It was a fairly uneventful 3 day sail over in which we caught no fish. Getting moored up in the tiny harbor however, with room for 8 boats, 6 already there, was a different story. Backing up a 53 ft, full keel ketch is not really a joy, and we enlisted the help of all the other yachties we could find on the seawall. It went mostly smooth and once secured, we all jumped off to go exploring.
It was late so we made it downtown just in time to go to the bank and locate an internet (which turned out it was a 24/7 place). I am already liking this county. Oh yeah, we now need New Zealand Dollars, right! We ended up at a night festival that was only running 3 days that week. Crazy thing was the food booths were selling mostly breakfast items, Schweet.
The next day we had to go through quarantine and the boat was sprayed. A fellow sprayed a little Raid in the air and charged 20 bucks. Interesting, but now we could "officially" be on land.
The island was great, small enough in area and population to be unspoiled, but big enough to have all the amenities one could desire. The people friendly, the beaches beautiful, and things affordable which always makes it a bit more fun and it only took 1 hour by bus to circle the island. Unlike French Polynesia where everything shut down at 6pm, there was a total night life and music scene. We ended up meeting one local musician who sounded like a Joss Stone / Janice Joplin, real groovy voice. We even got her CD - it's fab.
The island was great, small enough in area and population to be unspoiled, but big enough to have all the amenities one could desire. The people friendly, the beaches beautiful, and things affordable which always makes it a bit more fun and it only took 1 hour by bus to circle the island. Unlike French Polynesia where everything shut down at 6pm, there was a total night life and music scene. We ended up meeting one local musician who sounded like a Joss Stone / Janice Joplin, real groovy voice. We even got her CD - it's fab.
Taking the advice of a former crew - Lyz - we did the cross island trek. It was truly beautiful and a just enough of a challenge to be fun, not exhausting. Other than that we really just enjoyed. I even started running again!
The Whatever bar view where we later saw Humpback whales swim passed
Just another beautiful end to a fun filled day
A real map at the start of a hike? What a treat
Made the the summit after 40 mintues of straight up!
Post hike cocktail hour
Just another waterfall
Making friends
This is the place we finally got off the boat. I can't believe we were on Nyami Nyami for about 4 1/2 months! Wow! We spent a whole week on land which was heaven. We stayed at Backpackers International in exchange for re-doing a couple of their showers. We met a bunch of really cool people that hopefully we will see again soon. And again, we had way too much stuff!
Australia here we come and I am looking forward to some Planes, Trains and Automobiles for a while.
