Map by Amanda Hacking Our anchorages and dive locations throughout the Vava'u Group. Click on a flag to go to a description of that dive

Vava'u Anchorages and Dives

In the map to the right, the darker areas are land, the lighter areas are water, and the intermediate color is for the (extensive) reefs.  As a general rule, these reefs were shallow enough that even Ocelot, with her 4' (1.2m) draft, could not sail over them.  Since the electronic charts of Tonga are all very inaccurate (out by 1/4 mile or 500m), we had to pay a lot of attention to our navigation.

Click on the red & white dive flags to go to our description of that dive.

Cruisers who use MaxSea should check out our Passage Dangers page.  On it we've included a file you can download along with instructions on how to import it into your MaxSea.  The file shows some safe tracks through the Vava'u and Ha'apai Groups (as well as about 60 unmarked hazards between Tonga and Fiji).

In Vava'u, anchorages are frequently referred to by their "Moorings number," the number Moorings Charters gives to their clients.  We occasionally refer to anchorages by number and name interchangeably.  To reduce confusion, here's a list of the anchorages we went to and their numbers:

  5 - "around the corner" from Neiafu
  6 - Mala
  7 - Port Maurelle
  8 - Nuku
11 - Tapana
14 - Blue Lagoon
16 - Vaka'eitu (Coral Gardens)
22 - Taunga
30 - Kenutu
32 - Euakafa
40 - Ovalau
Luatafito - not a "Moorings Approved" anchorage, so no number

About the Whales:  Humpback whales migrate to Tonga every year to mate and breed.  During the months of July-October, these magnificent creatures inhabit this group of islands, and we frequently saw several even just on short day-sails.  They are most abundant around the southern islands and west of the group, but in the height of season we saw them all around Euakafa, between Hunga and Nuapapu, and even right outside Port Maurelle. Around Euakafa and Matuku in the Ha'apai, we could occasionally hear whale-song through the hull of the boat! Who needs a mic when you can press your ear to the floor and feel the thrumming in your chest?  By far the greatest amount of whales we saw was on the day-sail down to the Ha'apai. I think we saw six pods, and once watched a single whale just diving and breaching for about half an hour. Enchanting!

Diving Vava'u:  We went diving several times with Dolphin Pacific Diving, especially when they were doing a cheaper monthly "club dive," but several of our dives in the Vava'u Group were independent ones that we did with other cruisers.  Because air-fills were so inexpensive, we tried to never return to Neiafu with full tanks, but much to Chris' disappointment, that didn't always happen.  The five independent dives we did out in the outer islands were a bommie south of Tapana, inside Blue Lagoon (#14), the Clan MacWilliam wreck in Neiafu, a bommie south of Vaka'eitu, and off Ava Island (SW of Port Maurelle #7).  The rest of our dives - most around Tu'unga'sika Island at the north-west entrance to the Vava'u Group - were with Dolphin Diving.

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