Anatom, Vanuatu

We had a lovely downwind 3-day passage from Fiji to Vanuatu. The wind was mostly less than 10 knots from directly aft and seas were very calm. Although we fished every day, we didn't get a bite.

As advertised, the Anelcauhat anchorage in Anatom was protected and calm. There is a reef surrounding most of the bay and a sandy atoll on its southern side. The atoll was a US airstrip in WWII and is now called Mystery Island and is used by cruise ships. Once a week or so, they pull in and dump their passengers on the small strip and the local come out to entertain them and sell food and trinkets.

We hoisted our yellow quarantine flag and we soon joined by Collin and Thomas representing Customs and Immigrations. Things went smoothly and soon Thomas and I were strolling up the beach to find the bank. The bank would not take any credit cards, so luckily I had a $50 US bill tucked away that they happily exchanged for about 5000 vatu to cover my quarantine fee.

They had a nice primary school that I stopped and watched the carefree kids enjoying a recess break. I spoke with several of the locals and two teachers volunteered to gather up some pamplemouse for us. We had not seen these large grapefruit since Polynesia and we all love the taste and the fact that they keep a long time without refrigeration before going bad.

We really enjoyed the remarkable change in temperature. Here, the high temps are around 80 and the nights drop to 72 degrees and the humidity also seems lower than Fiji. We were told by Customs that this island was malaria free and later confirmed that fact with a malaria team of doctors that flew in for follow-up testing while we were there. The malaria team also told us that Efate was also malaria free and which islands to avoid on our travels north. Although we have the medication on board, we are not going to take it now because of possible side effects for Emily. We understand that if we feel the sickness coming on, we can use the same medication to cure it. We have very good mosquito screens and nets, good repellant and are normally all sealed up before dusk each day.

We snorkeled for the first couple of days and the coral was very healthy. We saw mostly smaller fish since the islanders had probably already eaten the big ones. We saw a few turtles who also did not hang around to see if we were hungry.

The wind speed started rising and we decided to get off the boat and take a hike to a waterfall. Emily and I had wandered around the island a bit and found that the walking trails were numerous and hard to follow. We stumbled into one village and the fellow agreed to guide us up to the waterfall the next morning.

 

Kim decided to spend a relaxing day on board and Emily and I headed out at 8 AM to meet our guide. It was a grueling 2-hour, non-stop hike up to Bamboo Falls. We hiked through mud and crossed the stream more than 10 times. Some of the crossings involved balancing on tree trunks, hoping from stone to stone or simply wading in up to our knees in the fast running, cool clear water. We were rewarded by a large fall and enjoyed the fresh water pools below to cool down and wash off the mud. Emily and I both slipped several times, but neither of us was hurt. I took a GPS with us to record the hike but we found that the heavy tree canopy shielded the sky and most of the hike went unrecorded. We did get a fix at the falls and found that although the falls were only about 3.5 miles inland, we probably walked about 10 miles round trip that day. We shared our lunch with our guide (who walked barefoot) and found he makes the hike several times per week. Even without tourists they love to come here for a cool swim.

We returned about 2 PM to the boat, tired, but full of stories of our day in the jungle. The wind stayed up for the next several days and we explored Mystery Island and looked at the weather files for our next window to head north to the island of Tanna.

Tom
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