8th April

Finally back on track I hope. Monday night we had a surprise birthday party for Adrian at Keithie and Bruces house on Kol’a Ridge. Adrian caught my cold/flu/infection whatever, and he wasn’t feeling the best, but Coralie managed to drag him along. Nice place, Keithie has been here for 30 years, and the house looks like it’s taken a while to establish, huge Royal palms around the swimming pool, decks and verandahs overlooking Iron Bottom Sound, nice place.

We had a small (10 – 12 inch) diamond python decide to slide around the pool side for a bit, which was interesting, first snake I’ve seen here so far, so I was pleased. Very small, grey with black diamond pattern and it didn’t appear too concerned with me peering at it from a close distance. It slid down below the deck after a while and carried on doing whatever it is pythons do at night.

We’ve got the contract for the median strip cleaning again, which helps pay half the wages each month, and also a few good landscaping jobs as well the last couple of weeks. I’m still hopeful of getting the street cleaning contract, that is going to take a while though while the council people are still doing it in their half hearted push a broom down the gutter way. Another month or so and I’ll have another word with them.

Our coconut mulcher has had a good workout the last week. The ladies spent this afternoon feeding our composted bark and chicken manure through it, to break it down even more so we can use it as potting mix and mulch for the planter tubs on the median strip. It fed through really well, and came out broken down and not as chunky as plain wood chip. Really hot digging into the heap, if it hadn’t been raining, I think it would have self combusted easily.

I’ve got a few slide pics of it, once Rose takes the film back to NZ for processing and sends it back I’ll send a scan to Rover Industries in Australia with a bit of a recommendation, and a begging letter for freebies if they have any.

If anyone is contemplating visiting the Solomon Islands I can recommend Savo Island resort. It’s cheap, close to Honiara, about a 45 min boat trip, and has a lot of things to keep you occupied if you want to be occupied, and good beaches if all you want to do is sleep on the sand.

SBD$150pp, breakfast smorgasbord $50, lunch and dinner smorgasbord $70, any trips, activities $50 plus guide and village fees, usually about $20pp. I’ll do one of the volcano walks with Rose, hopefully a bit of fishing, and a lot of pictures.

Most of our contracts for the roundabouts are due again soon, we get businesses in Honiara to sponsor a roundabout, ANZ Bank, Telekom etc, and they put up the maintenance budget for each one, and advertise on the roundabout, or we plant the name of the sponsor like we have for ANZ. I’m going through the contracts and trying to work out hours and allocations so we can get a better figure than the guesswork one we’ve been working with.

I’ve still got a bit of sinus trouble, but not as bad as last week, I can breathe and put up with it now. I’m out of antibiotics, so I’ll have to be careful for a while.
Sandy at work is trying to find a business to start on his land on Malaita, he is the eldest in his family, so it’s his to do with a he wishes. We’re looking at coffee if he can get the height into the ridge, or cocoa and vanilla if he hasn’t got the elevation for arabica. He wants to do tourism as well, so we’re looking at plantation style with accommodation and restaurant, with optional activities. It’ll take him a year or so to go through all the planning and financing, but if he starts now, he should be well placed when the tourists start coming back in a few years. There are a couple of coffee and cocoa plantations doing it now here, and they are making a living from it, as well as the income from the coffee/cocoa.

Happy Easter, I may be in over the weekend, depends on the weather and how much I can find to do.