Tuesday 4 November – moving further along

Our fresh food is running quite low and we won’t be back in a town until we pick Clinton up in Sorong, so eating out is a happy option. Plus our guide yesterday said there was a little village we could buy provisions from, so we went about 3 miles around the corner in search of both provisions and food. The anchorage was in a narrowish channel between two islands, the tide was roaring through it, swirling PolePole about. We got the anchor down in a nice sandy patch which was shallow, we needed a good holding in this turbulent water.

Once secure we headed to the little village for supplies. It was baking hot, we arrived around midday and found a very sleepy village, with no provisions to speak of. We finally managed to communicate a bit, finding some bananas and a few pawpaws a little girl climbed up a tree to get. FoWe were glad to find 4 tomatoes, otherwise it was all processed food in plastic packets! A little disappointing to say the least. It appeared quite a poor town, nowhere near the pride in gardening like PNG and Solomons.

After dumping our goods back on PolePole we went the other direction to a smarter Homestay where Rowan had booked lunch. It had a lot of accommodation but only one other couple eating lunch. The waitress said the guests were out diving, but it still did not look that busy. Interestingly it is a Muslim island and the woman were all wearing Burqas, one lady in full burqa just her eyes showing. We have not seen this before, as this part of Indonesia is much more Christian. It was a very mediocre meal, redeeming itself by being on a beautiful beach. We went and spent an hour or so reclining on their beach chairs after lunch enjoying the sea breeze. We went back to PolePole and had a very confusing snorkel in the channel as the current kept changing directions. There was plenty to see, loads of fish who appeared to be out in a frenzy, maybe late afternoon is feeding time. Loads of different kinds of clown fish in anemones. There was lots of bits of manta food in the water so at times the visibility was not that good, which means there were a few stingy things. We had a lovely evening watching what we think is the White Bellied Sea Eagle fishing around us.

Alex knocked us up a delicious salad for supper, then won again on his final night of 5 Crowns! He leaves tomorrow, the long boat from our tour yesterday is picking him up at 5am to take him to Sorong, where he flies to Bali for a few days before returning to NZ. We’ve so enjoyed his company, and of course his cooking, it is going to get very quiet again on PolePole!