Sakau Sailing School

South-west Malekula and the Maskelyne Islands is so remote! Its thick bush, and big swell coastlines, tiny islands surrounded by reefs and sandy beaches…..the villages are different to any close to Vila, or on the main islands. The people seem different too – much more gentle and sofly spoken than town kids, real chilled out and happy. All the mamas in the village woul,d sit under cocnut trees and weave mats most afternoons, the men were helping with the boat building and the young guys were with me learning about sailing and navigation….but so many politics in small villages! And the women were like the long lost forgotten tribe – they never got a mention, never got to eat with everyone else, and did all the work, including cooking for heaps of people without much thanks. Telling people about the setting sounds so idyllic, and it was, but the politics and relationships meant this tiny remote village in the Maskelynes was remarkably similar to other places, despite being so removed in materialistic terms.

The boys I had for sailing school were awesome. Always laughing, really cheeky but good fun. And so studious! They would copy down the notes on scrap paper and then write them up neatly at night in their books, and remembered everything we talked about! So we ended up going through the course material quite quickly because they seemed to hve such a good grasp on it all. They loved it though. So we’d do lessons in the morning and then sail all afternoon – it is a good life! Had a few high speed capsizes in the hobie-cat which was fun. It was awesome seeing their enjoyment when they realized the hobie was just a FAST sail canoe!

All the chiefs from a couple of villages around the place sat me down one afternoon on the beach and seriously tried talking me into ‘taking’ and Vanuatu man for a husband as it would increase the wisom and knowledge of their local community….after telling them I thought the white guys would learn just as much as them and them telling me in their culture they view their women as products which they try to ‘export’, I reconfirmed my decision NOT to get married this year (tough really….NOT). But they were actually trying to convince me to do it.

We ate lots of lobster, fish, coconuts, yam…..one night a HUGE killer avock mudcrab with pincers the size of my hand tried to eat me while I was innocently asleep on the deck…luckily I woke up and then had a fight with it trying to get it back in the bucket….

I had a few days overlap with Ross (he took over from me with the sailing school) so we successfully became the first white people to circumnavigate Sakau Island in a hobie cat! IT WAS FLIPPIN COOL!!! Had a good breeze, maybe 20 knots, and a few metres of swell and we sailed out the channel in the reef, INTO THE PACIFIC OCEAN, and round, and then back in the next gap in the reef. Talk about a good adrenalin rush! If we’d capsized we would have been on the reef in no time, but of course that was the beauty of it all…..adventure a! (We had a VHF and people knew where we were….so don’t worry dad!!!)

Then last night we had all the boys out on the boat for tea, and we cooked them lamb fillets and chocolate cake, and they gave me a mat with my name woven in it and a cool bag, and made me feel special! It was such an awesome priveledge to be hanging with them for a few weeks!

Sleep is calling, but will update this again in the next few days for installment two on remote village life! Project MARC (who i was there with) stands for Medical Aid to Remote Communities. Its a cool set up.

Look forward to sharing more, and hearing about all YOUR adventures! Flick me an email :)

Hugs and blessings,
Miri