Finally Leaving...

That's it for us and Tonga...

Tomorrow we set sail for Wallis, and a new chapter.  There are plenty of stories from Tonga that I never got around to sharing on the blog, but time, and bandwidth, have not allowed.  So I'll make do with a final dump of pictures...

And tomorrow, the solace of the open sea...

Better and Better

Tension, of course, is at the heart of any storytelling.  That's something that I had in the front of my mind when I was writing South From Alaska - so many sailing stories devolve into mushy travelogues of the "then we picked up the anchor and moved to another spot" sort just because they lack tension.

Well, be on notice - I have, for the nonce, given up all thoughts of tension, and by extension I suppose, storytelling.  (For this post, at least.  Our family life afloat is just normal life at this point, so we have the normal ration of tensions, though we're certainly safe from the Walter Mitty tension.  But more on all that some other time.)

For now, some pics to go with an earlier story, posted with the text-only services of the ham radio when we were out of internet range.

This is the scene on the windward side of Taunga Island, and our evening ashore at the Best Beach In the World (as long as you're not after surf!).

First, there was Elias rowing ashore on his own.  Check out the little form in the boat, bravely setting out without any qualms at all - what parent's heart wouldn't sing?

Then there was a family game of footy on the beach.  This mostly devolves into chasing Dad around.

And then the main event - the fire and dinner.  That's the Best Beach in the background - a perfect causeway of sand reaching out to a little islet whose name I can't produce without my chart in front of me.

"This is why we're here!" 

And, then, perfection capped - a raucous sunset breaks out as the sun transits the few degrees of clear sky between cloud ceiling and horizon.

 Alisa, giving herself up to the moment.

And, at the risk of repeating myself, there were no other boats there, which is something in a crowded destination like Vava'u.  The herding capacity of yachties never ceases to amaze...

The End.

To Lose a Tooth

For a seven-year-old, Elias has a lot of baby teeth - until the other day, he had only lost two. 

Then, on that other day, the whole family was on the bow, watching whales from the anchored boat.  Elias was taunting his brother and was therefore banished to the stern by the captain. 

The next thing we heard from him was a howl of pain - while he was meant to be meditating on his evil ways in the solitude of the back deck, he somehow managed to slip on the swim ladder and smash face-first into something hard and metallic - we're not sure what. 

There was blood, there were lots of tears.  And when we had everything cleaned up, it was apparent that Elias was on his way to losing tooth #3 - one of his front teeth.  It hadn't been loose before the fall, but was now hanging by a thread:

He suffered through lunch like that, making do with a meal of pineapple juice and soft coconut meat, before he got brave and asked me to yank the tooth out.

He was of course very excited by the prospect of a visit from the Tooth Fairy - how easy it is for kids to believe!  And he made this sign for his door, perhaps out of lingering concern over the ability of the Tooth Fairy to find our boat.  Similar questions often arise during Santa and Easter Bunny season.

It says, "Please come Tooth Fairy... I have just lost my 3rd tooth".

The Tooth Fairy came, and left two pa'anga.  Elias was well pleased, and quickly blew the windfall in the Neiafu fishing store.

The scene at breakfast the next day.

And the view from the breakfast table.

A Month? We'll Take Two

The business of extending our visas so we can stay in Tonga for another month brings us to the big town of Neiafu, and back to internet range.

Discordantly enough, I've been reading We Wish to Inform You That Tomorrow We Will Be Killed With Our Families.  Perhaps because I'm in the middle of that story, opening the Times at the internet cafe just now and seeing the news from Egypt took my breath away.

We are so unreasonably fortunate..touch wood...in what we find ourselves doing.

In the last week or so since we were in town our story has slowed down to the point of not being a story.  We meet some other yachties, we school and feed and hug and clean and instruct and scold the boys.  We watch the stalk of bananas on the stern arch slowly dwindle, and the basket of papayas disappear two and three at a time.  And!  If any of my work colleagues stumble on this, I assure you that I am working on my science work for long hours every day.  But that is the limit of our ambition just now.  And on a boat there is always a distraction...

Our latest milestone is that we find ourselves suddenly able to go snorkeling together as a family.

Who's cuter?

This works because Eric is happy to ride around on my back.  He doesn't have a lot of staying power, but he's completely happy and at ease while it lasts.

And now, instead of trying to take pictures of fish, I find myself taking pictures of my family underwater - especially, of course, Elias.

He is, as I've noted before, completely at ease in the water.  And of course he finds it completely unremarkable that he is so at ease - the water is just another place to be, much less overwhelming than town, in some ways...

Alisa and I, meanwhile, find ourselves looking at the bigger picture, the scope and direction of our lives together, and we start to mutter the Galactic incantation:  Don't wanna stop don't wanna stop don't wanna stop don't wanna...

Jumping

Jumping off the stern arch is all the rage on Galactic.

I thought we'd never see Alisa doing the jump.  But then Elias' 7th birthday rolled around, and she figured it would be the perfect way to kick off the celebration.

Of course, the day also included some more traditional celebrations.

Alisa made him a new stuffed horse  (on the left) which our still-so-innocent oldest boy was thrilled to get.

There was a birthday cake in the shape of a cheetah.

And we finished the day with a beach fire.

It was a family-only celebration, as we hadn't yet hooked up with any other kid boats to share the day.  And it was a simple celebration - the same decorations we put up in the cabin for every birthday on Galactic, some gifts, some cake, an early-morning birthday snorkel and the various other outdoor fun.  

The real treat for me was seeing how adequate that was for Elias - he told us a few times that it was the best birthday he could imagine.