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Finance shops were all over the place and seemed somewhat informal.
Pigs were common, too.
We learned from our cab driver later that China has been building
roads, buildings, and other infrastructure and has also been
over-fishing the waters. We think that China may be trying to absorb
this country and its resources with its money. The cab driver said
that the government is very corrupt and funds that were supposed to
be spent on projects are being taken by officials. Sad...
We'd walked to the next village where the commercial docking is
located.
The bell was ringing for this stone church. Men with woven mats
(called tauros) strapped around their waists were going in.
We went to an ATM and got some local money. 2 goats were tangled
together with their tethers in a yard.
A family of 3 open the gate to their church and across the street a
banana tree grows in an abandoned cider block house.
The Tongans are working to attract Australians.
Another cemetery...
While many businesses were closed, this bakery had many customers
who were picking up their Sunday sweet rolls.
2 boys heading to church.
This brightly painted tree house has been in place for a long time.
Note how the tree has grown around the railings. We saw a number of
front yard tree houses.
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This is for Dana. An Apple store in this
yellow building with a graphic on the side that looks like a
sun dial, but there was no pointer.
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The Australian embassy and if you are Canadian, you can also
get services here. As we headed back into our port town, we
found the headquarters of Tonga's first online bidding website—sorta
like a Tongan e-bay.
We passed the Anglican Church, which had a service in session. These
children had taken a break from church.
Another service was just getting out...
Across the street a family gathered after church and posed for us.
Just around the corner, another church. This one was stone and
included flying buttresses.
A burial mound of the "Ancestors."
 
The king's guard was summoned and he left through another gate.
We continued walking past the king's palace down the seaside
walkway.
 
Fish traps were in place off the seawall and we liked this
restaurant's carved sign.
We headed back through town with its deserted streets and had some lunch and iced tea on the
ship before we headed out again. This family posed in front of
the ship.
A family taking photos... Dean offered to take the whole group. They
were grateful and wanted our ship as the backdrop.
One last photo of the family and a kookaburra sitting in a tree.
Main Street was empty.
The Department of Environment seemed ironic to us since there
was so much trash and other obvious environmental problems.
We caught a cab for the afternoon. Seini (Jane) was quite outspoken
about the problems of Tonga.
The solar project was funded by Japan. Seini said her electricity
bills were lowered because of this, but we heard from other people
that they were not online yet. So who knows...
We went to the Captain James Cook landing spot.
Another cemetery of the Ancestors with others buried around the edges,
We thought the ones with wine bottles marking the edges would have a
more interesting passage.
Seini took us down some back roads to get to the attractions.
This stone bridge and the stone with markings down at the end of the
field tell
the story of a king and 2 sons who needed to make peace with each
other.
 
An interesting church bell and a family that had been just let off
the church bus, which was an open-backed truck.
We saw several homes and businesses with the purple and black, which
Seine told us means that there has been a recent funeral. 
Some churches were quite simple out in the far out villages.
We loved the blow holes.
The lava tubes along the whole shoreline set up sequential blow
holes as large waves traveled down the beach.
In the wooded area behind the blowholes a bunch of guys were
drinking and smoking. Several people had mentioned that life is too
easy for the men, so they just sit and get fat. Tonga, Seini told
us, is #1 for obesity.
 
We bought some Tonga water at a local coffee shop to get some wifi
and then it was time for an all American dinner out on the Lido
poolside to get read for Super Bowl #49, which will be on
Monday afternoon now that we've crossed the International Dateline.
On Monday we headed out on a public bus. (They were not running on
Sunday.) We went on the HIHIFO bus, which went west.
The buses are owner-operated and they have no official
schedule--they only have a route. This one was not in great shape...
It collected a bunch of kids going to their first day of school for
the year. We'd learned from Seini the day before that people have to
pay for school, whether it's public, religious, or private.
A broom and a mat are required for boys, but not for girls.
In each village there was a convenience store where people congregated—they
also served as unofficial bus stops.
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