Luganville

We stayed here for much longer than planned due to bad weather. We certainly had more rain than sun – nice to know there are other places in the world as wet as the UK! But it wasn't a bad place to be stuck. Moored outside a small resort on the island of Aore just across the channel from Luggenville. Aore was the Americans R&R base during the 2nd World War & Lugenville was the American base for the army, the channel between the two would have been filled with huge war ships in 1942. It certainly hits home looking at old photos & imaging all the men here. We scavenged the beach with Miles & Paulene (guests at the resort who were kind enough to share their shower facilities with us. With whom we had lots of fun & even celebrated Paulenes birthday on Barraveigh with sundowners & birthday cake!). Bobby & Miles digging with their “made in China” folding spades (all the shops here are owned by the Chinese). Paulene & I hunting for bottles in the shallows of the sea. We were proud of our of war treasure. Trash to everyone else but treasure to us! A collection of old coke bottles (with year of production on their sides from 1942-1944), glass bottles of varying sizes, bullets & shells, Bobby even found an old razor & part of an Old Spice bottle.

Manson (our friendly waiter with the widest smile) gave us a guided tour of the island, pointing out old American bunkers & educating us on the local fruits. Did you know that you could suck the fleshy seeds of the cocoa pod? Unfortunately it doesn't taste of chocolate but really sweet & refreshing. Bobby & Miles explained to Manson about the moon & sun & how they rotate around the earth. It will be one of those special memories; watching three men crouched down on the dirt road, drawing in the dust, caught in a private moment. I learnt later what they were doing & how Manson had suddenly asked why the moon is sometimes in the sky & sometimes its not. Reflecting on the incident afterwards it stuck me how lucky, we in Western countries, are. We have a right to a free education. We may bitch & grumble about our governments & taxes but seriously we are lucky. No matter what our parents earn we have the right to free schooling, which allows us to have a career & a decent way of life. In these counties parents have to pay school fees for each child. Sometimes its just not possible to send all the children to school. No education no chance for them to get a job. Just remember this next time you want to grumble about your country.

I was excited to dive the Coolidge. The biggest accessible wreck dive in the world. An American cruise ship converted into a war ship during WW2. It hit one of its own mines & sunk close to the coast of Luganville, so close in fact that you walk out from the beach to it. Its a deep dive in which you can penetrate many of the cargo holds & rooms of the ship. Being a new diver, my nerves got the better of me & I bottled it. I think I'll stick to the shallower dives with pretty fish until I've gained some experience! To all you keen divers out there this is meant to be one of the best dive sites, with groups of divers out here completing 3 dives a day for a week on the wreck. Word has it that the night dive is the highlight!
We snorkeled Million Dollar Point where the Americans dumped millions of dollars worth of equipment, vehicles & bottles of coke into the sea. The French had declined the offer of purchasing it knowing it would be too expensive for the Americans to take home. They were counting on it being left behind & they would have it all for free. The Americans sure did leave it all behind but not before building a jetty & driving it off the end into the sea! It was a weird sight to see mountains of tanks & trucks rusting underwater & prob one of the only places where a dump site is a tourist attraction.

This year 4th July celebrations were taken seriously on Barraveigh! No other Americans around but Bobby was not going to miss the opportunity to drink beer! Awake early to make pancakes & raise three huge American flags. I made a pot of tea for him to throw into the sea (for those Brits who have no idea what I'm talking about, google Boston tea party). We then headed into town to celebrate with beers & a lunch of burgers & chips! It was a fabulous sunny afternoon spent in the pool looking down on Lugenville where so many Americans were based during the war. I wondered how the American soldiers fighting here in WW2 would have celebrated July 4th if at all, & raised a beer to the memory of those men, their bravery & courage.

Prepared to leave we filled up on our duty free allowances. Bobby, officially allowed to open his sealed box of spirits purchased in Port Villa, immediately went nuts with the Southern Comfort & earned himself a nice hangover the following morning! Once he recovered we topped off the diesel jugs with duty free fuel. Trekking off to the fuel depot expecting to fill them up at the pump, but oh no this is not the western world. The guys rolled out a 200 litre drum of diesel. Opened it, put a tube into the drum allowing us to visually see the quality of the fuel, then inserted a pump which manually had to be turned with a handle to transfer the fuel into the jugs. Now heres a question for you? How many people do you think it took to complete this operation? Answer: 5, including the lady at reception who completed our paperwork. One guy to turn the handle, the other to hold the funnel & watch the fuel going into the jug, another man to oversee the operation (I'm guessing this was the boss), & another to wipe down the jug if any fuel got spilt! On a plus side at least everyone gets a job! It was one of those moments when you wish you hadn't left the camera on the boat!