When we got up we read a pamphlet on Vava’u that we had picked up in town. The first thing it said was to beware of salesmen that approach your boat when you first arrive. Too bad the customs guys don’t hand out the pamphlets. Clearly, Alofi hangs around the wharf waiting for new arrival boats so he can be the first to get a hold of them. His prices on everything are outrageously expensive. He pushes you hard to buy before you get a chance to price shop. Cruisers, if you are approached by Alofi, just say no.
Minutes after reading that, a guy in a small boat pulled up and started knocking on our hull. He was selling handicrafts. We are sure it was the same dinghy Alofi was in yesterday (we are also sure the dinghy did not belong to Alofi). We quickly turned him away after our previous experience and the warning.
Usually when we arrive in a new place we spend the first day figuring out what we are going to do for the rest of our time there. We were feeling discombobulated with no plan for today. We decided to get breakfast, then wander around town and get the low down on what there is to do here. As we were walking out the door, Alofi came rowing up in a rowboat. This time he had bananas, limes and bread to sell us. Eric told Alofi we were aware of his crazy prices and offered to trade him the kava he sold us for the bananas. We had seen the going price for bananas and knew the number of bananas he had matched what we had paid for the kava. He reluctantly agreed We got a ton of bananas they fill our 5 gallon bucket to the brim. As soon as they are ripe, Christi will be back on the fruit frenzy worse than ever. If anyone has good recipes utilizing tropical fruit, taro, or other produce available in this part of the world, please email or post them.
With Alofi gone, we headed over to The Aquarium for breakfast. Eric and Gisela showed up a couple minutes later and we all had breakfast together. The Aquarium is run by Americans, so we got the first American style breakfast we have had since leaving home. We were thrilled about “American Style” breakfast food. The people at the Aquarium are incredibly helpful and gave us all the info we asked for about all the good spots for kayaking, snorkeling, anchoring, etc. They assured us Alofi is an anomaly and no one else will try to sucker us. And their food is good and reasonably priced.
We wandered through the main drag of town, which didn’t take long. Here are some sights around town: teenagers in school uniforms, a residential street with a baby pig running across the road, the gas station, library, and Catholic church.
Our overall impression of Neiafu between the walks last night and today is that it reminds us of bordertown Mexico, but a little nicer. There is no graffiti or trash around, but it certainly doesn’t feel clean and modern, especially with all the livestock roaming the streets. There doesn’t seem to be much by way of nice landscape. Many buildings are in need of serious repairs. It is definitely not nearly as first world as the Society Islands, but it is not quite as poor and run down as parts of Mexico, either.
While wandering around, we ran into a couple from Chicago that we had met in Niue. They invited us to join them for dinner. We went to a brand new restaurant called “Sails” that opened this week. It is an upscale restaurant. We had scallops, tomato cream soup, tuna, and seafood pasta. The food had a definite Asian/Indian flair to it. The tuna came with green papaya slices, which are salty, and taro hash browns, which taste like regular hash browns. For dessert we got a banana in a cinnamon sauce with vanilla ice cream. The food was very good.