The journey from the Kingdom of Tonga to Australia

With a very wistful feeling, it was time to leave the ‘Wildlife’. Dave, our skipper, took us all, including our luggage, to the beach with the dinghy, and then it was time to say our final goodbyes. Fortunately, all six of us flew together on the same plane (almost a private charter) from Ha’apai to Tongatapu, so we at least didn’t have to say goodbye directly to our friends.

Lulutai Airways moved the flight forward by 30 minutes the night before, yet flew at the originally scheduled departure time. At least there were 12 seats available on the flight!

Hardly landed in Nuku’alofa, we took a taxi to our apartment where our left behind bags awaited us. But we went straight on to the artist we had visited before our departure to see the whales. We had commissioned our own wooden whale and could hardly wait to see what Steven, who incidentally also creates art for the King of Tonga, had conjured up.

The whale that his son Easy had ready for us in the shop was a very beautiful piece, but we perked up when he said that his father was on the way and had a very special piece with him, and that we could still change our minds. We did just that right in front of the shop when we saw that whale. It was the first piece of art they had sold that had never made it to the shop, let alone to the wall in the shop.

It is a beautiful piece, and we named the whale ‘wild boy’ in memory of the experiences burned into our hearts with our wild boy in the water.

After dinner, we had to say goodbye to Anne and Nicolas, who stayed for one more day in Tongatapu.

We saw Britta and Björn the next morning at 4 am at the airport, as our flight to Australia was leaving Tonga at 5 am. So that night was anything but long...

And we had the added stress of Easy oversleeping; we woke him up with a call 15 minutes after the agreed pickup time, and he then arrived over 30 minutes late. We were at the airport just under 30 minutes before check-in closed; wild boy still had to be packed, the customs had to prepare the papers for entering Australia, and so on.. in short, 2 minutes before check-in closed we dropped off our luggage (boarding had already been called), wished wild boy a good first flight, went straight through security, and off to the plane. By a happy coincidence, we sat behind Britta and Björn, which allowed us to exchange the latest news right away.

After a 2.5-hour flight, we landed in Fiji, said a heavy-hearted goodbye to the other two, and took the short cut to reach our flight to Adelaide.

Wild boy handled the journey well; the customs officer was super friendly and only wanted to see a small part of him; the photo we took in front of the shop was sufficient for him. With collective effort, wild boy was safely packed up again, and we made our way to collect our car to start the next leg of our journey.