So I'm just getting back from my trip up to Ambae Island for a little vacation and Fourth of July celebration. The top picture is the 4th gang. This was actually an Ambae Volunteer picture, but Dom and I decided to poke our heads in it as a joke. The other picture is Tim and two guys from his village throwing up the USA. I started out my trip by flying to the East part of Ambae Island and meeting some friends in the provincial center of Saratamata. Its a pretty well developed place and our friend Steve, a UN volunteer, has a nice set up complete with fridge and generator (flashy items in Vanuatu). We drank, storied on, and ate at the local restaurant.The following day I got on a truck to meet Liz, Alyssa (Peace Corps Vols), and Jen, a British volunteer in the North. Dominique and Tim stayed in Saratamata because the weather wasn't too nice. Our plan as to hike to the top of Manaro, Amabae's active volcano, and check out the crater lakes up there. After I met the girls in a village near the ocean, we hiked up a road that looked like a 3 mile long golf fairway to reach the last village on the way to the volcano.
When we reached the village there wasn't a person to be seen and we spent a while walking around the ghost town looking for signs of life and direction on which way to the bungalow. We eventually found a couple people that showed us to the bungalow and we relaxed a bit as they set up our room for the night. Evidently the whole village was down the hill at a 100 day observance of a death. I checked out some of the birds in the area as the area around the bungalow is well known for birding. I saw one new bird, a cardinal myzomela, a brilliant red bird, and heard a few birds that I hadn't heard before. The girls relaxed, having just made a big hike from the West of Ambae to the North a couple days before and were already well blistered and banged up. As night fell we arranged our guide for the next day, drank a little kava, ate, and nodded off.
The whole night it rained and we awoke to a soppy scenery around the bungalow. We were hopeful though as we could see some sunlight coming in and the rain had stopped. We ate breakfast, including hot sugar water (they were out of tea), grabbed the lunches a mama packed for us, and hit the trail.
The trail was cleared but nothing like what you would think of as a trail in the US. I think in the US we take for granted how nice our trails are maintained. You've got switchbacks and debris cleared and signs and devices to control water flow and erosion. Vanuatu: No gat. In Vanuatu trails are A to B. If you need to get to the top of the hill you don't zig zag. You shoot straight to the top. Also, in Vanuatu there are no such things as trails, only roads. Now there's all types of roads: Cement roads in Vila, Dirt truck roads, and then footpaths that are still called roads even if they sharply resemble goat trails. So we were on the latter road going to the top.
The road was muddy as all hell, and pretty steep. The weather didn't clear up and we got rained on for a good couple hours. After hiking for about 3 hours at a pretty good speed I asked our guide if we'd hit the halfway point yet as it seemed like we were making some serious progress. No not yet. I probably shouldn't have shared the news with the ladies as they were sure we had at least gotten half way so far. So we kept charging uphill for another 3 hours or so until we reached a crossroads where we could decide what crater lake we wanted to go to. We then proceeded to cross over countless steep drainages in an up and down rollercoaster ride for an hour and a half.
As we approached the area near the lake it got real quiet. There weren't any birds calling and the air was real calm and cool. According to Ambae custom when you die the god Takaro grants you permission to go to Manaro's Lake Vui and dance eternally. Supposedly you must have the road to Manaro tattooed on you so that Takaro will accept you into this afterlife of dancing on Manaro.
We started to smell the sulfur that comes out of the vent in the center of Lake Vui and arrived on the rim of the lake. Problem was that it was so foggy we couldn't see the lake below. The setting around the lake was pretty cool though as there were a bunch of burned trees along the ring of this lake. We ate lunch, laughed at our misfortune at not being able to see anything, and headed back. This picture is Jen, Alyssa, and Liz on the rim of the lake cold, tired, and slap happy.
The descent from the volcano took a good 5 hours and we were hiking by headlight for the last hour or so. towards the end we were finding it hard to pick up our feet but kept charging. Justin, our guide, was telling me custom stories on the way down. It was pretty cool until I hit a point later on the descent where I was too tired to keep up with the stories. Evidently, a couple years ago there were some people that had to be carried down ffrom the volcano because they flat out ran out of gas and couldn't move anymore.
We made it down to the village, paid our bill, and took turns taking pulls of whiskey from my flask. Steve, Dom, and Tim were waiting for us at the village with a truck they booked for us to go back to Saratamata. We arrived in Saratamata and enjoyed a couple cold beers and chicken wings and rice at the restaurant. All of us were walking a little funny, but I think Alyssa took the cake with her bowlegged cowboy walk.
We were supposed to leave the next day for Tim's village in the South, but the road was impassable by truck as the creeks flash flood during rainstorms. The next day we were clear to go and the 12 of us piled into the truck. We had to get out of the truck at the creek crossings as some were pretty hairy. Jackie, the oldest volunteer in Vanuatu at 72, was sitting shotgun in the truck with Justine's small dog Stu (short for stupid). Unfortunately for Jackie, Stu felt ill and puked all over her and the truck during the trip. Jackie took it quite well but said that she doesn't think the truck well ever smell good again.
We got to Tim's village in the South and entered an area of Ambae that is very different from the West or East. Most houses are made of local materials and they haven't received the development that other areas of the island have. In many ways they are looked upon as the backwoods portion of the island. But, at the same time their kastom is a lot stronger than other areas so it was really cool to check out and story with the locals.
Tim's whole village became a mud pit with all the rain so we spent most of our time either in Tim's big house (built by a Japanese aid agency many years ago) or down in the nakamal area. We were well entertained by the two puppies, Stu and Boiler (named for a sore he had on his neck when he was about a week old) tirelessly fighting in the house.
For the Fourth of July we paid for a cow and ate tons of beef for a couple days. For $10 each we split a cow among 12 people. Steve had brought his generator and speakers from Saratamata too so we enjoyed good food, plenty of liquor, and music for a great party. Tim's village made a ceremony for us in the evening and we all feasted with the village. This is a picture of us all lined up for the ceremony and our salu salus around our necks.
Once the ceremony was finished Steve put on Shrek 3 for the village via a projector on the outside wall of Tim's house. This I'm sure will give Steve god-like status and fables told about him for years to come.
On the days surrounding the 4th almost all of us got kastom tattoos as guys in Tim's village still know how to work them. Ambae is one of the only islands that used to tattoo as part of their kastom. Most people have the road to Manaro tattoo. Also, it used to be kastom to tattoo girls from head to toe when they were still babies. There are still a few very old women in a neighboring village that have such intricate tattoos. Everyone in our group got the "Road to Manaro" tattoo which looks like two dark lines, and we're all looking forward to the time where we'll be getting down with our bad selves on Manaro in the afterlife. This is a picture of Bob doing mine on my calf.
They use dye from a purple plant in the area mixed with ash and water. Then the "needle" is a thorn from an orange tree. They have to hold the thorn a certain way so that the thorn just barely goes into the skin, yet enough to get the ink in. Its kind of like a rhythmic motion that is a series of small pokes to form the line. It hurts but the pain isn't unbearable by any means.
Once the 4th Festivities were finished and we rested for a day Me, Tim, Liz, and Jen hiked from the South to Liz's village in the West. It was a pretty long hike (about42km) and there were some great views of the ocean and hills from steep cliffs and beautiful black sand beaches that we crossed. Tim's dog, Boiler, is a champion as the three-month dog walked the whole way and only had to be picked up three times for very brief rests. Tim fell and knocked his knee pretty well on a creek crossing which means dirty blong ear in local language (basically slippery as ear wax). He was holding the dog so he sacrificed the knee. Luckily it wasn't so bad he couldn't keep walking.
Once we got to Liz's village she treated us to mac&cheese her mom had sent her from home. A great treat after a long hike. The following day Tim and I taught the kids at Liz's school how to play kickball as Tim had been sent a real kickball from home. The kids loved it and we had a great time playing and teaching it. Tim, in his gimpy state, was not playing, but coaching/umping a few steps down the first base line from home plate. In a moment of pure intellect Tim was staring out into the field while a girl fouled off a ball directly into his crotch from a whole 3 feet away. He dropped to the ground and a good 100 or so adults and kids in the area were doubled over laughing at his expense. Some things like crotch shots are just universally funny.
We hung out in the well-developed West for a couple days and just relaxed. It was great. The West has a lot of money as many prominent politicians have come from that area. Its definitely a stark contrast from the South.
After a few days in the West, sadly it was time to go and I got on the plane to depart for Vila. It was a great vacation and a really cool, different way to celebrate the Fourth. I think I'm going to try to get back to Ambae again some time. Maybe camp up on Manaro for a couple of days and actually see the crater lakes.
This picture got put in out of order but its a towel Steve got at a Chinese store before coming out for the Fourth. Tim is proudly displaying it with some people from his village in the foreground.
