The Kingdom of Tonga!
It was a 10day passage from Maupiti to Vava’u in Northern Tonga – the longest passage so far. All the wind models indicated that we should take a broad northerly sweep to avoid high seas & strong winds further south. So with this in mind we set sail early morning, bouncing around in the disturbed sea in the Maupiti pass. I kept a log of each day’s experience for my own benefit as much as anything – too much to reproduce in this blog, but I will transcribe a little bit for each day of the passage to describe the flavour of life onboard during a longer passage.
Day 1: Spinnaker up! All going swimmingly well for 4hrs then wind shifted, spinnaker collapsed & wrapped itself around cross trees tearing in an attempt to unravel it. Stuff it – then 2 sweaty hours fixing it with sail tape.
Day 2: Winds very variable in strength with lumpy seas – difficult to get boat into consistent rhythm until late afternoon. Mussaman beef for dinner.
Day 3: Light wind so 2nd attempt at spinnaker, but twisted badly (wine glassed), so had to bring it down & undertake the laborious task of untwisting & repacking. By the time that was done, squalls were upon us, so didn’t use it after all!
Day 4: Speeds up to 8.4kts with triple reefed main & slightly reefed jib Rainbows & cloudy skies.
Day 5: Bill checks the rigging every evening & found that bolt holding bracket for main sheet had become really loose – not expected! Thank goodness Bill noticed as no main means a really slow trip!
Day 6: You start to get used to your cocoon – life becomes simplified to weather patterns, forecasts, safe rig, good food, plenty of rest. Bill & I are confined to area size of our bedroom at home- there’s no escaping each other’s company! 670nm to go at 5pm ie half way – good for morale.
Day 7: Light breeze on the beam but doing nicely. A couple of pilot whales came within 20m of the boat – seeing cetaceans is always a good sign!
Day 8: Happy birthday Bill! Black sky behind with thunder & lightning but trying to out run it. Failed lol.
Day 9: Fantastic sail over night reaching an average of 7kts with relatively flat seas. Re-ran the routing models & they show we should arrive in 2 days time instead of 3! Lifted my spirits no end.
Day 10: Wind dropped & it’s getting frustrating, we don’t want another 2 nights at sea…… Now wind has come up a bit & we’re sailing at 6-7kts just marginally off course on a broad reach. Fingers crossed the wind holds.
Day 11: Hooray!! Land ahoy! Hello Tonga!
We weren’t planning to spend too long in Tonga, as we were still planning to get to Fiji & leave the boat for a while, so we could get back to the UK. However, we certainly needed some downtime & serious R&R. The actual entry formalities took over 2 days, as we arrived on a Saturday and only customs were working. Nothing happens on a Sunday in Tonga, (meaning it is considered a ‘day of rest’) and then Monday was a public holiday! Finally after 3 further nights on the boat we could go ashore and complete immigration & bio security so that we had officially arrived!
We were last in Vava’u 16yrs ago. To be honest it hasn’t changed much – a few more buildings in Neiafu the capital, but clearly not a thriving economy. Having said that all the Tongans we met were overwhelmingly hospitable and friendly. All rather large it has to be said! Tonga has the dubious distinction of being the most obese country in the world with up to 40% of the population having type 2 diabetes & life expectancy is not improving. Probably a combination of dietary changes, (high fat imported meat is consumed), less exercise and probably an element of genetics.
We restocked with fresh provisions & headed off to the anchorages away from the main town. First stop Port Maurelle, which we remember well from our last visit to Tonga on Vagabond Heart 16yrs ago. At that time we were travelling with 2 other families on their boats Lucey Blue & Pegasus. Much of Tonga is remembered through the lens of children’s activities, beach games, bonfires and social gatherings in the evenings. It was here that our youngest Wil, turned 10! What we didn’t seem to remember was the holding in the bay was really quite bad with coral rubble & boulders strewn around on the sea floor. It took us 3 goes at anchoring before it was adequately set! Nevertheless, we enjoyed a couple of days there snorkelling the edges of the bay, (very little coral but lots of small fish as well as 20+ squid at one stage, their flickering iridescence quite spectacular).
We were also invited for sundowners on a boat called Aroha, one of the Pacific rally boats. It was a very pleasant social occasion. We joined this rally as it provides great support, tons of information, all sorts of discounts at various locations, a group of fellow travellers, various social events and most importantly, helps facilitate the strict demands of returning to Australia & importing your boat.
The wind was due to change direction, so we headed to an anchorage near the Coral Gardens. What we hadn’t anticipated was that it was also the chosen destination of several of the world ARC boats for the next few days. Tonga was the first time our itineraries actually crossed, (we had tried to avoid this group of 45 rather large yachts moving through the Pacific together). These boats do an ‘assisted circumnavigation’ in 15months starting in St Lucia in the Caribbean. With an entry fee of between £40000 to £80000, it attracts a certain cohort of participants with some staggeringly expensive boat real estate. Anyway, there was about 25 of them filling the anchorage so Bill & I chose to cross over some relative shallows to the adjacent anchorage where we were the only boat!
The Coral Gardens themselves were actually just that – it was like being in a marine version of a botanical garden with all sorts of different coral shapes, sizes & colour with vibrant fish flitting to & fro rather than birds. It was good to see such healthy coral as we have encountered a lot of coral bleaching & proliferation of algae in our travels through the Pacific. I was also happy to see lots of large (occupied sadly) molluscs on the sea bed – in fact, it seems, the Vava’u group is a shell paradise.
After a final quiet night at Tapana island where we were able to reciprocate sundowners with the folk on Aroha, we headed back to Neiafu to do the clearance formalities so we could head to Fiji. The weather was looking very favourable with consistent easterly winds & no squally weather predicted.
Whilst there we were very happy to be able to donate 10 lifejackets to a local marine safety organisation. These jackets were all unused and must have been a left over from the charter days of the boat. They will go to some of the outer islands where the inter-island boats will use them. It was nice to know they are going to a good place.
We had one of the best meals we have had on our final evening in Tonga, at a restaurant called Kraken. We remembered this restaurant from our last visit as it had a very similar boat to our old boat Vagabond Heart, on its premises which at that time housed a family. The restaurant was rebuilt during Covid and was actually constructed around the boat, (which I have subsequently found out was a Formosa 51 called Fair Seas – but obviously not in its terminal phase). The boat has been renovated, decoratively painted & polished and now forms the centrepiece of the bar! It looked fabulous & we were pleased to see it again. Not only that, the food was great, (coconut snapper with a creamy lime sauce for me & Bill had local crispy pork belly), washed down with AUSTRALIAN wine whilst overlooking Neiafu harbour. A rather belated birthday celebration for Bill!
Checking out of Tonga the following day proved to be an exercise in frustration & tolerance – Bill became uncharacteristically ‘directive’ with the authorities to enable us to get out of there in a timely manner! Obviously we experienced Tongan ‘time & efficiency’ – all done with a lovely smile of course! So onward & upwards, Fiji here we come…..