Get On, Clip In, Fall Off

Part 4 - On Board

In the morning I woke up early and sat out on the balcony sipping tea, eating biscuits and listening to Radio Australia on shortwave as well as the local relay of the BBC World Service on FM, a useful relic of colonial times. The rendezvous point for people joining Søren Larsen was conveniently downstairs outside the Kaiviti's reception, so were able to have a nice leisurely breakfast by the pool (including spam fritters) before packing up, checking out and finding the small but growing crowd waiting to join the ship. There were, if I remember, about 13 voyage crew joining for this leg - with a maximum capacity of 22 the ship wouldn't be too crowded. We started meeting some of them now before all piling into a minibus and heading back to the Waterfront where we met the two long-term voyage crew who had been with the ship since it left Auckland a couple of months earlier - Emil and Simon, who was universally known as Syd for reasons I never quite worked out.

From there, some people went off to change money or to do last-minute shopping at those places which were open on the bank holiday Monday, dodging the president of Vanuatu giving a speech marking the holiday, while the rest of us were handed orange lifejackets and ferried to the ship which was to be our home for the next 12 days in one of Søren's inflatables. I could make out the Red Ensign and "Søren Larsen - Colchester" at the stern, which was a reassuring touch of home for someone far away on the opposite side of the world.

As we crossed the harbour I felt a familiar mixture of excitement and nerves. A whole lot of people from all over the place were about to be thrown together in a confined space for a fortnight. I hoped everyone would get on okay, as if personal conflicts arise in this kind of environment there's really nowhere you can go and hide other than in your cabin, which you may well be sharing with various other people anyway, so other than hiding in the loo there would be virtually no privacy. I'd been on enough Scout camps as a kid to be used to living in close proximity with large numbers of unwashed people and their socks, but at least then I'd known the people I was living with. This time everyone was going to be a stranger.

The only thing I had figured out so far was that there wasn't any such thing as a typical voyage crew member. The modal age was sort of thirty-something, but that was the only general statement which you could make. There were voyage crew from various parts of the UK, assorted European countries, New Zealand and the US, alongside permanent crew members from New Zealand, Australia, Shetland, Finland, Denmark (especially Denmark) and heaven knows where else. There were hardened sailing types and people who looked as if they'd never seen the sea before.

After a spirited run across the harbour we pulled up alongside the ship, pristine and shiny after a long layover and a repaint, and rapidly learnt the technique for boarding from an inflatable - grab the ropes supporting the step, stand on the edge of the boat and wait until it reaches the highest point of its up-down bobbing motion, then step smartly up onto deck without pausing. We found ourselves standing on the maindeck surrounded by a bewildering array of ropes which descended from the sky and attached firmly to wooden pins. We also found that tea and biscuits had been provided for our arrival.

The crew members who didn't have anything better to be doing at that moment introduced themselves - they were a likeable and affable bunch, and I guessed that after long months at sea it was probably good for them to have some new people around as well. Most of the deck crew lived in the fo'c'sle down below in the bows, living together for anything up to a year without any break from the ship longer than a couple of days. Various officers and cooks were spread out across another couple of cabins in the bows while the engineer, the first and second mate, and the Captain occupied another three cabins in the stern. The bulk of the remaining space belowdecks was taken up by the engine room, the heads, the saloon and a number of cabins for voyage crew which held between two and six people. Our names had already been posted next to our cabin doors, and by virtue of being a couple Kat and I had a tiny double cabin to ourselves, with two surprisingly comfy bunks, a wardrobe about six inches deep, and a bookshelf. They hadn't been kidding when they'd advised not packing too much and bringing soft bags rather than suitcases - once the luggage was in there wasn't very much room left at all. It was hot and stuffy below as a result of the tropical climate and the ship having not moved for a while, so most people left their cabin doors open almost all the time.

Part 3 - Port Vila

I woke the next morning in one of those surreal hazes which tell you that you've just had a very weird couple of days, and was surprised to find that we were still in Port Vila and the whole journey thing hadn't been a dream at all. The room was slightly tatty but clean and perfectly serviceable, not air conditioned but with a ceiling fan which made us feel very colonial. Fortunately there were also teabags and milk (UHT, it's always bloody UHT in the Pacific) so were able to fortify ourselves before showering three continents-worth of gunk off and going to find some breakfast. Incidentally, contrary to the usual tourist paranoia the water in Port Vila is perfectly safe to drink.

The Kaiviti Village doesn't have a restaurant of its own as it's more of a self-catering arrangement with cooking stuff provided in the rooms. However, it does have a bar by the pool which does snacks and where they didn't seem at all fazed at being asked to provide burgers to a couple of jetlagged incomers at 11 in the morning. On the other hand, they did seem surprised when we realised how long it had been since we'd eaten properly and ordered another round. There were a number of plaques around the bar left by various visiting army units, and we both agreed with the assertion of a military band from New Zealand that the Kaiviti made the best burgers in the Pacific.

We were not due to join the ship until the next day, which meant we had a day to kill in Port Vila. It was also a Sunday before a public holiday, so the place was quiet to say the least. The Kaiviti is on a hill at the south end of town, but Vila is not a large place so it was easy enough to walk into the centre. We passed people fairly regularly, almost all of whom said "Hello", and got into the habit ourselves as well quickly - although when one surly white man responded with 'bon soir' in the evening we were reminded that French is also an official language in Vanuatu, albeit something of a minority one.

On the way down the hill we got a good view of Port Vila harbour and could see the reason for our being there - the brigantine Soren Larsen anchored out in the bay, looking distinctly out of place among all the visiting yachts from overseas.

Central Port Vila was sleepy, to say the least. The market's closed on Sunday (and anyway, it would all be just about finished by midday) and most people were at home, with the occasional group of people on the streets or passing in the communal taxi-minibuses that are most peoples' form of transport. That numberplates generally have three digits, or four at the most, is an indication that most ni-Vanuatu can only ever dream of having their own car. Vanuatu is quite religious, so Sundays are always going to be quiet - most people will be at church. Apart from one small supermarket, a snack bar and a van pumping out loud music on some ground next to the market, everything was closed and deserted.

It wasn't so quiet around the places frequented by yachties and expats. The usual sounds of braying came from the Yacht Club as the wealthy and yachty came out to play, and we found the Port Vila Pub to be open (the only proper pub in Vila, possibly in Vanuatu) and found it to be largely staffed by talkative Aussies. We also discovered that the people at the next table were also joining the Soren Larsen the next day . Later we'd know them as David and Wendy, but being British we agreed to leave proper introductions until the next day. Once we'd had our pints of Tusker (the local brew, a not at all bad Antipodean lager similiar to the many nearly identical amber nectars drunk in Australia) we paid up, finding the prices to be extremely Western, and headed back to the Kaiviti for a lie down. I picked up a copy of one of the local papers, the Port Vila Presse (published in English, French and Bislama, so it's a kind of Pacific Rosetta Stone) and read about the latest political scandal in Vanuatu. As the country's so small the politics read like local politics do here - everything is personal.

After dark we headed to another place catering largely to expats and visitors, the Waterfront Bar and Grill. It's a favourite hangout for visiting yachties too, so you can make reservations by calling on VHF channel 60 or phoning 23490 (Vanuatu has five digit phone numbers and no area codes!), then tie your dinghy up at their wharf while you come and visit. The locally-produced steaks were excellent - big chunks of fillet at prices which to ni-Vanuatu probably seem outlandish, but to Londoners were very reasonable. After a nice relaxed dinner we headed off for our final nights' sleep on land for almost a fortnight. The walk up from town to the Kaiviti was warm and pleasant, with a sky full of stars courtesy of the less-than-intensely-bright street lighting of Vanuatu's capital.

Part 2 - Sydney to Port Vila

The Air Vanuatu flight to Port Vila (a 737 - the standard unit of air transport around the small South Pacific nations is the 737) left late, owing to engineering problems. We had window and centre seats, with the aisle seat being occupied by a doctor from the Solomon Islands. After a short flight by comparison with the long haul from London and some rather good in-flight service we touched down at Port Vila's Bauerfield airport just as it was starting to rain big, warm, tropical raindrops. More like rainsplats, really. The approach was over the sea - not surprising for a small island airport - and the bright lights of the airport fire station were the first lights we had seen since leaving Sydney. The 737 stopped outside the tiny terminal and we all trooped down the stairs, through the rain and into immigration at what must be one of the world's tiniest international airports.

There was a local string band (assorted guitars, banjos and the like accompanied by a tea-chest bass) entertaining the dazed new arrivals as they queued to have their passports inspected. We noticed that someone in front of us had an Explore Worldwide tag on his hand baggage and was most probably there for the same reason we were - being British, however, we let him get on with it, as there would be plenty of time for meeting people later on. This proved to be helpful, as like many countries, Vanuatu's immigration officials don't like tourists turning up without an onward air ticket, and he had to produce various bits of paper to try and explain why he would be going home from New Caledonia rather than Vanuatu. We, on the other hand, just had to say we were doing what that guy was doing, and were admitted for a month without any trouble.

Against all odds our bags had arrived, and after I'd stopped to change a travellers cheque for a wad of vatu (the local currency - there are about VUV200 to the pound sterling) at the bank office, we cleared customs and stepped out into Vanuatu. It was dark outside and the rain was just easing off. Scattered street lights broke the darkness, but it was still very obvious that we'd arrived in the third world. Luggage was being bundled into broken-down taxis with boots which didn't shut properly. A helpful passer-by roused a taxi driver for us who had been sleeping in his cab (we'd been some of the last people to leave the airport) and, once he'd woken up, we had a white-knuckle ride into Port Vila in a rattling microbus which smelled of sleep. The town was just like the airport - dark and damp with few people about as it was getting on for 0200, but when we pulled up outside the Kaiviti Village Motel, one of the staff had kindly stayed late to wait for us. After paying the driver we checked in, found our room, then decided that as we had been up for something like 50 hours, spent 30 hours on planes and in airports and crossed 11 time zones, it was probably time for a sleep. Despite the fact that I'd just arrived on a small speck of an island that was part of a Third World country in the middle of the Pacific Ocean, I decided that all the excitement could wait for the morning and slept extremely well.

Part 1 - London to Sydney

[This has been previously webbed, but not here]

"Hi, guys! How you doin'?"

This isn't the greeting you usually expect to receive from an immigration official, but stumbling off a BA 747-400 early one morning at Sydney's Kingston Smith airport it was nice to present our passports and have someone actually be nice to us. We'd left London about 23 hours earlier after a day at work (the theory being that it would be easier to sleep - worked for my then-other half, Kat, but not for me) and had been sitting in economy class ever since except for a couple of hours wandering around Bangkok airport during a stopover. The flight had been pretty full, with more rugby shirts than usual owing to the number of British and Irish rugby fans heading to Australia before the World Cup.

We had a stopover in Sydney of about 11 hours before taking another flight to Port Vila, the capital of Vanuatu. As spending the whole time sitting in the transit lounge wasn't too attractive, I'd sorted out visas (easy to do online) so we could have a bit of a wander around Sydney and kill time by doing a bit of sightseeing. A saintly check-in clerk at Heathrow had managed to tag our bags all the way through to Port Vila so we didn't have to worry about them - just passport control, past lots of terrifying signs about Australian quarantine rules, through customs (bags are X-rayed with machines specially set up to detect fruit, veg and whingeing Pommie bastards) and out into the big wide world.

The rail link from Sydney airport is fast and efficient, so some time before 0700 we found ourselves standing blearily at Circular Quay, looking at the million-postcard view of the Harbour Bridge and the Opera House. The strange thing was that nobody was around, except for the occasional jogger and the occasional bird, including an ibis demonstrating why its beak was not designed for scavenging discarded junk food.

It was the start of a bank holiday weekend, so we wandered around the deserted streets looking for somewhere we could have breakfast. Just about everywhere was closed, but just as we were about to give up and eat our shoes we found a pleasant cafe inside one of the city railway stations and scarfed down bacon and eggs and a whole lot of tea as well as visiting the station bogs, which were in need of a clean after the heavy Friday night, to clean up and change clothes.

The city slowly came to life and our day passed in a surreal haze, which included a bit of last-minute clothes shopping and the discovery of how enormously helpful and friendly people in Australia tend to be, before we decided to jump on the ferry across to Manly, on the other side of the harbour. The Scouts were selling chocolate to passers-by to raise money and there was a real bank-holiday party atmosphere, with the Manly jazz festival providing accompaniment while we had some excellent fish and chips. After the trip back the effects of lack of sleep and jetlag really hit, and we passed most of the afternoon in a vague haze of fatigue wandering around the Opera House area, stopping off to sample that great Aussie obsession, beer, before heading back out to the airport.

There were a surprising number of people checking in for the Air Vanuatu flight to Port Vila. Almost all of them were white - with the exception of the cabin staff, the number of ni-Vanuatu on the plane could probably have been counted on the fingers of both hands. There were the usual assortment of diplo-brats, expats and expat families, and as always, a couple of unaccompanied minors being dispatched after visits to relatives. There were a number of tourists as well, most of whom would have been on package tours to the luxury resorts around the main islands of Efate and Espiritu Santo. For many of them, the only parts of Vanuatu they would see would be their resort, the beach in front of it and the road from the airport.

Another travelogue

This is extremely overdue, but I've finally started to pull together an account of three weeks spent in various parts of the South Pacific last October. Most of this was spent on the brigantine Søren Larsen, a wooden sailing ship, sailing between Vanuatu and New Caledonia (or as it's also known, "France"). The remainder was spent in Sydney, Australia.

Parts of this account have already appeared elsewhere. However, they haven't appeared on the web before, so it's not too much of a recycling exercise. I'll plonk instalments here as they're finished. In the meantime, Part 1 follows shortly.