SAILING! MUST SEE places in Vanuatu. Ep. 132
We are Pierre, Lisa and our furry crew member Tiller. We are sailing around the world in our Outremer 5x catamaran and we just sailed from Bora Bora to Vanuatu to rejoin the Outremer GLYWO rally after spending a full year in French Polynesia please subscribe to join our adventures and a big thank you to everyone who's already subscribed. Hello and welcome to BioTrek sailing. In our last video we had sailed from Bora Bora to Tonga to Vanuatu and we were in Tanna which is an island quite visited by visitors even though it's southern-most Island because it's got an active volcano We arrived in Port resolution before any of the other rally boats and that was kind of fun because we had a chance to catch up with Luc, the organizer who knows Vanuatu really well. I think he lived here for I think it was six years and so he knows lots of Chiefs and we were really looking forward to the program . And here he is uh giving me my fishing present for winning a fishing competition and also talking about the stay we're going to have in Port Vila we're the first boat here and it's very unusual to see a single boat.That's right this is pretty
amazing to have only one ship, one sailing boat in Port Resolution and you are the one in fact all of the rally is going to be really the first sailboats coming back to Vanuatu since COVID. So maybe Stanley just say who you are working with the rally. And you're wearing an ARC shirt. See your shirt from the ARC, that's another rally, they go around the world like we are, We are now 18 boats from many different nationalities many French. Canadian, Americans, British Dutch, German. We had an Italian who s no longer with us. We are a big group going around the world but we take more time than the world Arc. They go fairly fast. We want more time to discover more islands and meet the people. So we take about three years and a bit
so this is a prize for the fishing competition. Actually I believe you were the winner of the three boats. I don't remember. No 2 Canoes had a bigger one but we had more fish Anyway you deserve one of the three prizes for the best fishing between Panama and all the way to Bora Bora. So congratulations. Thank you. Delayed gift but wow what a gift! And this this is made in French Polynesia. The whole thing. And the tourism office of Vanuatu is very excited too. Actually they are going to give us a formal welcome in Port Vila
wow because they say okay you are kick-starting the tourism and the nautical tourings Yachts nice Yachts nice people is the way to go. So it's going to be a fantastic program in Vanuatu We were warmly welcomed back in the rally by all of the different boats. Now I have tell you they were about I think there were 33 boats that started out. Some boats leaving from France Europe and other boats, like us, joining in Martinique. And right now there are 18 boats in the rally. Why do boats drop out ? Well it's for a number of reasons. Some some just can't keep up with the maintenance. I mean sailing these kinds of distances is hard on the boat and rigging has to be checked there's maintenance on the water maker, the motors ,all the electronics and so we're lucky on BioTrek because Pierre is so handy he can fix anything, he's really a MacGyver on the boat. And other people are learning along the
way, But it's been challenging for some boats to keep up with the constant repairs that are always required. Another reason why some people dropped out is because they were they were only planning to sail to either Tahiti or to New Zealand. And then some boats have dropped out sadly for medical reasons and they've either sold their boat or they have had it shipped back to their home port and at least one boat is decided they wanted to spend more time in the South Pacific because they didn't figure they had seen enough because they had to go back and forth to their home country. That's one of the reasons we stayed in French Polynesia for a year. We just really wanted to experience the cruising lifestyle in French Polynesia and we'll go and see New Zealand and Australia by plane after we finish doing this rally We watched as the rally boots arrived, including Tiller. They had spent the
last eight months in New Zealand and traveled to Vanuatu via New Caledonia In the last episode I showed some of the volunteer work the rally did in the villages including repairing solar power systems that were damaged by the recent cyclones children in the village of Port Resolution are really special. Friendly and smiling and always helping you, not asking for anything. Here they are helping me launch the dinghy. Oh you're so strong Pierre fixing the sail because he noticed it's got a weak point and he's gonna fix it before we have a problem so there's our boat in Port resolution we can see the smoking volcano from our anchorage and when the wind blows from the West it was putting ash on the boat so when it was time to leave Port Resolution we were glad to head up to Port Vila I didn't take any videos of our sail from Port Resolution in Tanna to Port Vila because I had a little bit of a GI infection. I wasn't really feeling well and didn't feel like picking up the camera. I just have a few shots of Port Vila and particularly interesting in the market and some of the rally activities but the really interesting things to see in Vanuatu you have to see by boat because that's when you sail north from Port Vila. It's easy to get an airplane to Tanna because there's the active volcano and there's lots of tourist flights there. And Port Villa is the city with the international
airport. But once you go north there are many, many islands, not all of which have an airport or maybe there's only a flight to it every couple weeks and not really any tourist facilities for staying. So it's really fabulous to see these places by boat . And the people are just delighted when you come and visit their village. There's a bit of a custom to do an exchange of fruits and you give them some gifts. The kinds of gifts we give them our clothes maybe some cooking oil we've been giving solar lights. Things that they need in the village. It's it's really quite a great experience
The rally was officially welcomed by officials and the tourist office of Vanuatu and Luc had a chance to tell them what cruisers bring to the tourist market which is very different than cruise ships because we spend money in the supermarkets restaurants and lots of places where cruise ship people don't go We were welcomed with gifts and necklaces and then it was time to socialize and enjoy some local dancing next we sailed from Port Vila to the island of Epi where we were going to meet the local people and enjoy racing with them The Village was large enough to have a high school and also a small market town is graced with Norfolk pine and also a shade tree Barringtonia Asiatica is also called the fish poison tree because all parts of the tree are poisonous. As everywhere in Vanuatu children always like to help the cruisers bring their dinghies up to the beach Luc knows the Chief in Epi and when we travelled to Epi with the rally they had organized to give us a super welcome reception and organized a day of racing which was super fun thank you then it was time to prepare the canoes for the races and to let the races begin. First it would be the men's race then they would have the women's race and then it was the children's race as always Tiller is a big attraction for the kids That is nice. She likes it very gently I went in the women's race with Tiller the local people thought it was hilarious to see a dog on a paddle board but I don't have any pictures of that after the races the locals had put on a dinner and there was prize giving. The best prize of all was a paddle board given by one of the rally boats to the local winner of the children's race.
That was one happy kid! After dark the villagers put lights all along the beach. What a beautiful sight! the next day we took a boat to a neighboring small island to visit another Village and then have a snorkel to see the dugongs. Dugongs are like manatees but they're really not the same species their tail is more like a whale tail but like manatees they're vegetarian and they feed on grass The Village Chief explains some of the signposts of taboos and some of the reasons maybe not to pick the fruit because it's not ripe yet and then the woman of the village put on a feast of fruit and vegetables the visit ended with the woman singing for us then a children's song all together in French We are just leaving Epi. That is the Island where we were yesterday they said there were 600 inhabitants on is going to be a nice and quiet ride Are you excited Tiller? Are you excited! We had 2 fish on. Pierre landed his fish and then he came over to help me because I was all tired out. It was such a big fish and it was taking a long time to come in That was a big fish but a shark got it oh my God the shark got it first two fish one half gone the other one is still here let me show it to you so exciting it's a super nice tuna and we're using Tim's method Interesting right! Wagging tail.
so we're anchored here all right hello come on over I'll give you I have these little tiny cakes you can come and taste it Do you like it? Yes ! It's sweet. You gotta brush your teeth afterwards right? Yes. Do you brush your teeth every day? yes . Good because you don't want to have some cavities, right, or lose your teeth wherever we go in these islands the custom is to give gifts and so we had this barbecue on the island near where we're anchored now we're not in the same bay where the rally went we decided to come here because we're with the boats that like to do water sports the wing board and kiting there's a good bay where everyone's off doing that right now I'm not I'm not a winger. I like paddle boards. So I'm here working on my videos. Some of the boats organized a barbecue on the beach and so we went and asked at the island if that would be possible and they said fine. So we first went to the main village to give them some gifts and to meet with the chief. And then when we had the barbecue we brought some gifts. It turns out
there's only one family that lives on that island. A family. A couple Brothers they said it's just really not very many people and they came and joined us at the end of the barbecue and they were really excited to taste our food. We had made some fish marinated in oriental spices I made some shish kebab. There was bean salad and all sorts of things that maybe they don't eat or prepared a little bit in a western way or an Asian way. Very fun
so we're anchored here it's very nice and calm you can see the main island here this is the island where we had the barbecue and then the the main village is on this island and you can see some of the other boats here because they're doing some water sports they're doing wing board and such today Can I see your chief? We asked to see the chief and then we were taken through the village to find him. After we had given them the gifts the children took us on a tour of the village. There were lots of children with the Melanesian blonde gene evident and my son-in-law, who's a geneticist, tells me that it's a different gene than that from northern Europe blond gene, It evolved separately okay beautiful boys Aline is showing them the pictures hey never opened the presents in front of us it was clear that they liked the presents polenta, more fish, sweet potatoes..
Tiller do you like it peanut sauce. This is tomatoes. yeah tomato. You don't get it too often right We got them from Port Vila Anna , you made the pie! We gave the left overs to the family living on the islands and they folded into the most eco-friendly package I've ever seen look at that! It is like a little package I'm not sure where I'm gonna end this video. I'm working on it today. Not a lot of time when we're back in the rally to work on video editing. But I have today to do that and hope to show you some
of our favorite shots and favorite places And the people here are fabulous. I mean there's children everywhere. Young children and they're they're always smiling and they just want to they just want to be close to you and see what you're like they're so curious and it's really a lot of fun we make these videos to share our enjoyment of our ocean world with you we really appreciate it if you subscribe and give us a like and if you like these videos consider a donation to The Alliance to cure this is a foundation that we support. They are trying to
find a cure for the disease of cerebral cavernous malformation. And you can find more information on the the links in the comments below and also on our website 100% of contributions go to the foundation and the foundation can give a tax receipt
2023-06-11 21:39
