Sept 21, 2000-Racing In Port Vila

Port Villa, Vanuatu

WINGS has been tied up on the sea wall near these boats in the town of Port Vila for two weeks now, side by side with about 20 other cruisers, and there are about 80 boats anchored or moored in the snug harbor. Port Vila is a full this season with a lot of boats here that skipped Fiji because of the problems there, but it seems like there is plenty of room for us all. The seawall is concrete and the water is about 5 feet deep at low tide so when we tie stern-to with our six foot rudder we have to be well off, about 10 feet away. We have a long plank (about 10 feet long, did you guess?) from the stern to the wall and to get ashore or back we walk the plank, so to speak. Its a little tippy too, so walking it is sort of daunting. Guests who want to come aboard have to face this little jaunt and we tend to get fewer guests than we might otherwise. Knowing that they have to go back the same way they drink less while here too. In some ports where stern-to mooring is required the fancier yachts have aluminium gang-planks called passerelles but nobody here seems to have one. Maybe the ones they have are not long enough, so all the boats use the 8" wide tippy planks.

Like we'd heard, Port Vila is a nice town, very cosmopoliton. It has one main street and a few side streets, several restraunts and clothing shops, and everything is within walking distance of the sea wall. Prices are high compared to Fiji or New Zealand, but not too bad. They have TV here too and we've been watching non-stop Olympics, with French commentary. We see every odd event that has a French competitor in it. The people of Vanuatu are Melanesian, very happy and pleasant people and they all seem to be tri-lingual, with English, French, and Bislama, a funny sounding pidgeon English. "Youfella go blue boat blong salwater?" (Translation: Are you people going to the blue ocean going boat?, maybe). The food is good here, if less exotic than Fiji, and the beer is great. Tuskers, the local brewery makes some good lagers. One aspect of Vanuatu which we were not expecting is the industriousness of the people here. Not since Mexico have we had so many offers to do boat work for such low prices. We've been hiring guys to do things like wax the hull for $US1.50/hr, and they work hard.
Racing Fun

Tuskers also sponsors some yacht races and Sunday we sailed in the Tuskers Regatta, a short "fun" race in the outer harbor. There were thirty boats or so, local and visiting yachts, and there was a proper committee boat, real marks, fair handicaps, and an excellent prize-giving party with tons of barbequed food and good wine and Tuskers beer, all free for all the race participants including crew. The barbeque included ribs, fish, and a whole calf on a spit. But before we could get to the barbeque we had to do the race. With eight excellent crew we picked up off of other crusing yachts, plus the two of us for ten total, WINGS probably had the biggest and I think the best crew, in the race. The wind was in the high 20's and sometimes over 30. The course was a couple of long reaches and one long close hauled fetch. The reaches were too close to the wind for the kite with 30 knots so we planned to use the genoa. Most of our excitement occured before the start. At three minutes to go our genoa blew out. It ripped from leech to luff about half way up. Of course we were (in typical WINGS fashion) in the midst of the fleet going the opposite direction. The crew pulled together marvelously to get the sail changed in under three minutes while we got turned around and positioned as best we could without a jib for the for the start. When the gun went off we had the three up and we made a good start, fourth across the line. The crew work saved us. Then we worked our way past those four boats while one boat passed us and we finished second behind MILANTO, a nice Swan 46 from Cowes, England. They had a little bigger sail which helped them on the reaches and they reefed the main for the close hauled work. I think we might have pulled them in if we'd had more beating, but we were happy to take second.
Back in Business

We want to acknowlege Ed & Julie from CINNABAR, Laura and Randy from POLLEN PATH, Dave and Sue from PERRIGRIN, and Andrew and Deb from RISKY. Not only did they sail WINGS very close to its potential, they danced to Psycho Killer when we toured the harbor after the race. Good sailors and dancers all.

Now we are repairing sails and getting ready to do a little cruising elsewhere in Vanuatu before we take off to Noumea in October. We will come back to Vanautu next season and spend more time here, this is a great place for cruising and racing.

Fred & Judy, SV Wings, Port Villa

Wing's Crew