Tue, 4 Dec 2001
The Kingdom of Tonga is an independent, conservative Christian country, covering 170 islands, which are a combination of high volcanic and low coral. 134 of these islands are uninhabited because they lack fresh water and arable land, much like the Tuamotus in French Polynesia. The Tongan islands, almost due north of New Zealand, are dispersed into 3 main groups, the northern or Vava'u Group, the central or Ha'apai Group, and a southern or Tongatapu group. The Tongan people are Polynesian with a small mixture of Melanesian, most closely related to Samoans, and speak a dialect of Polynesian called Tongan. Many Tongans also speak English, some with surprising Kiwi accents.
A king rules the Tongan people, and the current king has been on the throne since the mid 1960's. (The health of the 82-year-old king was reported to be poor and we worried that if he should die, the country could go into a state of mourning for as long as a year with a notable impact on business and government office hours.) Tonga came under British protection in 1900. While Tonga retained its independence and autonomy, the U.K. agreed to handle its foreign affairs and protect it from external attack. Tonga became fully independent again in 1970. The country has a constitution and parliamentary government based in some respects on the British model.
Dutch navigators discovered Tonga in 1616, but Europeans did not have much contact with Tonga for another 125 years. Captain Cook called Tonga the 'Friendly Islands' when he visited because he found the people to be friendly. Little did he know that he misunderstood the intentions of his cannibalistic Tongan hosts, who invited him and his crew to a feast for which they were to be the main dish. A misunderstanding amongst rival chiefs spared the Captain and his crew and they dined along with their hosts.
The London Missionary Society arrived in 1830 to successfully convert the Tongans to Christianity, and many of the missionary teachings are still in practice today. Tongans are very conservative in their manner of dress and the church remains a strong part of the community. On Sunday, everything is closed and quiet, and church bells and church music floats over the water at various hours throughout the week. We once heard music long after midnight and once at 6am!
Some things have changed since Garth visited here last. The main town of Neiafu is bigger but is still a sleepy, dusty little place with a conservative population. The selection of food supplies is quite limited: There are few vegetables to buy yet we could buy any size can of corned beef we wanted. Occasionally, after a ship comes in, cheese and other gourmet foods are available, but they disappear fast. Papaya, bananas and pineapple, of course, are readily available.
The biggest changes have occurred as a result of the number of yachts that visit here. It was shocking. In Neiafu harbor alone, there are 80 boats on moorings and at anchor, including the fleet for 3 charter companies. When Garth's family was here in the 70's, there were a total of 6 yachts in the entire Vava'u Group. The number of yachts really overwhelms Neiafu harbor and the strains are evident. Down along the waterfront there are bars and restaurants catering to the many yachties with loud rock music that blares until the wee hours every Thursday, Friday and Saturday. Guards prevent local Tongans from coming down to the waterfront to join the celebrations, which particularly amongst the local expats, seem wilder than we've seen elsewhere, with dancing on the tables and the bar and jumping on the docks. A few Tongans work at these places and we wonder how other Tongans must view them.
The Tongans usually wear long sleeved, dark shirts with long black jeans or other pants or a long dark skirt with highly decorated woven mats around the waistline. We see some dressed in a modern hip-hop style occasionally, but not often. School uniforms for both boys and girls is a white shirt with a wraparound skirt or sometimes a jumper for the girls. It makes us hot just to look at the Tongans with all those clothes on in this heat. We Westerners are encouraged to dress conservatively, with long sleeves and long shorts, skirts or pants. (The heat makes visits to town wearing all these clothes rather unappealing and lots of yachties dress normally. We paid for a day at a hotel pool just to deal with the heat and enjoy a relaxing day with friends swimming, playing Frisbee and ping pong.) We've noticed that the Tongan people have extensive gold dental work, often on the front teeth. While throughout the South Pacific we saw lots of gold dental work, it was notable in Tonga.
The outer anchorages away from the town of Neiafu are all within a couple of hours of easy sailing and are not nearly as overrun with yachts as Neiafu harbor. The area reminds us of the San Juan Islands in the Pacific Northwest, with its deep fiord like peninsulas and lush green shores (with the addition of palms trees towering above) and many anchorages, between which yachts switch places every night or two. Moorings Charter Company has produced a useful cruising guide, which numbers anchorages, so we don't have to trip over the long Tongan names, can quickly identify where our friends are anchored, and use anchorage numbers to locate various resorts or restaurants. A daily (except Sundays) morning net on the VHF, run by the businesses announces special events and advertises meals at various resorts throughout the Vava'u island group. The VHF radio signal reaches nearly all the outlying anchorages so we can continue to be in touch with events and our friends if we choose, regardless of our location. Numerous tours, dive and whale watching excursions, restaurants and resorts sprinkled throughout the anchorages all beg us to open our wallets, but most things are relatively inexpensive compared to prices at home for these same items. But, we need to be careful while we are not working to live within the budget of the house rent so we don't deplete our savings.
The outer anchorages offer numerous secluded spots to enjoy great snorkeling amongst a wide variety of shapes and colors of live coral. The outer anchorages were very peaceful and pleasant. Our days were filled with snorkeling, walking on the beach and hiking around the islands and coral reefs. Many of our nights have been filled with bonfires on the beach, roasting marshmallows, and singing songs with a guitar, as well as dinner parties with other cruisers. We explored some interesting caves here, although we haven't seen anything to rival what we saw in Nuie. We've seen some kayakers paddling around the islands and making camp at night, and that seems like another neat way to explore this area. No stores are visible in the few tiny villages outside of Neiafu, but with town so close, reprovisioning requires only a minor detour. The people are friendlier outside Neiafu, but we have little contact with them except when they come out to the boats to see if we want to buy handicrafts: baskets and carvings. Otherwise, they pay us little attention.
A resort now sits perched on an uninhabited island (Mala) where Garth's family visited many years ago. The owner of the island, Telenote, who welcomed Garth's family 25 years ago, is still alive and is in his 80's. We met one of his sons, Joseph, who told us that the son that Garth's family met, Shone, now lives in L.A. and he, along with an American designed and built the classy resort on the island his father owns. The resort has now been open for 10 months and we enjoyed 2 great lobster dinners for a special treat (one of which we won).
There is a free yacht race each Friday at 4:30pm in Neiafu harbor. We raced the "house" twice in an evening fun race and lots of people took notice at how well we did. It certainly wasn't like one design racing (we raced even with a J130 and several empty 45-50 foot charter boats in our fully loaded 31 footer), but it was great fun to get out on the water just for fun. The prizes were top notch, too. We won a lobster dinner at a local resort and a 2 tank scuba dive. The local businesses really support the races and sometimes, there are more prizes than there are participants. We did a Halloween race, and had fun decorating the boat to look like a whale. But the best part was the "spout" we rigged that we used to soak our competitors after finishing. There were some great decorations and costumes as well as a great party.
We checked out of the Vava'u group to explore the Ha'apai Group to the south. As we were leaving the group of islands, a whale slapped its tail near us for several minutes and we considered it a goodbye gesture.
Ha'apai encompasses a sprawling group of islands sprinkled amidst numerous reefs, a little like the Tuamotus in French Polynesia, requiring careful navigating. Ha'apai is a short overnight or a long day sail from Vava'u in the right conditions. We almost left Vava'u for Ha'apai several days before we did, but the weather made a passage unappealing; we were glad we waited since conditions got worse before they got better. When we left, we had a beautiful sail under a full moon.
Thanks to electronic charts to supplement the poor paper ones that we were able to get before departing the U.S., we were able to visit this area. The electronic charts provided essential detail for safe navigating, although like the Tuamotus good visibility is critical. We enjoyed a couple of anchorages on our way south, walking beautiful sandy beaches and frolicking in the surf in our last taste of 'summer' before we sail south to the much cooler weather of New Zealand. The fine beaches made the Ha'apai Group special. We would have enjoyed a longer stay, but our 31-day visas for Tonga were about to expire, and we had incentive to avoid another $25 in fees by leaving before the time limit. So we moved on to Tongatapu to check out of the country and run a few errands before departing for New Zealand.
The southern most island group is a short overnight or a long day sail from most anchorages in Ha'apai. We considered visiting the capital of Tonga, Nuku'Alofa, on the main island only briefly, mostly as a close jumping off point on our way to New Zealand. The area is not known for great cruising, but offers a few amenities that the other islands groups lacked, like email, fresh provisions and a place where we could get extended visas for New Zealand.
Nuka Alofa is another tiny harbor, med moor style, like Rarotonga in the Cook Islands, although anchorages nearby offer other options. When we pulled in we had lots of wind (we sailed into the bay doing 7 knots with a double reef in the main), making it difficult to back in against the quay after dropping anchor, but we had some assistance from other yachties. Of course, once we arrived we discovered the many reasons people stay longer, such as restaurants and tours; We could have enjoyed exploring the town's market and shops a little more but generally we found Nuku'Alofa it to be another slightly larger, dusty town with a garbage problem and were ready to move on.
Our overall reception from the Tongans seemed a little cool when we walked around, and the locals here were not nearly as friendly as other Polynesians we've met on our voyage throughout the South Pacific. While people always said hello to us in French Polynesia and especially Rarotonga (in the Cook Islands), we found that here people don't usually say hello unless we do first and sometimes not even then. Sometimes, we hear comments and laughter behind us after we pass, making us a little uncomfortable, and we western women in particular don't feel comfortable walking around alone.
Often our most intimate contact with locals in most countries is with the kids. Children, the world over, are always incredibly curious and usually friendly. Once when we were snorkeling in Vava'u, kids waited patiently for us to come out of the water so they could talk to us. They asked us our names and where we were from, touched our skin and hair, and then wanted to know whether we were swimming in our underwear; we had to explain that we were wearing special clothes designed for swimming. Their English was limited and we could tell they didn't always understand what we were trying to say to them. The kids were collecting shells at low tide along the reef and we saw them smash the shells to eat what was inside as they went. Kids, because of their insatiable curiosity, bridge the gap that separates people. So many yachts visiting such a small country undoubtedly alters the original social dynamics and affects our experiences of the local population.
We expect to be in New Zealand for about 6 months during the southern hemisphere hurricane season. We are looking forward to spending some time in a highly developed country with all the amenities. We will enjoy the unlimited gourmet food selection and the opportunity to resupply, repair and make upgrades to our equipment, as well as rest from being on the move for months. I am nervous about all the boat projects we have planned and how it will be living amidst them, as well as maybe trying to get a job in New Zealand to pay for all the extras. We will see what the situation looks like once we get settled. We look forward to exploring New Zealand a little as well. We might try to do some sailboat racing in New Zealand if we can find a good one design fleet. Some friends of ours have talked about investing in a boat, but we'll see where that goes. We'll see what we have time and money for.
Cheers,
Wendy Hinman and Garth Wilcox
S/V Velella (Wylie 31)