Email from the Ship: What an incredible day we had on Wed 3-10-04. Now I have another favorite island Santo, Vavuatu- used to be called New Hebrides. Luganville is the name of the town where the ship docked.
We arrived here Wed @ 6:30 am and the capt. and purser arranged a tour for us to see the island.We left at 10am with Sandy our guide and he showed us all around the island. The road is not paved and is very very bumpy but it was nice to not be in a city. The island has lush green vegetation, trees, beautiful beaches, and many coconut palm plantations with lots of healthy looking cows roaming among the trees. This island exports a lot of beef to Japan. Sandy shared a lot with us about his island. We went to the local market where fruits and vegetables and kava root were all laid out in piles on the ground.We stopped by a copra drying oven and saw how the copra(meat of the coconut) was being dried.The ovens where they keep a fire going with wood and coconut husks and on top of the ovens they place the copra.We ate some of the copra and if you like coconut it was quite tasty.There is like a shed built around the top of the ovens with doors at either end, where they put in and take out the copra. When it is dried they put it in burlap bags to bring to the wharf where they dump the bags in big containers in storage sheds until the ships come to load it. We loaded 1200 tons here in Santo and will load another 800 tons in Noro, Solomon Is.
We then went to a beautiful secluded beach where Helen and I went swimming and then we ate our lunch. Sandy brought some avocados from his trees and they were delicious.
We passed by many villages and schools and all the people were very friendly. We went up some of the mountains where I didn't see a road but Sandy seemed to know how to get places to show us beautiful views of the island. We are leaving Santo now @ 3pm 3-11-04 on our way to Noro, Solomon Is.. No one from this ship has ever been there so it will be a new experience for all of us. We will be there in 2 and 1/2 days.
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