We got up early, had breakfast and set off on our walk to the water taxi. The walk takes about 45 minutes and we definitely wanted to miss the heat of the sun.
On or first visit to Erakor the water taxi had been free, we'd been in the evening but had read in the book it was always free! Much to our dismay we turned up at the taxi pier to be told it was 1000 vatu each, expecting to not have to pay we'd only brought our emergency bus money which amounted to 980vatu between us. When we explained we worked at the hospital they said they'd allow us to pay 1000 for the both of us. This however still was beyond our budget. To make matters worse I dropped a 100 vatu coin through the slats of the pier. At this point tensions were running high so I jumped into the water alongside the pier and started rummaging for the pound coin sized coin in the pool beneath the wood. It was, I think, at this point they realised, we weren't trying to get away with not paying, we genuinely had no more money. To my relief I found the coin, someone lent us 20 vatu and we boarded the taxi!
Stress over we went for a stroll around the island. It was as beautiful as we remembered
The corridors of plants in between the villas
Beaches all to ourselves
Secluded and so quiet
Just us all morning!
We did some reading and had our picnic lunch of crackers, cheese and some cooked beef. We both said due to the sogginess of our crackers it was one of the worst lunches but definitely the best view!
We made our way round to the su loungers at the front to spend the afternoon looking out over the lagoon
The 1000 vatu taxi fare gave us a 1000 vatu voucher to spend on food or drink so we treated ourselves to some chips and enjoyed our diet cokes with some iced glasses
A perfect afternoon
We listened to music, read our books and watched the sun come down. This place is literally as close to paradise as we've been and we had a truly brilliant day
That evening was a quiet one. We had tuna omelettes (for the final time!) and sat with the med students, played some cards and shared some funny stories from our last few weeks.
The next day we were in two minds as to whether to venture to Pango beach or whether to enjoy some time by the pool. We both had some home 'life admin' to do so decided to stay back and get that done. We spent the morning intermittently jumping in the pool to cool off
And headed down to our new favourite lunch spot 'Chill' for a fantastic view and some yummy food and some celebratory champagne.
The evening we had been invited to Dr Dyxons, the consultant surgeon, for dinner and drinks. We headed down to this super nice complex complete with security guard, swimming pool and self contained little villas. He came a bit late having had a hectic day at work. He'd lost one of our favourite patients the day before and seemed to be struggling a bit so we sat down to some fruit cocktails and munched some pizza. It was really nice to chill and he had some really good life lessons for us with regards to our future careers.
We excused ourselves at 10 as we desperately wanted to say goodbye to the gang at Cafe Du Village. We rung down to check it was still open and then ran down to catch them before they closed. Sheila and Wendy were waiting for us at the bottom of the stairs so excited to see us!
Sheila had made us some bags with our names on, we couldn't have been more touched, they're hand woven, with the cours of the Vanuatu flag on one side and 'Alex' and 'Emie' on the other (such an adorable spelling!) these two ladies have made or trip so much better, cyber memories we made with both of them will stay with us for ever and they've made sure we can write to them from England which hopefully we'll continue to do until one day maybe we'll visit agai.
Sheila, Amy, Wendy and me
Amy's bag
Made from woven banana leaves, we're desperate to get these through customs but if not we got good use of them on our last Saturday
We had a lot of cloud during the day in our last full day by this meant that we got down to packing and clearing up our mess! We had bought some champagne to drink whilst watching the sunset at the waterfront so we just prayed all day for a nice sunset.
430 came and the sky was lovely, we headed down, grabbed some island time ice cream and sat near our favourite spot to watch the sun come down
Cheers
Not the most beautiful we've seen but definitely a fitting way to end our stay.
In the evening we met with Hannah, hannah, Megan and Andy for dinner at Au Fare. We got there in perfect time to watch the fire show, on a stage in the ocean! This was followed by music from Philip and Jimmy, the same singers from
Cafe du village (we got a cheeky mention!) We both had steak and chips washed down with a free cocktail (my first piña colada!)
Piña colada
Enjoying our last night in Vanuatu
We have had the most incredible, enriching and enjoyable time in Vanuatu. We don't think we could've chosen a better place for our elective and will be so sad to leave. We've made brilliant friends (Silas our bus driver has beeped and waved a good few times since the weekend round the island), and had some fantastic experiences both medically and culturally. We're not ready for the adventure to end so watch or New Zealand
Thankyou Coconut PalmS
Bye Vanuatu
We'll never forget you!
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