Survivor in Port Havannah

From Barry: Wednesday, Sept 4, we motored to Port Havannah on the island of Efate. Although our course has changed from SSE to SSW from yesterday to today, the wind has clocked and is right on the nose again, for the most part. The mainsail provided minimal drive all day. There were a few brief times that we were seduced into putting out a headsail, but would soon be luffing or backwinded and forced to roll it up again. It was a relief to enter the narrow northwestern channel into Port Havannah, a deep bay between Efate and the fringing islands of Moso and Lelepa. We are told that Moso and Lelepa are "famed" as the locations of one of the "Survivor" TV shows series. We anchored off the mouth of a small creek in nice sheltered water. Port Havannah was also used as a sheltered anchorage by our ships during WW2 and there are supposed to be numerous relics of those times to be found by divers.

5 September. We took a dinghy ride up the creek for about ¾ of a mile looking for birds. We heard many, but only got brief glimpses and took no pictures. We also snorkeled in two spots, but the visibility was only fair and the coral fair for the most part. We did see lots of small colorful fish at the second location, along with a number of small to medium clams, two pin cushion starfish and a bunch of large "feeding tube" creatures, all of which we had also seen in French Polynesia. Our neighbor here is a megayacht named "Blue Gold", home ported in Port Vila and when we dinghied past we were invited aboard by a NiVan, Nixon of Asanvari fame. We got to see how the other half lives! We got a complete tour of the ship from bridge to engine room. Made in Italy, the yacht had beautiful, large sitting and dining rooms and numerous cabins, two kitchens, a large laundry room and large engine room. The bridge was impressive. On the other hand, the yacht had seen better times and was badly in need of repair in the showers, electronics, engine room and a few other places. We were told that the yacht is owned by a Dutch businessman who visits infrequently. Since the water maker had been sold off, they were in need of some good drinking water. We supplied them with 15 gallons. It is a lot of boat for a crew of two relatively inexperienced people to maintain (Nixon and his girlfriend).

6 September. We went up the creek again in the dinghy soon after it got light. The birds were very active and calling up a storm (birds in Vanuatu have 2 or 3 espressos when they get up in the morning) but hard to get a good look or picture. Eventually, we got some fair to good looks and some pictures of Rainbow Lorikeets, Pacific Emerald Doves, a Grey-Eared Honeyeater, two Pacific Black Ducks and a dozen shore birds, either Bristle-thighed Curlews or Whimbrels. Lynne is going nuts trying to figure out which it is. Midday, we moved the boat near the southwest end of the harbor (where they filmed Survivor) to get a shorter hop to Port Vila in the morning. We also saw Pacific Reef Heron and Mynas. By the way, the shore birds were Whimbrels.

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