Mal de Mer

The trip to 1770 had been almost uneventful save for one leg. We had decided to cut northeast from one main road to another that let directly to 1770 (if I have not mentioned it before 1770 is so named since Captain Cook arrived there then). The road we follow was supposedly a main improved road. But it narrowed and narrowed and had one point we reached a y intersection with no clear idea of where to go. Les chose what he thought was the most likely one, but we lost some confidence at some one lane and gravel section. We bravely proceeded on in what we took to be a NE direction. (It is hard to know the direction one is going- I never know at all and neither Les nor Trina are ever quite sure. The sun always seems to be in more or less the same place in the sky whichever way one goes.) But the theory was that we had to intersect the other road before plunging into the Pacific. And eventually we did. So we checked into our lodging which was very spacious including kitchen, washer, dryer, two bathrooms and so on. The next morning we were due to set out for Lady Musgrave Island and the barrier reef on the boat you see. The weather was cool with wind, cloud and some sprinkles. We were not sure the trip would be on. But we boarded the boat and said they would go, but mentioned that the swells were up to three meters or so and stated that anyone who was not up to that need not go. For stability reasons they did not want too many people on the upper deck though in fact it and the boat as a whole were quite full (100 or so people). No one decided not to go.

It was up and down with slides in various directions. Quite often the waves hit the sides and splashed quite a ways up on the windows. The crew- some twelve people or so (they have to serve both morning tea, lunch and afternoon tea, have people to run the other boats after arrival, to supervise the scuba divers, to act as lifeguard for the snorklers and to perform on the boat some other tasks which I shall proceed to. But soon we hit the open sea (the trip takes more than 90 minutes at decent speed) and the passengers started to grab for the bags in backs of the seat in front of one. Les and I survived. But Trina who is as it turns out very prone to seasickness bit the dust first, followed by Lian. For a while Julius was okay, but he too succumbed. The crew was very busy collecting used bags, bringing ice and cold rags and providing suckers. Somehow all the rather green passengers did not respond with smiles to the rather cheerful and quite unaffected crew. And of course even if one is not affected it is still not a great deal of fun to bounce and roll along surrounded by vomiting people with bent necks so as to ensure the bags were in close proximity to the top of their bags. Quite a large supply of bags is needed for such a trip. Near the arrival a grinning crew member assured all that the return is always better. We shall see in the sequel.

But we did arrive though Trina in particular was not in stunning shape. This is one of the reasons we have no pictures of the island. But this saga will be continued in the next post.