- April 2025
We arrived in the early morning. Miriam took the helm for the anchoring maneuver. We dropped anchor between a rather large Police vessel and another cat, just to be informed by a guy in the tender of the police vessel, that they were in too shallow water and needed to move the ship. In the process they were getting very close so we decided to raise our anchor and drop it again further downwind. At around 9:00 we were done and killed the engines.
The protocol for getting clearances was a bit more complicated than in the Cook Islands:
- We had to announce our arrival by email at least 72 hours in advance. Karen did it before we left the Cook Islands.
- 30 minutes before the arrival in the port we had to call the port control for instructions for anchoring.
- After launching the tender we picked the biosecurity officer up in the marina. She was accompanied by the officer from the Harbour authority.
- While they were sitting in the cockpit and made us fill out their forms, one more person from the customs department arrived in the Marina and needed to be picked up from there.
- The bio security officer then toured the boat to find illegal agriculture products.
- The customs person toured the boat separately too to check for firearms, drugs, and other items. They jokingly pointed at Gael, who was wearing a Hawaii shirt, and asked “ And where are your drugs ?”
- The immigration lady then took our passports and five filled out immigration forms (she had only brought five) but since we are seven, she told us that we should come to her office later today to pick up the stamped passports and the two people who did not fill out an immigration form would have to join to fill their’s out in her office.
- After arranging for fueling for tomorrow, Martin, Gael and Karin walked to the immigration office to do the above.
- Several documents had to be printed / photocopied three times for the three clearances, and some had to be changed because manual changes were not allowed. That’s why there is a printer on board.
- The process was finished at around 3:00 PM.
Bad news: We still have problems with the garbage. After initially saying we can drop garbage bags at the marina for a fee per bag, this was later revoked since it seems illegal to “import” rubbish from yachts. So our port bow compartment is going to continue filling up with garbage.
In the meantime, Regis Jr.’s two uncles head arrived on the boat and were settling in. Regis went to shore to met with his brothers and friends and they went shopping to resupply our food stocks.
Later there was a welcome Pastis party on the boat, some repairs started before the young ones went back to shore for dinner and to get the luggage of the new arrivals from their hotel.
And we lost a day today. What happened to April 13? I never lived that day 🤣
Quite a busy day. Tomorrow will be a working day too.
I need to get my proper camera out and take some proper pictures. But as of now I don‘t even have a computer to load the pics from the camera.