On the island of Gau on our first day we walked through the mud and rain to the village of Sawaieke for sevusevu. I guess that muddy walk just wasn’t enough, so we decided to top it with an ultra-muddy hike. Nautilus arrived the day after us, and when they went in to do their sevusevu, Tim asked them to try to arrange a guided hike for us, which, of course they succeeded in doing. It was all set up for the following morning, but after it rained all night and wasn’t showing much sign permanently letting up, Tim wanted to abort the hike and tried to raise a faction of hike dissenters. For some reason, I was pretty intent on getting off the boat and going for a hike, rain and mud or no rain and mud, so I tried to raise a counter faction of hike supporters. Tim radioed Nautilus, and the hike supporters were backed by Hans, who has tremendous influence over his spearfishing bro-friend, and Tim relented, and the hike was on. And once again at the end of the day I wondered if the Bellinis were regretting spending their vacation with us!
The path was steep and *ridiculously* muddy. I mean, I’m pretty sure our guide thought we were the craziest bunch of Palagis she’d ever met wanting to go on this hike. Most of the kids kept smiles on their faces, and a few took advantage of the conditions to get really good and dirty. We stopped twice before finally aborting and coming back down before even getting high enough for any good views.
After the hike, Tim and Marcus went spearfishing, all the kids went over to Fluenta to play, and all the moms came over to Exodus to drink wine.
Fortunately, the next day the sun came out and snorkeling fun was had by all, and the day of the muddy hike lives in our memories as one of those camaraderie building experiences, something you didn’t really enjoy too much but you’re glad you did.
Muddy hike but most of the kids are still smiling!
Gresham Family Exodus 