January 2002 - Solomon Islands - Gizo & Liapari

This page starts with us at Gizo (again!) and it's two days til Courtney's Birthday (Jan 11).   The  plan was to move on to Liapari for her birthday but then we found that traditional dancing to be held at the Gizo Hotel.  She made to the decision for us to stay an extra day and then sail to Liapari on her birthday, with a cake to follow the next day.  Sailing or moving the boat on birthdays is generally not accepted practice.

Instead of sitting in Gizo harbour for the day we went out and anchored at Nusa Mbaruku at the end of the airport.  We went down the side of the island in the dinghy and visited the ICALM research  centre.  This centre looks at developing technologies for Pacific islanders that utilises the resources in their waters in a sustainable way.  Projects like clam farming, fish farming, collecting small fish for aquariums are undertaken.  We went for a snorkel in one of the clam enclosures - quite a sight with hundreds of large clams on the bottom.

We then had a long drift snorkel back to the boat and then made our way back to Gizo to go see the dancing

This was a great choice.  The dancing was done by a Gilbertese group from the village across Gizo harbour.  The Gilbertese are Polynesian and are descendants of people who came from the Gilbert Islands (Kiribati) during the sixties.  Their dancing was great with the youngest starting out doing simple forms of their dances.  Progressively older children had their turn and the show finished with the older ones going really fast and really dancing up a storm!.  For a birthday treat they made Courtney a headdress, and sung ten bars of happy birthday.- one for each year.  We very much enjoyed the evening.



We left the next day for Liapari.  This is a small privately owned island .  Noel and Rosie have a business here making aluminium boats and general engineering  workshop. We anchored in the lagoon after crossing through the small gap in the reef created during the war.  It is only 15 metres wide and 3 metres deep and as we passed the narrow section the tendency was to stand up straight and hold your breath to help the boat through.  Here we also met Richard, his wife Christine and their  ten year old daughter, Anne-Maree.   Richard was overseeing a re-fit on two live aboard dive boats - the Spirit of Solomons and Bilikiki.  These boats are truly up-market compared to our way of life.  The Bilikiki has 10 cabins with ensuites and is air-conditioned with nice lounges areas, decks, and a specially fitted out diving area on the stern.  They do a 14 day cruise out of Honiara and is largely booked out by American dive operators. They charge US$300 per person per day and include all meals and dives.  They do slide developing on board as many of the passengers are professional photographers or keen amateurs.

We had dinner aboard one night and had a lovely feed of roast pork and the girls were especially thrilled with the double  chocolate ice cream.  Over dinner Richard enthralled us  with his stories of his involvement in the Bougainville war.  Apparently NZ's 60 Minutes did a story on him entitled 'Kiwi Rambo'.  During our visits to the boats we were able to stock up on a few books to read as the boats both have overloaded libraries of books left behind by passengers.  We were also able to borrow some videos and 'help Richard out' by taking some gourmet cheeses that were about to go out of date.

With Noel's workshop, Liapari is the place to get things fixed.  The top bearing of our anchor winch had collapsed and Noel and Richard were able to help me get the bearing out and then replaced, with the new bearing eventually coming from Australia.  Noel is real speed freak, and in his shed he has a jet ski and a speed boat that looked like a dish with a massive motor in it.  Rosie's niece Debbie who runs the office took Courtney for a spin on the jet ski.

There are roads around the small island and the girls have been able to get their bikes out and go bike riding.  Some the local kids have bikes and they have been having a ball riding around, swimming and fishing. A huge school of herring sat under the jetty or in the shade of the dive boats.  They drop a treble hook (no bait) into the school and then a quick jerk and a fish is hooked.  One afternoon from the deck of the dive boats we watched some large trevally charging into the school to catch a fish. Really impressive!

Courtney's birthday went well and a Gameboy game of Harry Potter was a hit.  A close second was Care of the Australian Horse and Pony - a book we picked up in a second hand store in Gizo.  There was a horse there on  Liapari, and Courtney and Anna have enjoyed giving it a biscuit and a pat each day.

After a week we went back to Gizo (after struggling to lift the anchor up by hand!) to do a refresher dive course.  Liz and I hadn't been diving for over 13 years and we wanted to do some dives here, so we thought a refresher course would be a good idea.  Kathy (Dive Solomon Charters, in the Gizo Hotel) took us out to Kennedy Island, and in the shallows  we went through all the basics and emergency procedures.  We both coped well and then in the afternoon we went for a dive along the drop off wall of the island.  We swam along the wall at around 20 metres and marvelled at the huge coral fans that protrude out and the hundreds of fish around us. We now look forward to more dives but have to watch the budget as this is not a cheap activity.

We lined up to do a night dive in Gizo Harbour but the rain set in for a few days which made this impractical.  We sat out some strong winds in Gizo for a few more days before heading back to Liapari.  When anchoring in Gizo we tied a line with a buoy to the anchor and this made pulling up the anchor and chain up much easier - but still too much like hard work.  We arrived in Liapari after a smooth trip and anchored just in time as a nasty squall blew over.  One of the men who worked there, Johnson, wanted to buy Courtney's bicycle for his son.  After agreement with Courtney, a deal was done and the bike was sold. Nice to off-load something for once.  The anchor winch and bearing went in OK and we were on our way again.