Before leaving Luganville Vanuatu we hired a taxi driver for the day to show us some of the local sights.  The first place we went to was a place called Million Dollar Point.

During World War 2 the Amercians occupied different parts of Vanuatu and had many troops and bases on the different islands. They brought much equipment with them to support the troops and help build their stations. Machinery like bulldozers, trucks, jeeps, lorries, were all brought in by ship but when it was time to leave they couldn’t take it all with them, it was much more important to take all the troops home. Also when they purchased all the equipment there was a clause in the contract stating that it was not allowed to be returned to the USA after the war as this would not help the post war recovery. No new machinery or equipment would be sold if there was a sudden mass arrival of second hand equipment. The Amercians tried to sell all the equipment to the French at a cheap rate but the French tried their luck and knowing that they weren’t going to take it with them held out and tried to get it all for free. The Americans weren’t feeling charitable so lined up all their equipment on the beach, fitted them with hand throttles and drove them all into the sea. Those pesky French didn’t get any of them ! Dozen of trucks, bulldozers, diggers, jeeps, were all driven into the sea and the area was then named million dollar point. Over the years because of rough storms items have been washed ashore and you can now see  the remains of many vehicles. Engines, wheels, gearboxes, caterpillar tracks litter the beach, some of the parts now look as though they have melted into the rock and coral and become one.

You can snorkel and dive the site but on that day the sea was rough with big waves crashing into the beach, it certainly must be an interesting site seeing what lays beneath the surface.

OK its a bit of an environmental disaster I guess by todays standards and theres even talk of the Amercians coming back to clear it all up, but I doubt if that will ever happen.

One intrepid New Zealander went back 3 years later and managed to pull a bulldozer from the sea. He cleaned it up, changed the oil, put a new battery and electrics in it, put some fuel in it and got it going !! He then pulled another 7/8 bulldozers from the sea using the one he had saved, did the same thing and then took them back to New Zealand to sell them. Amazing to think that they would have survived having been submerged for 3 years in salt water.

There was also this HUGE tree nearby the beach which was nice –

The second place we visited was a blue hole, there were a few of these in close proximity to each other and we visited just one. Caused by the abundance of minerals the water is a very clear blue colour, reminded me of the sink holes that you see all around Mexico. People come here to swim, relax and unwind –

We stopped for lunch at a place called Velit Bay, the entire bay was owned by an individual, all 1600 acres of it !! It was a long windey drive down to the beach, the place had many cattle and large coconut plantations.

Unfortunately a storm was blowing up and the wind got stronger and stronger, soon the rain came and there wasn’t much point continuing our site seeing trip, Champagne Beach would have to wait for another trip……..

Thanks to ‘Mr Cool’ for driving us around in the smallest taxi ever !!

Our last stop on Malakula was Wala island a small island on the east coast, we anchored on the north shore which gave us good protection from the south east winds.

We were met by a guy who was interested in getting his invertors repaired, when we went to his house we saw he had two huge speakers and was clearly blowing them up after some serious music was being played ! We tried to help but they were shot to pieces, I think he gives them to every passing boat to fix but knows they have had it. Another guy we met on the beach was a quietly spoken man called George, he asked us if we wanted a tour of the island and to go and see the ‘stones’. He asked us what sort of food we ate on the boat, we didn’t know whether he was asking as he had very little food or if he was just being inquisitive. We said we didn’t have too much as we needed to restock in Luganville as we had been away for over a week, he then asked if we would like to come to dinner that night with his family, I think he thought we were going to go hungry !! He then apologised to us as he hadn’t shaved for a while, his mother had died 11 days earlier and as he was in mourning he wasn’t allowed to shave for 30 days. It seemed to be that you had 30 days to mourn and that would be it as later he showed us his mothers house and said that he would take it down after 30 days and then she would be gone.

He took us through some land filled with coconut trees which led to a clearing filled with large stones on either side. When a child was born a large stone was carried from the sea up onto the land, one side for boys, one side for girls. In front of the stone were placed some smaller stones were a pig would get slaughtered in celebration. There did seem to be an awful lot more boys that seemed to be born than girls going by the number of stones, but then he said that the men had to carry the boys stones and the women the girls stones. I think the story did get lost in translation a little but it was an interesting walk through the island.

The ‘stones’ –

Me and George hanging out near one of their drums made from a tree trunk –

He showed us his house and the new house he was building next door, this was to be built partially of brick and he was saving up for the concrete floor which was currently coral from the shore.

The ‘new’ church with the old church next to it –

We returned to the boat for the rest of the afternoon before going back to Georges house for dinner with his family. He was there with his wife, daughter, brother, and other members of his family all sitting on the floor waiting for us. He had asked me before whether I wanted to try Kava, a drink that is drunk all across the Pacific and other places too. Its basically a crushed up root vegetable which has the effects similar to drinking alcohol. I had to sit away from the rest of the family and he poured me a glass of it telling me to drink it in one !! Fortunately it was dark so I didn’t really get to examine it but I’m pretty sure it looked similar to pond water and tasted similar too. It made the tongue and lips go slightly numb but nothing much else, I had another cup later with similar effect but nothing much else happened.

Chris, Lisa and I were served dinner first with the others waiting and watching, it seemed to be that we had to eat first and then the kids would eat next. I noticed that George and his brother never ate, maybe there wasn’t enough to go around. It was a simple meal of rice, yams, vegetables, and to wash it all down rain water poured from a kettle. It was nice of them to have invited us to their home and have dinner with them, they had so little but were so very generous.

During our visit we had noticed a floating pontoon stacked up on the beach, the tourism board had managed to get cruise ships to come to the island. George said that there hadn’t been a ship for 7 months because of the cyclone but the cyclone had only been 3 months earlier. Apparantly the village chief had started to get greedy and instead of accepting the agreed price for each ship visited he now wanted to charge per person and now the cruise ships were never going to return. A big loss of income for the tiny island.

One thing you have to remember on some of these far away islands is that you could always become dinner – apparantly the last reported case of cannibalism was only in 1987 !!

We left Wala island the next day and George was waiting on the beach to wave us goodbye, it was a worth while stop and we were pleased we went there.

We now weren’t far from our destination of Luganville so we stopped off just south at Ratua island resort. It was a private island resort but you were allowed to anchor outside and come in and use the facilties like restaurant and bar. It was a peaceful anchorage and a great stop for our final night before Luganville.