Siki and blue eyed eels

Pete is enjoying making the acquaintance of a local Polynesian man, Siki, who is the caretaker for the property fronting the anchorage we are in. He speaks basic French and between the two of us we can converse and get simple points across. He's very kind and generous with the fruit that grows here on the property. Every day we come home with a new fruit with instructions on how to eat it. We have tried coconuts in many stages of ripeness, heart of palm, jack fruit, papaya, bananas in several varieties, star fruit, giant lemons, small lemons and something else as yet unidentified. He also grows vanilla and has given me 8 vanilla beans. I put them in a container of sugar and hope to experiment with desserts. Ellie and Carter both received shell carvings to make jewelry necklaces. Pete brought him out to the boat today to give him some music CD's as a thank you present.

My new thing this week is learning to drive the dinghy. We usually go everywhere together so Pete always drives. But occasionally it is nice to have the freedom to move about on my own. It's not hard, it's just so different from a car. I've had it as a goal for months to give it a try, but the last straw has been seeing all these boat kids driving their dinghies. Ten year olds zipping around in inflatables with 15 horse engines, put to shame.

Part of my frustration on the boat is that we are just a bit too crowded. Every locker, cupboard and drawer is crammed full. I've decided that 25% of our stuff needs to go. Each space has stuff in it that we just don't use. I took a big bin of books to the beach and instead of trading them, I just gave them away. Viola, now the CD cases have a good place on the shelf and the cameras aren't sitting on top of the fridge. I am doing the toys next. Don't tell the kids. Pete needs to tackle his workshop space. If you know Pete or have ever seen his garage, you will know the challenge that will be. I've also bought some nice local art and hung it on the wall to make it seem more homey. I wish I had had more time before we left to fine tune, but now is as good a time as any to make improvements.

We had a lovely walk today up to a look out and down the other side to another village. A fresh water stream runs through and is populated with blue eyed eels. They are 3-4 feet long and much thicker than a mans arm. People feed them regularly, so they come out of the shadows and beg. Their gaping white mouths come up out of the water waiting for a tasty fish morsel. It rained on and off all afternoon, but we just hid under trees and were a bit glad for the cooling off. We covered about 4 miles in all up and down a very steep hill, and all 12 kids ages 4-12 did great. All 13 adults did pretty well too, considering the lack of hiking we've done in the past 3 months. We all enjoyed doing something different than the beach playing.

-Kellie