2400 miles (roughly 16 days) sailing to cover in less than a month, we figured we’d better bust a move and get away while the weather was still looking good. Our time on Espiritu Santos will be well remembered, whilst Vila didn’t exactly seem like much of a tourist trap, Luganville was even less so. The town itself (pop around 12 000) is a pretty typical sleepy tropical setup, with a good market and a number of other stores that all seem to sell a bit of everything and shut each day between 11:30 and 1:30. Hmmm…..maybe that’s why its so sleepy! Anyway there was enough there for us to chill out in the bay for four or five days and re-provision comfortably before we left.
The two highlights while on Santos would have to be a little road-trip I took via mountain bike around the coast to some famous blue water springs and a couple of days spent diving on ‘Million Dollar Point’ and the sunken wreck of the ‘USS President Coolidge’.
After waking up early one morning with no plans I thought it might be a good idea to hire a bike some place and see if I could make it the 40km or so around the island to the famous ‘blue holes’, one of the few tourist attractions in the area. While no one else was keen to slog their guts out on a bike in the rising heat I set out to find a bike to rent. Unfortunately it didn’t take long to find out that there wasn’t a single place in town that rented out bikes so my only option was to try bartering with the locals (luckily most speak pretty good English). After flagging down a bunch of kids on the street I’d had a few offers but no one seemed to have any brakes and I was told there were a few hills along the way so I had gratefully declined. After almost an hour spent hunting for a bike I decided to flag the brakes and take the next offer, so I was soon on my way on a beat up old mountain bike with 3gears (out of 21), no brakes, and a seat that would later become the
bane of my beaten and bruised bum….oh well, I figured It was good to get off the boat and get some exercise.Anyway, after taking the scenic route through a bunch of native villages and being treated to some of the local produce I rejoined the main road around the island. Like Efate (Vila), the main roads still exist from those built by the Americans during WWII, and although no bombs were ever dropped on these islands, the roads outside of town all look like they’ve been carpet bombed by the Japs at some stage or another. Only after a couple of hours on my bike, the combination of a seat with the padding eaten out of it and a road with potholes up to my elbow, left me fearing I might be rendered infertile forever after! Anyway, just when I thought I couldn’t take it anymore a trusty Hilux rolled up with three raucous Aussie girls on the back, and (regrettably) their husbands in the cab in front. Being a seasoned hitch hiker, it wasn’t long before I was drinking cold beers on the back with the girls and on my way to one of the most beautiful swimming holes I’ve ever seen. Of course, by this time the batteries were flat in my camera so I cant show off the girls... oh well! Luckily I was with a good crew with some local knowledge as the pool was so hidden that I never would have found it on my own. It would seem property is pretty cheap in Vanuatu and it’s becoming a popular sport for kiwis and Aussies to build holiday homes here, good old fashioned kiwi batches with solar panels and all!
The Diving in Santo is also world famous. Although no battles were fought here during WWII, there was a major American naval base at Luganville and the Americans managed to sink a
bunch of their ships all on their own! The most famous of these is the ‘USS President Coolidge’ which sunk just off the shore outside of Luganville when it hit a couple of American mines. It now lies about 50m off shore in around 20-60m of water. The Coolidge is a cruise ship that was converted to a troop carrier/transporter for the war in the pacific. It is now one of the most famous wreck dives in the world thanks to its easy access, and awesome array of war paraphernalia, including cargo holds packed full of jeeps, trucks, tanks, bulldozers and the like.We dove the ‘Coolidge’ the day before we left with a local dive outfit who were cowboy enough not to
care too much for legit diving certification, but they were cheap, and we didn’t all have our cert’s on us anyway so who’s complaining! Anyway, first dive was a bit of a recccie so they could suss us out as divers. We still got to penetrate the upper decks and got down to 40m though, pretty deep considering Simon had only just been certified! The second dive in the afternoon was definitely the highlight. This was a more in-depth (excuse all the terrible puns here!) penetration to the medical supply room and a couple of cargo holds. The supply room is still full of medical supplies and instruments and the cargo holds were packed full of cool shit like guns, jeeps and tanks. At those depths you only get about 20mins bottom time so it soon time to head for the surface, stopping several times along the way up the coral bank to feed the fish and decompress. Yay! Definitely a dive spot to go back to, there is soo much more to explore.‘Million Dollar Point’ is only 500m down the coast and is a famous dumping ground for American
equipment after WWII. From what I hear it was cheaper of the Americans to dump huge amounts of machinery (trucks, bulldozers, planes etc.) of the back of their ships than is was to take them home again…go figure! Anyway, It makes a super cool spot do dive or snorkel with wreckage ranging from 5-30m of water. Anyway, so now were just about to pull into Ghizo Island in the Solomons. We’ve been at sea for the last 6 days and were originally planning to go straight to Papua New Guinea but some more dodgy weather (40+ knots) was forecast ahead of us so we have veered north to skip along its northern edge. We’ll probably spend three four days here while the weather clears before we head south to follow our original route to Darwin. We don’t know a lot about Ghizo, but I hear there’s some more good diving. I think there was quite a bit of action here during WWII so I’m looking forward to some more wrecks!
Take care ya’ll and stay tuned!
Tomo
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