I made it!
I woke just before 4 am, had the breakfast I had picked up the day
before, got ready and took the ferry across to the mainland. Fortunately the ferry runs 24 hours a day, so
you just go down and someone will come along and pilot the boat across -- great
service. I was riding just on 4:30.
I soon remembered that I'd forgotten to
bring any money, but fortunately I found an ATM and could get some cash from an
ATM. I was going to buy some fruit along
the way, but I never saw any. Later on,
I discovered that all the fruit had been destroyed by the cyclone and there was
very little available. It didn't really
matter, though, as I'd brought enough Gu and other food, as well as two full
bottles of water, which lasted me through the entire journey.
The trip into Port Villa was
straightforward, but once I got there I promptly got lost and headed way too
far south. The roundabout I was supposed
to turn at wasn't actually on the main road, but was set back slightly so I
didn't see it in the dark. Then, to make
things more interesting, none of the streets are signposted! After wandering aimlessly around Port Villa
for about half an hour, and asking twice for directions, I finally found the
ring road heading east just on 6 o'clock.
From there, the road improved steadily, and I was well out of town
before the traffic began to build up.
Stage one completed.
The road around the eastern side of the
island is must flatter than the one on the western side, but just to make up
for it I had a headwind for about 35 km.
Never mind: the scenery was amazing:
I had lots of fun just riding through the
desolate bush, through tiny villages and past the occasional "resort"
-- at least, that's what they called themselves, but they looked more like a
collection of shacks.
The damage from Cyclone Pam still very
evident. About half the houses had
tarpaulins over their roofs, and there was lots of twisted roofing iron lying
around, as well as uprooted trees:
The villagers had started to collect the
rubble, but it's all just lying around in piles on the side of the road. One of the schools I passed was using a tent
as a classroom, and the road was washed out in a few places, bringing it down
to one lane:
Fortunately there was hardly any traffic,
so it didn't really matter. There were
also shipping containers dumped periodically on the side of the road, which I
found out later were used as shelter during the cyclone.
The eastern side of Efate island is where
all the agriculture is. I saw cattle,
goats, a pig wondering along the road, as well as plenty of chickens. A group of farmers I saw were riding on
horseback.
After heading north along the eastern side
of the island, I reached the northern side which had beautiful views of massive
offshore islands, as well as the inland volcanos. The road was mostly flat, but still the hills
took their toll, and when I started heading back down the western side of the
island the hills got steeper and nastier.
I passed a roadside stall selling World War
II memorabilia, which I'm sure Quinn will want to check out. I also saw a school that had been completely
destroyed and was being rebuilt after the cyclone. Most of the people on the island seem to work
as farmers, hacking areas of farmland out of the bush with fire and machetes,
planting crops, and harvesting them.
Dirty and laborious work, but at least they've got food to eat.
I got back to Hideaway Island around 11,
having ridden for just under 6 hours. It
was a great ride, and while I felt tired I wasn't too exhausted to take the
family out to Port Vila in the afternoon for some shopping. I took Oscar snorkelling briefly before it
got dark, and then in the evening we had dinner at the bar on the mainland
beside where the ferry comes in, which was having a Fire Dance evening. It was quite a show, though of course very
noisy:
I think I'll only tackle the full ride
around the island once. I'm not keen to
ride through Port Villa during the day, and I don't really want to have to
climb those nasty hills again after so much riding. But that doesn't really matter -- as long as
I do a regular ride of maybe an hour a day, I should be fine. So I'll concentrate on relaxing more, and
spending time with the family, only sneaking in rides when I can.
All told, I rode 125 km and climbed just
over 1,000 metres today -- it wasn't exactly a flat ride, though it was made
more challenging by the steepness of the gradients (one close to the 18% grade
I rode the first day I got here), as well as the fact that the nasty hills were
all in the last 30 km:
When you're riding a hill that steep, your
bike effectively becomes like a singlespeed -- gears don't matter any
more. If you had a lower gear, you would
have changed down 3 or 4 times, but you don't, so the only question is whether
or not you can grunt your way up. It's
that steep that if you stop you'll never be able to start again.
I made it up the really steep hills, though
it hurt, and my core is tired now from the strain. But I made it! While I'm tired, I'm very happy I did this
long ride. It was quite an adventure...
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