Wallis Island is the sort of place where you are always on your toes. There are no safe anchorages, despite being surrounded by a barrier reef. Only the southern part of the lagoon is navigable and the main island has no real bays, leaving the anchorages exposed to the winds. The reef provides some break from the ocean swell, but there is still quite a fetch in the lagoon, especially in high winds. Of course we picked the worst month to visit, being the start of cyclone season. We were there for a little over three weeks. We dragged anchor twice, once wrapping a rope around the prop, which rendered us immobile with a reef only a few feet from our transom. Thank goodness the anchor found something to dig into there, but for the rest of the night we worried about our position in breaking seas and winds of around 40 knots. We were with Opus IV who provided moral support as well as helping us dive on the prop at 3 am. However, once the rope was free we discovered the maneuver had cracked the bearing housing on our shaft so it was another half a day before Rob could jury rig something to get us moving again. Opus dragged once, also putting them close to the reef. These three incidents happened in three separate bays, and neither of us have dragged our anchors anywhere else over the past several years. We put it down to a poor bottom of shallow sand over coral, and a lot of bucking in the big seas pulling the anchor free all the time.
In addition to dragging, we both sank our dinghies on different nights, Opus with outboard attached. They managed to resurrect the outboard but lost diving gear and shoes, including a prescription mask. We only lost flip flops, but naturally each of us lost a left. We had found some on the beach the day before, and you guessed it we now have four rights between us.
For the last ten days of our stay there, we had a vicious convergence zone over us. This gave us unstable wind patterns (going from 0 to 35 on a regular basis, mostly from an easterly quarter) and several nights of severe lightning. None of us had much sleep for the entire time we were there and Rob commented that he got more sleep on our passage to Tuvalu!
The breaking seas made going ashore difficult at the best of times. So we curtailed our shore visits, which meant we saw much less of this lovely island than we had hoped. We got a couple of nice expeditions in on our bikes, and the excellent French roads made easy going. The locals are very friendly, all waving and saying 'bonjour'. Most speak not a word of English. Some of the ex-pat French can speak English, but I would imagine it could be a frustrating place if you did not know any French. Everything is very expensive, which actually meant we spent little and lived off boat stores. Fresh fruit and vegetables are almost unavailable, despite growing in everyone's garden. The few things you can buy are outrageous (tomatoes $10 per kilo and cabbage $4 per kilo were about the cheapest!). We splashed out for some of our favorite French foods, and the baguettes were excellent and reasonably priced.
Being confined to the boat meant that the computer was in hot demand all this time. Rob is learning more about the various navigation programs we have accumulated, and I have been catching up on my journal from Europe (about time!). We had Rob's birthday there, with Paul and Joanne from Opus. On Rob's request we feasted on the excellent New Zealand beef sold here (steak Oscar) with home made chocolate ice cream for dessert. I must say this was one of my most successful culinary experiments - so decadent we all sat around bursting but not giving up until the last lick was gone. I made it from the fresh cocoa we purchased at the market in Samoa, rumored to be the best in the world.
For a whole week after we checked out we waited for the weather to abate so that we could leave. I was reluctant to head to sea amidst thunderstorms! Finally we had a break in the clouds, and set off with the convergence zone forming around us periodically, tossing up towering cumulonimbus thunderheads. I tried to imagine them as harmless fluffy shapes (koala bears, lambs and such), hoping this would prevent them from letting loose the menacing lightning storms they kept hidden in their black bellies. Rob for some reason saw them as rows of turnips. He is an odd character at times! We were lucky the lightning stayed on the horizon, although we were doused with cooling showers on a regular basis. We had little wind for the trip, and were glad to find the bearing repairs held up under power for so long. We are hoping to have a new housing sent to us in Tuvalu. Only one small tuna graced us with its presence. In exactly three days, we cleared the pass at Funafuti.
