacht club, we aren’t done yet. Well I think Karen and Luce are, they seemed to disappear. However, for all the yachties, its back to Dreamweaver. We have tacos, rum drinks, and kava and tell stories about our amazing day. It really was too good a day to describe.
School Pictures Ok just a short story about trying to help the village. Paul and I were wandering around the village and wandered into the school. Lakim the schoolmaster asked if we could do them a favor. They have a sister/penpal school in Australia. This school had sent them a class picture, and they wanted to reciprocate. Could we take a picture of the class, make it look pretty (PowerPoint) and print it out for them. Well we would be more than happy to. So we came back in the afternoon and took the picture of the class in uniform. Then we went to the boat and made the presentation. We told Lakim that we would bring the last copy (we didn’t print enough first time) of the picture in to him when we came in for dinner around 6PM. So we are wandering around the schoolyard
looking for him. One of the kids told us that he was over by the classrooms. We came across this local man and we asked for Lakim, but we of course got the name wrong. He responded with “You are looking for me.” It was Lakim. Paul and I were both so embarrassed. How could we A) forget the guy’s name and screw it up, and B) not recognize him? Our lame defense is A) it was dark, B) he was coming from the garden so he wasn’t in his good school clothes we had seen earlier C) we are just embarrassed. But Lakim didn’t seem to mind and was happy to get the print. When we left we were saying goodbye and Paul and I both said “eemom” (goodbye in Bislama), Lakim responded “eemom.” Then he said, “Wait, that is my language. How do you know that?” It was just a great exchange. Paul and I laughed all the way to the beach.
PS - Of the group I’m the only one that really got decent shots of the volcano. Largely because I used the night shot option on my camera. In the interest in truth and honesty, the red glow wasn’t as intense as it shows in the pictures. That is a function of the long exposure. Nevertheless, the pictures still don’t do justice to the whole experience.
And now...
Pictures PPS -- I was looking at Katie's pictures from Turkey today, while I waited for mine to upload. And I was thinking, man this is a slow pain in the backside. Do you find my picture links that way? Would it be easier if I put them on another site?
Just curious. Drop me a line and let me know, or if I don't hear anything I won't change.
PPS -- oh yeah, good pics Kate.
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Cherie
non-member comment
Great pics
hey man hot pic i use to live in vanutu but i live in australia umm there sum awsume shots u took ............ episcally the sign that was funi ne way thoughd id pop in n say hi hi !!!! lol ritio got to go bye ciao love cherry tree