Luganville, Espiritu Santo, Vanauatu

        

We were in Luganville during our world cruise in 2009. It was pouring rain, that's pretty much all I remember. We were hoping for better weather this time. We arrived at 8:00 am in beautiful sunshine. We were going out with a different group at 8:30 so had 30 minutes to shop the market on the pier. At 20 after Mel came to get me, they were all together and ready to go. Bad start with a new group but they didn't seem too upset, we just got in a nice new 12 passenger van and off we went. 

We did a quick drive thru town, stopping for a minute to look at the market then headed out of town. This was a snorkeling tour so the first stop was at a beach at Million Dollar Point. It is called that because after the war millions of dollars worth of equipment was shoved into the ocean there. The water was a bit cloudy and the sun was behind some clouds so visibility wasn't the best. It looked like an underwater junk yard with few recognizable items. We did see 2 cannons. We found out later that further down the beach was a tank, that would have been interesting to see. The pictures I took are pretty much all the same color except for a burst of color like the red coral and blue starfish. It was an interesting place to snorkel. 

    

Next we went to one of Santo Espiritu's 3 Blue Holes. These are beautiful pools on a river of some sort. The water actually felt cold after the warm ocean. There was a lot of alge on the rocks where we entered the water. Other than that the water was crystal clear and beautiful. There were no fish and it was quite deep so not much to see. But it was refreshing and a nice swim. 

         

Some time ago a Brittish man purchased a large piece of land which includes the land around a beautiful bay. He has coconut trees and a lot of cattle as well as a small restaurant on the beach. He eventually wants to add cabanas for visitors to spend the night. We drove down a steep drive to the restaurant. We first went swimming. There was nothing to see other than the bottom strewn with dead coral. I did see one fish about an inch long. After swimming we ordered lunch which was made with fresh seafood. It was delicious!  

That was our last stop so we headed back to town. The others wanted to be dropped at the beginning of the market on the pier. Mel and I had the driver drop us at the food market on the other side of town. I wanted to get a picture of something I had seen at the market, BATS!!! Right beside the road one woman was selling bats. I asked if they eat them with no reply. As you can see from the picture, the people of Vanauatu were not as friendly as those in the Soloman Islands. 

The bats were priced differently, I assume by size. Someone at our table had seen a program showing them being deep fried and eaten whole. Yuck!! I think it was the most unusual thing we have seen in a market and we have seen a lot of markets!

We continued down the Main Street in town. We found 2 different craft coops but they had mostly clothing. They had a few carvings but nothing like we had seen in other ports. I did find a lady sitting on the floor behind a counter sewing with a hand cranked machine. It was old and looked very uncomfortable to be sitting and sewing like that. 

There were few other stores of interest. Most were Everything stores which we have seen in most of the islands of the Pacific. We reached the road to the pier which had booths set up full of colorful fabrics and dresses. We looked at everything since we still had more than an hour until all aboard. We did buy one carving but not much more of interest. We were back in our cabin over an hour before sail away.