Battle of the Bands in Tonga!

Last time we left you we were enjoying ourselves in Niue . This time we tell you what we have been up to in the last month, our travels to and our exploration of the Vava’u islands in the Kingdom of Tonga.

Our time in Niue was coming to an end. Our hand was some what forced, the sea forecast for the next couple of days had big swells coming from the South West straight in to the anchorage. We had a very uncomfortable night onboard Azimuth, with the boat rolling from side to side, and that was before the worst of it had arrived. It was also getting very difficult to land our trusty canoe on the shore and even more difficult to launch it again. We had a canoe fail moment not dissimilar to the the last time, although this time it was Ailsa that was take a full dunking rather than me!

So we got Azimuth ready for her next sail. This time we hoped it would be uneventful!

Infact, it was a lovely uneventful sail. About 48 hours to get to the island group of Vava’u in the Tonga. We had the rather strange experience of crossing the international date line, another first for us. Whilst the time did not changed, somehow we lost an entire day, so we arrived three days after leaving Niue even though we had only been at sea for two.

Land came in to view late morning, and we sailed down the western side of Vava’u during the afternoon and then motored the last 5 miles in to the port of Nieafu weaving in between beautiful forested islands and in to the narrow entrance of the superb anchorage. The anchorage is effectively a tidal lagoon that is surrounded on all sides by tree lined hills with only one narrow entrance.

First we had to check in to Tonga. You are required to pull up to the fishermans wharf and fly your Q flag and wait for the customs officials to board the vessel, insect it and do the required paperwork. This dock has a pretty poor reputation as being badly maintained. Its old broken concrete will put a nasty dent in your boat if your not careful. There is a sunken wreck at one end of the dock and the other end has a shallow sand bank to catch you out too!

When we arrived, there was no room at the dock at all. The last space was taken by a yacht we had met before and the rest of the short dock had small fishing boats parked along side. We tried to call customs to get some advice as to where we should berth, but no one answered the radio. Eventually another friendly local came on the radio and tried to help. In the end we shouted to the fisherman in their boats who were busy sinking several beers and asked them if we could raft up? They were very friendly and helpful and they took our lines and got Azimuth berthed across two of their boats.

The customs guy turned up with a huge pile of forms that I had to fill in. However, it was Saturday afternoon and he was due to knock off in 20 minutes. Another boat arrived just after us too, so he told me to pretty much just sign the forms and fill out the minimal amount of stuff and he said he would fill out the rest later. We were done in 15 minutes. This is in contrast to many other peoples experiences where the average checkin time was about 3 hours!

So we the stamps in our passports, we pulled of the dock and headed to the anchorage. It was packed full of boats! Unknown to us, it was the start of a week long blue water sailing festival. We managed to get the very last buoy luckily for us after being kicked off another buoy by one of the local boats. It would have been very difficult for us to anchor here with the depth in the lagoon being about 30 to 40 metres and our anchor windlass now not working at all.

It is a lovely anchorage if not a little noisy at night. We have the local start dogs howling in the early evening, then the enormous fruit bats take to the skies at dusk and start squabbling and squawking. Finally the cockerels start their chorus in the early dawn. You definitely feel close to nature here!

The port town is lovely. It has a very laid back feel to the place. There is a great fruit and vegetable market that is open all day everyday except Sunday. The high street is a line of primitive shops run almost exclusively by Chinese families and all of them sell the same stuff presumably because they are all supplied by the same boats trading with the island. There is a great cruisers community here too and there are plenty of restaurants and bars to hang out in meet up with people. It is also a much cheaper place than the crazy prices we have had to pay in French Polynesia, presumably because it is closer to New Zealand and well supplied.

Our first week in Tonga was a little slow. It took us a couple of days to recover from the sail, and then Ailsa was struck down by a bug and felt lousy for a week. I spent the time catching up on a couple of boat jobs.

One day we had a knock on the door, and we were delighted to see our friends Knut and Sunni from La Kahina who we had met in Suwarrow in the Cook Islands and had a night of jamming with Knut on Banjo and me on Guitar. We decided we should make some plans to meet up again for a rematch. Knut and Sunni had been joined on board by Knuts brother Michael and his girlfriend Antonia as well as their cousin Ruben.

A few nights later we had our first chance to meet up and play some music at a local bar called the Kraken. It was great fun to play with these guys!

Later that week, we took a walk to the local national park which resides on the highest point on the island. We had some great views of the island and out over the town and anchorage

It seems word had got out about our first little gig. That weekend we got an invite to a party at a locals house with instructions to bring the guitars. We had a great afternoon. Our hosts were Axel and Yorik who owned a dive business on the island. They cooked for us all and we picked coconuts from their garden and drank the coconut water. Then it was time for a few beers and another impromptu gig!

Whilst we had been enjoying the party, our son Caleb had been hard at work. He has been in Gibraltar for the last three months studying and sailing to prepare for his commercial yacht master offshore exam. He passed! Well done mate, a great achievement!

After a couple of weeks in Tonga, it was great to have our good friends Donna and Mark arrive on Coral Moon! We hadn’t seen them since our few days together in Raraka, and we had both sailed many miles through the society islands and the cook islands since then . A lot to catch up on!

The anchorage here has a floating bar that is run by a fun Canadian couple. I think Donna and Ailsa may have had one drink too many when they decided they needed to experience the over water trampoline that is attached to the bar … luckily I was there to capture the moment on video, so I can share it with you here! Such grace and beauty!

Yep, our stay has been a lot of fun here in Tonga. Probably the highlight though was another invite to play our third gig . This time we played at a local restaurant called the Humpback Bar. The bar already had their own house band, playing traditional Tongan music on guitars. The gig was described to us the battle of the bands? Trad Irish versus Trad Tongan?! Should be fun right?

We were collected by a minibus that evening and we headed to the venue with all our instruments in tow. When we arrived the house band was already there and set up. They invited us to join them in a traditional Tongan drink called Cava. Its made from the root of a pepper plant. Its not alcoholic but has some other drug like qualities when enough is consumed. Quite bizzare to drink as it makes your mouth tingle with the pepper content.

These guys were very talented musicians! And also they were very good at close harmony singing. We clearly had our work cut out in the battle of the bands! We setup on the other side of the room, and throughout the whole night we took turns playing a song each. The place was packed to the rafters!

At the end of the night we were able to join the two bands together and we played along to some of their traditional songs and they explained the meaning of them to us too. It was a great musical experience!

Join us next time as we wait for a weather window in Tonga and then make the 1200 mile sail to Whangerai in New Zealand for the next part of our world adventure.

Dom and Ailsa on Azimuth