The day ended up being a sunny one although the wind kept up it’s 20+ knot fervour. Around 9:30 we headed into the beach along a channel through the coral off our starboard beam. We dragged the dinghy up the beach and tied it to a tree not remembering well the time we lost it. The beach is just over 1km long, perhaps more if the tide was out.
We first headed north looking for possible places where the ruins of the prison would be. The interior of the island was dense foliage right up to the beach. We did see some propped up sticks at one point and we made a mental note of them as they may have been markers. At the northern end of the beach we were not far from the north western coast so we crossed the interior and came upon another beach on the far side of the thin end of this island.
This beach turned out to be another km long (I knew because I took my hand held GPS with me) which we also walked along. With some optimism we decided to cross the island through the interior. Here my GPS wouldn’t work except for one or two spots due to the overhead canopy. We weren’t able to get too far from the shore as the undergrowth got denser the further we went in. This was our chance to find the fruit trees mentioned in our guide. We soldiered on through the undergrowth sweeping away cobwebs as we went. We soon lost sense of direction although we didn’t know it. When we saw the trees thinning out we headed straight for the beach only to find it was the wrong one.
We walked back along the beach before again plunging through the interior, this time where the distance to cover was only 0.1 of a mile and taking a note of where the sun was. As luck would have it we made it back to the first beach right where we saw the two propped up sticks. We saw nothing to indicate why they were there. No prison ruins. No fruit trees.
We now walked south down the beach. We did find the prison ruins at the back of a small clearing. It turned out to be a concrete block looking more like a water cistern. There was some writing on the interior wall – perhaps from a prisoner but more likely graffitti. Next stop was to look at the wreck of a small fishing boat on the beach. Not as small as we imagined. Our guide book says a few people lost their lives when this boat foundered here in a storm. A somber reminder.
We walked as far south as we could before turning back and dinghying back to the boat where we hung out for the rest of the day making our onward plans.
Today we plan to head to Kelefesia, the southernmost anchorage in the Ha’apai group. It should be a pleasant stop with some shelter from this relentless wind. It will also shorten the trip down to Nuku’alofa as well as giving us an extra 10 degrees on the wind. After all these days of strong wind the ocean swell will be up so anything to make the ride a little more comfortable will be welcome. That means that we’ll be working our way up against the wind which is still coming form the east south east.
I made a mistake in yesterday’s blog. It turns out today (by our calendar) is our two year anniversary since moving aboard. Helen has started to write a perspective on the last year but has a bit of a block. We’ll need some patience.
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