Vanuatu Holiday, Day 6

I was up just before first light, and took my bike down to the ferry.  Just as I was about to board, I looked down into the water and saw a light-coloured sting-ray scooting quickly past the end of the jetty.

My leg still wasn't quite perfect, so I changed my plans at the last moment and decided to check out a secondary road instead.  About a kilometre away is a side-road that heads down to a place called Devils Point.  There are farms down there, as well as lots of run-down (and some abandoned) tourist ventures, a group of wind turbines on the hill, and plots of land for sale right on the edge of Mele Bay.

Wind Turbines overlooking Devils Point Road.

The difference between the main road and a secondary road is enormous: I knew it would be unsealed, but the road also followed the contours of whatever land it had been built on, rolling up and down and side to side.  There were also corrugations in places, and some places where the rain had washed the road surface away, revealing rocks underneath:

Despite this, there were places where the road surface was smoother than I expected.  It seemed to be made of crushed and compacted coral, and while I had to ride slowly and concentrate the whole way, it was just about rideable.  I'm sure that Ray Lichwark would have hated it, but I managed to ride 20km down this road without a hitch.

At the turn-around point was a half-built resort, a very modern-looking concrete building which didn't look like it was being worked on any more.  Weeds grew tall around it, and the smooth concrete driveway leading to it just stopped beside the road, leaving a 30cm step up from the dirt road which no car could drive up:

I got back to Hideaway in time for breakfast, and then it was time to start our tour around the island.  We were picked up at 8:30 am, and our first stop was a local school to drop off some supplies.  They were still using three tents from UNICEF as extra classrooms.  The children there sang us a song.

We then continued north, before stopping at a roadside stall that was actually a museum.  They had a collection of coke bottles from WWII, as well as things like razers, parts of an old stove, a raft, and the remains of a huge jar that had held acid.  Anneke bought herself a polished shell.

The man running the stall/museum was the grandson of the man who had originally collected all the items, who is now 70.  Amazingly, he was wearing a Rotorua Marathon finisher's T-shirt from 2014!  He hadn't done the race, but had been given the T-shirt for doing a local run.  Small world...

We passed a solar power station, which was used to power a local coconut-processing operation.  Apparently it had only been built in recent months, though it looked like it was several years old.  There was a warning sign telling people not to go near the panels or they'll get electrocuted; Tighe saw the picture of the electrocuted man and said "if you go in there it'll make you go crazy"!

A bit further along, our driver showed us where two WWII tanks had been abandoned on the beach.  The children took souvenirs -- I'm not sure if we'll be allowed to take them back to New Zealand, but at least the boys are happy.

We then stopped at another school to give away more supplies.  This school had only just re-opened their main classroom the previous Friday, after it was rebuilt following Cyclone Pam.  The office was still a port-a-cabin supplied by UNICEF:

Apparently they used to have six houses for the teachers to live in, but all but one was destroyed by the cyclone.  They still don't have accommodation for the teachers, but three of them are living in one house while the rest are living in nearby villages.

One of the children there had cut his foot, and needed to get to the local health centre, which was about 2 km away.  So we bunched up in the car and took him, along with the school's principal, and gave them both a lift down to the health centre.  If we hadn't turned up, they would have had to walk.

As we had been driving along, we saw signs for a WWII museum, which of course we wanted to check out.  They also offered the chance to go and snorkel over a plane that had crashed into the sea.  When we reached the place, though, the gate was closed and a sign said that the museum was closed "for construction work", but the snorkelling tours were still running:

We were keen to do the snorkelling tour, so our driver opened the gate and we went in.  The owner had gone into town, which is why the gate was closed, but one of the workers wandered over on a beaten-up bicycle and, after some negotiations agreed to take us out to the plane.  We then continued driving down a grassy path among the coconut palms, looking like we were heading across somebody's farm:

When we got to the end we discovered why the museum was closed: it wasn't there any more!  Cyclone Pam had completely removed the building:

This is where the museum used to be. 

Apparently the workers had managed to find most of the memorabilia in the nearby fields, and it was now being stored in a house while they built a new museum building, but it was going to be a while before the museum opened again.

We changed into our togs and jumped into a tiny dinghy, bobbing in the water of a channel cut through the mangrove swamp:

Our guide took us out through the mangroves into the open water, where we headed across to where the plane had crashed.  Apparently the pilot had survived: he had run out of fuel on the way back to the airstrip and crashed the plane into the water, where it had stayed ever since.

The plane was in about two metres of water.  It was a tiny fighter plane, just room for the pilot and whatever equipment he had been carrying.  I swam down and squatted inside the cockpit, while Ruth took a photo.  It was pretty amazing.  While the wings and tail were now just ribs, the rest of the plane was mostly intact:

We then continued around the island.  We passed an old US WWII airstrip, and could see the letters "USA" made of huge piles of dirt so they could be seen by approaching aircraft.  The "U" was clearly visible from the road, and we could see the other letters but couldn't make them out.  The airstrip itself was now covered in regrowth.

A bit further on, we stopped for lunch at the "Beachcomber" restaurant on the northern end of the island.  The restaurant only took cash, as the Visa machine needed electricity and their generator was unreliable.  The restaurant had mineral hot pools attached, and was looking a bit run down but must have been quite luxurious when it was first built:

The dining area was outside, with shade-sails overhead.  It wasn't until we realised that the shade-sails were attached to the steel reinforcing from broken concrete pillars that we realised that the original roof had been blown away by the cyclone!  Stepping further back from the building, you could see just how much damage had been done:

Fortunately, the roof over the kitchen area was still intact, so they could keep going despite not having much of a roof.

Tighe found all sorts of treasures on the beach: books, old spray-cans, playing cards, etc.  All stuff washed out to sea by the cyclone.

After lunch, we continued around the island, stopping briefly at a nice beach to take some photos, but not long enough to have to pay the entry fee:

As we drove along, I learned a bit about the local language.  There are over 125 different languages spoken in Vanuatu, most of them local dialects.  This meant that nearby villagers couldn't speak to each other.  Instead, they used a shared "pidgin" language which was loosely based on English.  The roadside signs were intriguing:

They use words like "blong" for "belong", and "yumi" which means "us".  So when a sign said "rice blong yumi", it meant "our rice".  The pidgin language was quite fascinating.

As we headed along, our driver pointed out a local weed which the Americans had inadvertently introduced to the island during WWII, and which he described as "a mile a minute".  It came originally from South America, and was covering all the native trees and plants, choking them.  This weed now covered half the island, and a lot of work was being done to keep it under control:

Tighe asked what it was like to be bitten by a spider, and our driver said that they didn't bite.  So we stopped and he showed us a big spider, which Tighe touched:

I bought some duct tape for putting my bike back in its box tomorrow, and we headed back to Hideaway Island to rest until dinner time.  We then went back into town to a French restaurant called L'Houstalet, all white-painted walls and dark wooden beams.  They hadn't changed their menu in 25 years, and you can see why: they had classic French cuisine, local delicacies, and 22 different types of pizza for the children, so we all got what we wanted.

I ordered flying fox (a type of fruit bat), while Ruth asked for the wild pigeon.  For an entree we had garlic snails with French bread, while the children ordered pizza and pasta.

The snails were actually very nice.  I hadn't eaten snail in over 25 years, and hadn't liked it then (who wants to eat hard rubber balls?), but these were delicious.  They were served in their shells, dripping in butter and garlic which we used the bread to mop up.  Even Quinn tried some, and said it wasn't too bad.

The flying fox was much larger than I expected -- about the size of a small chicken.  The head and wings had been removed, but it was clearly still a bat:

The waiter had warned me that it had a very gamey flavour, and it certainly did.  The red-wine sauce was also very strongly flavoured, almost stronger than the meat itself.

Ruth and I were both given finger-bowls to use as we sucked the meat off the bones.  My bat was very well cooked, the meat almost falling apart like pulled pork.  It tasted a bit like venison, very strong, but I liked it.

The bat had tiny ribs that looked almost like fish bones.  It had an amazing meaty flavour, incredibly rich and filling, and was utterly delicious:

Ruth's wild pigeon tasted a bit like chicken, but I couldn't really tell as the flavour was so mild compared with the bat.

What a dinner!  On the way back to Hideaway Island, Ruth spotted a large "night butterfly" on a wall, so we stopped to take a look at it.  It was about the size of a Puriri moth, but dark brown, with white stripes on the wings:

We returned to Hideaway Island, exhausted but happy.  Tomorrow is our last full day in Vanuatu, as we fly back to Auckland on Wednesday morning.  We'll be staying at Hideaway, snorkelling and having fun.