S/V Hoku Pa'a Photos - Tabuaeran Part I, January 2006

...click on the small photos for larger versions...

Tabuaeran's anchorage is inside the lagoon, which we shared with Argos, Giva, Ilobaby, and one rusted-out hulk. It was usually a damp dinghy ride ashore due to the waves.	We arrived New Year's Eve, in time for celebrations aboard Argos.	...and attempted fireworks with outdated flares that fizzled!
Wolfgang and Ana from Argos bought their fine schooner in Sidney, BC.	New Year's Day festivities included a Beauty Contest for married women.	...which we sat on mats on the Maneaba floor to watch.
Great Hair!	This woman was last year's winner, and had her baby while we were at Tabuaeran.	This day (the only one during the whole year!) the men served the food and the women ate first.
Tabuaeran has a small dirt road running around the atoll's low-lying land. It is shared by pedestrians and pigs, cyclists and chickens, and the occasional truck.	The kids are charming and often come running out to meet I-matang.	Houses are commonly built on a raised platform of palm frond ribs, with a thatched roof. Cooking is done outside, sometimes under a small lean-to.
A ferry joins villages to the north and south side of the pass. Here elementary school kids take their afternoon ride home.	Two export crops on Tabuaeran are Seaweed and Copra. The seaweed grows for several months in rectangular plots before harvesting.	During school's two-month Christmas break, kids often help harvest seaweed. The 'weed is dried, bagged, and shipped off to make carageenan and agar (ice-cream ingredients).
Here a girl hauls a sack of coconuts to the waiting truck. To make copra, the nuts are split open, the meat pried out and dried in the sun.	The island's 3rd industry is supporting cruise ship passengers when they pour in on the Norwegian Wind every two weeks for their few hours on a tropical beach.	Tourists are entertained with dancing and can buy shell and carved wood souvenirs.
A free buffet lunch, including burgers, draws stealthy cruisers out of hiding, dressed like tourists.	Usually we have to mix our own drinks, except on Cruise Ship Day.	Here's Bwaraatu (remember, 't' sounds like an 's') and his canoe, which we offered to help repair. Just a small boat job...
After fibreglassing holes, replacing some wood, and relashing many of the joints (no nails or screws are used in the canoes), we applied a couple coats of paint.	Bwaraatu wanted to christen his nameless canoe Freya, which made our own ship happy!	Bwaraatu located a mast and sail, and launched her in the lagoon. These narrow outriggers are fast and sail upwind decently. To tack, the mast is moved aft and the stern becomes the bow.

S/V Hoku Pa'a 1000 DeCosta Pl. Victoria, BC Canada  V9A 6Y3

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