Trip 40 — Niue and Dogojima Walks

Niue day 1: Airport to Makefu
Friday, 16 February 2024

Today: 12401 steps/10.25 km/6.37 mi/1h 47m

Niue required as much financial planning as Cuba. There are no ATMs, and the one bank — which doubles as a post office, sending mail off the island on the weekly flight — doesn't change foreign currency. One car-rental place allegedly does, but it'll be a long walk there by the end of the week. I'm hoping that 400 New Zealand dollars (about US$240) will get me through the week, and I'll use credit cards when I can.

The hoteliers know that there's only one flight a week, so most places won't rent for fewer than seven nights. I found three places that would, one readily and two with a little coaxing given that it's the low season (the high season is June through September, when the whales are easily seen). That means that a couple of my daily walks will involve backtracking to where I'm staying, sometimes along the same route, sometimes inland.

The three hotels were to be paid in three different ways. One — the last place I'll stay — took a credit-card prepayment. The middle — not so much a hotel as a school converted into backpacker accommodation — will take cash.

The Anaiki Motel, where I'm spending tonight and tomorrow night, wanted the rental paid into their bank account. This was easily done in Auckland, and it was nice to have a purpose there. Two, in fact: A friend from summer camp whom I've known for 40 years (and haven't seen in most of that time) happened to be there, and we enjoyed a morning with her son and her partner at the Auckland Art Gallery, gazing at the extravagant, uplifting, cosmos- and nature-inspired outfits of Guo Pei.

Tomorrow morning I took the second Southern Line train of the day — such sentences are possible when you cross the International Date Line — and, after a couple of bus transfers due to track work, arrived at the airport. Niue is part of New Zealand but not enough so to be considered a domestic flight; the departures to Niue and Noumea left from the same gate at the same time from a side wing of the international terminal.

After three hours and two minutes in the air, we touched down on Niue. The flight was mostly full, about 160 people, with few tourists, as far as I could make out. We walked down stairs out of the plane and into the terminal, where passports were stamped. From there it wasn't immediately clear where to go, as customs hadn't yet set up; a singing and guitar-playing duo was performing at the far end of the room, anticipating our exit.

An officer arrived in a few minutes and I was on my way out, past the musicians. A woman handed me a paper schedule much like those distributed at resorts, with the hours of breakfast, lunch, and dinner hours at each place on the island (there are not many) and fun activities and special events. Tomorrow is "Dance and Mingle with the Locals" at the Golf & Sports Club, for instance, but it's nowhere near where I'll be, alas.

Niue has no roaming agreements with other phone carriers, so I purchased a SIM card at the airport's exit — a bit pricy at NZ$55 for two weeks and 6 GB of data, but it is the only option without relying on wi-fi. The terminal was crowded, as all the people departing Niue today were there as well, and plane day is a source of excitement on the island. The heat was intense but not oppressive.

I was eager to make pedestrian progress, but Niue's main supermarket is next to the airport, and I figured I'd better stock up. I wasn't sure what other markets would be open as I made my way around Niue clockwise. Also, one oddity of this island in Abecedaria is that I'm not spending any nights in the main town, Alofi. Today I'd walk through it, and I'll come back at the end of the week (overshooting the island's circumnavigation), but after today there won't be much to buy for a few days.

I bought a few tins of fish and protein bars. My weekly paper guide said that the outdoor market would be open this afternoon, so I planned to get some fresh fruit there.

Niueans are either particularly helpful or particularly suspicious, because nearly all the drivers who passed me offered me a ride into town, often prefacing it by asking, "Are you all right?"

"Yes, I'm fine," I'd say cheerfully. "I love to walk."

One of those people knew who I was. "Hi! I'm from the Anaiki Motel. Ilona said you're coming to stay there."

"Norman!" I said, emphasizing his name the way people welcomed Norm on "Cheers." Ilona and I had messaged each other about the room. She wouldn't be on Niue, but Norman would be taking care of the place.

"I can take you," he said. "Come in."

"Thanks, but I prefer to walk. I'm walking around the whole island."

"Ah, yes, Ilona did say that. See you later, then."

"Yes. Not too late!"

When the airport road met the main ring road, I turned right. Almost immediately I saw the turnoff to Opaahi. As Niue is a raised coral atoll (the world's largest), it doesn't have much in the way of beaches, and in order to get to the sea you have to go down a track. Since there's no safe place to park canoes at the water's edge, Niueans store them along these tracks, and they carry them down when they go fishing.

They've been doing that since before Captain James Cook arrived 250 years ago. Opaahi is where he and his crew finally stepped onto Niue, having tried in two other places farther north. Warriors with red-painted mouths fended off the arrivals by throwing a spear. Cook called the place Savage Island and never came back.

The market, it turned out, had only two vendors, and I patronized them both. John was grilling unique burgers; my pork-rib sandwich had beetroot, a fried egg, and his homemade paw-paw relish.

"Would you like a drink?" he asked.

"What do you have?"

"Coconut." He sliced the top off one and handed it to me with a straw. Coconut palms are all over Niue. As the story goes, the first two people on the island, Fao and Huanaki, arrived here from Tonga but, finding nothing to eat, rowed out to sea until they stumbled on the Samoan island of Tutuila, where they were given coconuts ("niu"). They brought the niu back and planted them. "Niu-ē" means "Behold the coconut!"

The other vendor, Ane, had containers of nanē, a porridge of shaved coconut thickened with starch. "I don't add sugar to mine," she said, "but some people like to make it sweeter."

While I had my lunch (the nanē was just the right sweetness for me), someone else came by to talk to John. She was carrying two uga (coconut crabs) each marked $25. Like everyone, she asked where I was from and where I was staying.

"You tell Norman that Mele said he should get you some uga," she said.

"All right, I'll mention it. I'd love to try them!"

She left. When I finished, John asked, "Did you like the burger?"

"It was wonderful. I love all those flavors together." I prepared to leave. "I hope some more people come." I'd been his only customer.

"Whether I sell burgers doesn't matter," he said. "I just like to talk to people."

"Well, I hope to see you again, then. Thank you."

At the center of Alofi on the inland side were a tourist office, the bank, and a bunch of stores along a green. At Buk Buk Chicken I picked up some fried chicken and French fries for dinner. At the convenience store, things looked bleak, but as I stood there a truck arrived, and someone brought in crates of produce. I took some exorbitant apples (NZ$10 or about US$6 for four, but I can't complain; that fruit came a long way) and what I thought was lemon iced tea but turned out to be a soda. The tap water is drinkable, so there'll be plenty of refilling opportunities, and I have a second bottle brought from Auckland.

On the seaward side were the port and a cluster of graves of important people on Niue, including the 10-year resident commissioner Cecil Hector Watson Larsen, who was murdered in 1953. The drawn-out trial resulted in death sentences that were later commuted to life imprisonment; Larsen was highly regarded by many but revealed to be a bully in the prison system.

I walked north out of Alofi; I had a little over an hour before reaching the Anaiki Motel in the village of Makefu. The area became residential, with sturdy houses and a few remains of homes washed away by Niue's strong cyclones. As part of Niue's embrace by New Zealand, Niueans were provided with storm-resistant houses in a basic form, which they could embellish and decorate as they pleased. Still, a problem exists with people leaving the island and abandoning their homes while still owning the land. Niue's population is only about 1500, down from 2000 a few years ago, and it keeps dwindling.

I heard the sound and saw the thing I didn't want to encounter: an unrestrained dog. Three of them. They didn't come close, and they did not look as vicious as those of the Caribbean, but they barked and stared. I continued on the opposite side of the street. When one dog started to approach, I bent down to pick up a rock, and it scurried away.

I passed that group and then saw three more up ahead. Now I was between two groups of dogs, and there didn't seem to be any humans. The first group was quiet but kept looking; the second group started to bark.

"No! Go home!" I said, raising my hand with three rocks. "Are there any people in this town?"

I got past the second group. Then a man emerged. They weren't his dogs, and he was sympathetic.

"How about a stone to the head?" he asked.

"I don't want to do that," I said.

"How about if they bite you?"

"Do they bite?"

"They do."

"Are they strays? Or do they belong to people?"

"They do."

"People own them?"

"Yes."

"OK, I'll have to protect myself."

I continued north, with the rocks in my hand. The houses fizzled out and it was a road with dense trees on both sides. People kept offering rides and asking whether I was OK. Were they trying to protect me from dogs? But no one had mentioned them as a danger when I explained my intent to walk around the island. The Niuean language even has a name for an island walk — takai — from when that was the means of getting news from village to village. John, the burger expert, had said I wasn't the first person to take such a walk. I knew I couldn't be.

Another car stopped. "Now remember, tell Norman to find you an uga for dinner," Mele said.

Just before Makefu was the grave of Nukai Peniamina, who was brought from Niue to Samoa by missionaries and educated there. When he came back to Niue, he was seen as an enemy, but he persevered, was an important liaison between the islanders and the London Missionary Society, and is now credited with bringing Christianity to the island in 1846.

The dogs of Makefu were sleepy; a few glanced my way but none approached or made a sound. Norman welcomed me to the Anaiki Motel and introduced me to the resident cats, Missy, Timmy, and Rusty. Two have cancer and are missing the tips of their noses. Near the driveway is a family of about 20 chickens.

I asked Norman about the dogs. "You should carry a stick," he said. "As long as you show them you're in charge, they won't hurt you."

I didn't want to hurt them either, though.

The Anaiki Motel has five rooms, and once again I am the only guest; Norman departed and will return tomorrow. The couches and the floorboards sag; it's part of the charm of the place. There's no phone signal in the building; I have to go out to the street or by the cliff to connect, but there are books to keep me occupied.

I found a coconut crab outside, but the only cooking methods I have are the microwave oven and the toaster, and neither seems proper, effective, or humane. Besides, I'm not even hungry enough for the fried chicken from Buk Buk. Tonight, a few sips of fizzy L&P "Good Lemony Stuff" and the sun setting near Avaiki Cave are all I need.

Go on to Niue day 2