11 July - More Firsts

1600 position 18-39S 173-59W. At anchor in Neiafu, Vava'u, Tonga

We ran out of beer, which put us in a crisis condition, and we had to sail
back to Neiafu to restock. It was blowing over twenty knots when we left
Vaka'eitu, but in Vava'u's smooth water and with double reefed main and
jib Moku pe'a romped back to town.

Shortly after anchoring and cleaning up the boat, we went ashore to shop
and on the way back to the boat decided that we needed to stop in the
Bounty Bar for some of Laurence's famous rum punch. The only other
patrons there were our pals Richard and Fran from Red, and our short stop
on the way back to the boat turned into an afternoon of excess and
laughter. We managed to get out just before dark but agreed to meet the
next evening for dinner and a walk across town to Tonga Bob's for the
weekly "Fakaleiti Caberet Show" a drag queen lip sync dance review. I
need to explain that fakaleiti is an accepted Tongan custom where families
with too many sons and too few daughters raise some of the boys as girls.
Some are gay, some aren't, but all dress and act like girls all their
lives.

The next day we made friends with Ken and Patti who are moored next to us
on the trawler "Oogachaka" (perhaps the best boat name ever). They wanted
in on the fun, so the six of us had dinner at the Aquarium and then saw
the show. Attending a show like that was a little outside of Noodle's
comfort zone, but it was tons of fun.

Our electrical problems seemed to disappear as long as we had wind and sun
to keep the batteries charged, but they would come back after even a
single day of light air and overcast. It didn't make sense since our
daily electrical load was only a fraction of the batteries' capacity. I
decided to load test the batteries, and yesterday discovered that one of
my two brand new (manufactured in January, 2014) deep cycle batteries was
bad. That could explain nearly all of the problems we have been having,
and as soon as I disconnected the bad battery things improved. However, I
now have half of the amp-hour capacity I am used to having. I have been
exploring options to either buy a replacement battery, or replace both
batteries with a single battery of greater amp-hour capacity. The problem
is our remote location. There are zero deep cycle batteries available
here in Vava'u. Anything we get would have to be shipped in either from
Nuku'alofa or New Zealand. Fortunately, we have 5 weeks to get it
resolved before we are scheduled to depart for Tahiti, and we are working
on this with both local suppliers and folks in New Zealand.

Today Lori and I walked four miles across the island and back to look at a
pile of rocks she was interested in. What remains of the Kilikilitefua
Wall, built in ancient times to honor the first-born son of each family,
is a foot high rock wall 300 feet long surrounded by a barbed wire fence.
We had a nice walk though, and on the way back stopped in the open
market to buy some kava which we will try some afternoon when we are
bored.