Today we were in the farthest northern realm of the Kingdom of Tonga where two isolated islands are seldom visited. Our hope for the morning was to go ashore on the island of Niuatoputapu. Today was Sunday, and this morning we anticipated finding most of the island’s population attending church. The Tongan people are well known for their joyful and harmonious singing at such weekly functions. In Tonga, Sundays are mandated as a day of rest with strictly no work, to go to church, and for family feasts.  

We headed in by Zodiac across the open ocean, eventually reaching a narrow entrance through the fringing reef into the island’s inner lagoon. From there our caravan of Zodiacs slowly made its way across the shallow reef flats toward distant village homes we could see onshore. Unfortunately, the conditions were not favorable and it ultimately became too shallow to proceed. We laughed our way back, thinking perhaps the Tongan gods were simply enforcing the day of rest.  

The people that live on Niuatoputapu suffered a destructive series of three tsunami waves, triggered by an offshore earthquake, which inundated 40-50% of the island in 2009. Nine people lost their lives, and a third of the islander’s homes were destroyed. In the years since then, there has been foreign aid and a dedicated effort to rebuild the homes and infrastructure that were lost. With this comparison in mind, our morning’s setback seemed relatively trivial.  

We returned to the ship, had a bite of lunch, and then had an opportunity to go snorkeling along a quieter stretch of the island’s fringing coral reef. Underwater, there were alluring channels through large coral outcrops. Colorful reef fishes vied for our attention . . . look at me, and me, and me!  

Soon we had to get underway for our overnight transit northward to Samoa. As we departed from Niuatoputapu, we passed the nearby the neighboring island of Tafahi, a small, conical, stratovolcano that rises steeply from the sea to over 1,800 feet. A few homes were perched in the forest along its western flank, and supposedly about a hundred people live there on this remote island far from Tonga’s distant cities to the south. The waters offshore were rich with fish and seabirds as we passed by. Flying fish scuttled and soared away from our approaching bow, as noddy terns, white terns, red-footed boobies, and lesser frigatebirds all swarmed in a clustered flock over the water, hoping for the chance to grab a fish. We continued off into the night, on our way to our next port.