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Should I say “Lost in Paradise” or “Paradise Lost”. That depends on which day, out of the last 10, one refers to. The last 10 days were spent on a Pacific island, one can certainly call paradise or my Bali Hai. We lived in a fare, at the edge of the Pacific Ocean, with its waves lulling us to sleep. We dove in the glass sea and viewed the USS President Coolidge in 100 ft of water and such creatures, as sharks, lobsters, rays, cuttle fish and all their tropical fish neighbors. We took long swims in the crystal clear waters off our own little Bokissa Island Hideaway. We indulged in conversations with people from many countries of the world; we sharpened our Aussie lingua skills, had deep conversations with some Germans, had light conversations in French, since Lothar is just brushing up on his skills and I am acquiring them, and finally our Bislama is improving and we can share a few words with the Ni Vanuatus.
We were fed 3 meals a day under the Pacific sun and at night sipped our wine under the magnificently lit stars of the southern hemisphere. It was difficult to decide where to lounge first, by the pool, on the beach, in our own hammocks, in our lounges or maybe on our porch. Yes paradise found!
Or was it?

On Thursday morning at 4:08, my paradise got all shook up. I was rudely awakened by Mother Nature, who wanted to remind me, that the Earth was her place, and we are only here because she allows it. As our bed was shaking uncontrollably beneath us, we felt like balls in a pin ball machine, that were being rocked back and forth. The rumbling of the earth sounded like someone was bowling with boulders.Our owner of the resort described the warning signs of an earthquake, like a train, that could be heard in the distance. He was surprised we didn’t hear it.(That can easily be explained, we often hear trains in the distance in the night at home since the rail track is within a mile, so in our sleep, we probably didn’t give that warning a second thought.) I remembered that in Port Vila in the Fatumaru Lodge, there had been a Survival Guide, telling you what to do in case of emergencies, like cyclones, tidal waves and earthquakes. At that time, I leisurely looked over the instructions, never thinking I would really need them. OK, I know, I must be a naive American, to think I am coming into “The Ring of Fire” and ” I ” would never be affected. Anyway, the instructions had said … In case of an earthquake, ” to dive under the bed and cover your head”. I quickly mentioned this to Lothar , and we were ready to do the dive. Problem…. the bed was encased in beautiful island wood. Next thought, a table…no, none to be had. As we decided to lift the mattress, in order to use it as a shield to cover ourselves, in case the roof fell in, the shaking was decreasing. We decided to look outside to see if there was any damage to the trees, since all the fares were surrounded by beautiful tropical trees, some towering 3 times the height of our little house. We also figured, if outside, if one of those guys should loose their footing, we could dodge in a different direction. Then of course, we remembered the Tsunami of 2004 and kept one eye and ear towards the ocean, as we walked up to the main restaurant area. Here we were met by the owners and several other guests. We weren’t happy to hear, that this had been the strongest earthquake, they had had, in the past 8 years of owning the resort. The owners checked all the essentials, like structures, generators, gas lines of individual propane tanks needed to supply hot water in the bathrooms, the boats and jetty construction. All held up real well. They said we could return to sleep. We took our 2 lawn chaises, propped them up at the end of the beach, and held a 2 hour awake vigil, to make sure no tidal wave was coming. At this point we had no clue where the epicenter was and how close we were to the actual fighting of the tectonic plates or the eruptions. At breakfast, we found out, that the quake had registered a 7.2 on the Richter scale and the epicenter was but a few miles away at the southern tip of Espiritu Santo, the island we had been on 4 days ago.
There was damage in Luganville, the main city of the island, but thank God and Mother Nature, no casualties.
This is the 2nd quake we have lived through, while traveling. The last one had been in Tokyo, on an upper story of the Holiday Inn Hotel, Narita Airport. I am not sure which was more frightening, thinking one would collapse down with all the stories of a building, or being killed by a roof and trees falling on you, while there is a sinkhole developing, which could totally engulf you. Neither is a pretty prospect and I thank Mother Nature for being kind. It was a strange and frightening experience to think that one can not depend on the fact, that the earth will be steady beneath your feet.

This entry was posted on Monday, August 6th, 2007 at 8:40 pm and is filed under General, Vanuatu. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.