Weeks since our last provisioning, it was time. Yesterday we flagged down a taxi driver and scheduled an 10am pickup. About twenty minutes early Roxy and I arrived at the spot and began waiting. A few taxis and a mini-bus stopped to ask if we needed a ride. We explained we had scheduled a pickup and were asked if we had the driver’s number. Huh, maybe this wouldn’t be happening since we didn’t. Not wanting to bail on the taxi we thanked the driver and waited longer. By 10:10am we were ready to take the first ride that came. Any of course no cars came for the longest time. Eventually the same mini-bus came by and with a look from the driver that he was not at all surprised we jumped aboard.
We stopped at the Customs office to understand the checkout procedure we would need in a few weeks. Of course we went to the wrong building first, but the agent there walked us outside and pointed to where we needed to be. After checking that box (only making one more incorrect stop and the wrong window), we headed to pickup a taxi into town.
The taxi dropped us at the city market, I headed to the Millennium Cave office while Roxy took a look around the market. It wasn’t far to the location on their website but I had no luck finding the office. I asked at a car wash, multiple people speaking Bislama (local language) talked it over and one guy who spoke English explained they moved to near the government Agriculture building – basically right where we were for the Customs stop. Ugh.
Meeting back up with Roxy, we started hitting the grocery stores to see what we could find. On the way, we saw a really nice looking, from the outside, butcher (Paradise Meats), but we were not impressed with the variety or the quality. We ended up at the LCM store. It had pretty much all we were looking for except carrots. Talking to two LDS missionaries, they explained that they normally have them and gave us a couple more suggestions. Being hungry, I stopped at the hot food lunch counter in the store for a grilled chicken sandwich. Nope, only “chicken and chips” was available. So be it.
Fully loaded we started the half mile walk back to the market for veggies. We made a number of stops for Roxy to jump inside a store checking for carrots and giving me time to eat my lunch. Soon enough, we got to the market. I watched the bags and finished my lunch while Roxy figured out a game plan. We made quick work of it but were disappointed in the lack of variety, we had expected it to match Port Vila’s market but this market was smaller with much less variety. We ended up with bok choy, butter lettuce, tomatoes, cucumbers, bananas, mandarin oranges, and cabbage.
Lots of cabs were waiting and we jumped in the first one for the thirty minute ride back to the beach by our anchorage, with a cost of 1,000 vatu (about $10). Then the work of finding a place to store everything began… The five hour effort in the heat really drained us, feeling really exhausted but thankfully to be loaded up for the next few weeks.
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