Blogs from Tongatapu, Tonga, Oceania - page 2

Last Friday and Saturday Tonga received an unprecedented amount of rain: According to the Tonga Meteorological Services at Fua’amotu, a 273.1mm of rainfall was recorded in the 24 hours between Friday and Saturday. Yep, June is not the best time to start a swim program! It has also been very overcast and cool. Many low lying areas flooded at the weekend (and rains continued yesterday) so there was the threat of evacuations. We are on slightly higher ground so are fine. You can see from the Nuku'alofa picture that the town and area has no hills. Sunday was a welcome surprise with sun and some warmth! So we headed out on our bikes. Remember Sunday the whole of Tonga comes to a screeching halt as nothing, really nothing, opens. So cycling is our main distraction. We ... read more

After a few days in the guesthouse it was time to find somewhere to live. Housing in Tonga varies greatly - see the pictures! The mansion beside the water belongs to friends. Ours is the rather suburban looking one! It is in fact NZ built and huge. We have 2 volunteer houses with 3 volunteers and some partners in each. Ours is in a fabulous compound with our neighbours - an Australian/Tongan couple and their 3 children. Note Jan having a bear with Salesi our landlord (unbelievably Jan is clutching a can of Fosters). We also have choocks and several pigs plus lots of fruit trees. I'm trying to plant some veggies (where the chooks cannot dig them up) and Jan is helping the guys on the land plant taro.... read more

It rained today in Tonga but didn’t dampen our spirits. Fortunately for the first part of our kayaking trip it was dry but going back there was a light spritzing. It was so great to be off the ship after four days. We were unable to dock in Rotorua, New Zealand due to high winds and the next day when we arrived in Auckland it was raining, windy and cold so we opted to stay on the ship. We hadn’t kayaked since last summer and the water was rough so we struggled but made it. Tomorrow we will know how out of shape we are. Last night after the Captain’s cocktail party and dinner we danced (fast, not waltz) for the first time on this cruise and so the hips are a little out of joint ... read more

HELLO, hello bloggies, sorry for the delay, nothing I could do, cut off from the outside world !! Well almost !! So going back to when we arrived at Tonga, we flew from AUCKLAND to the island, (can't remember the date now). The islanders on the plane seem to bring an awful lot of hand lugguage, lots of 'mats' These are what the women wear, no kidding, they wear these woven mats around their waist's and because funerals are a very big thing out there, they seem to bring over lots of cloths, purple colour and these are hung up outside the houses. So the first night we went to the buffet, traditional dancing evening, (Stu wearing the flowers) we had been up for 38 hours as we had to wait at the airport all night ... read more

Hi everyone, just putting up more photos of Tonga, it really was very relaxing and a great way of finishing 'our world wind road trip' which was fantastic and we're still talking to each other !! Believe me, in a car together 24/7 is always not a bed of roses !! But we both said it was a great adventure and would we do it again, most definitely!! hope it's the beginning of things to come. Roll on retirement, we fancy a road trip round Scotland, Wales and Ireland and further afield, Canada, America, the list is endless !! Met so many nice people and saw stunning beautiful places, we both fell in love with New Zealand, it really is just a wonderful country and would love to go back there again. We don't usually say ... read more