Fanning Island
By any measure, Fanning Island is one of the most remote places
on earth, an isolated speck in the vast South Pacific well over 1,000 miles
south of Hawaii and more than 500 miles north of Tahiti. Fanning is part of the
Republic of Kiribati (formerly the Gilberts), and its capital, Tarawa, lies far
to the west, more than 2,000 miles away, with nothing but open water in
between. The 1,200 residents of Fanning (or it might be 1,600 or maybe 2,000;
it keeps changing and no one has made an accurate count) exist amicably in the
dreamy, time-honored fashion of South Pacific paradises.
A handsome,
brown-skinned people, they are polite, gentle and shy. They live in grass
shacks, or, more accurately, shacks of coconut fronds and pandanus leaves. The
traditional dress, for men and women, is a sarong. They live off the land and
the sea: fish, coconuts, taro, pumpkin and papaya. They have no telephones, no
running water, no electricity (and by extension, no computers, no television,
no video games, no movies).
The only way to get here is by ship. Or when you think you can swim 800 miles, you can try to leave from Hawaii. Possible but not recommendable....I guess.
If you could run around the island, you would run 40 miles but there aer several openings in the atoll which makes it impossible to do this.
I did half a marathon and that's as far as I could run till I reached a big opening where the currant is too strong. I did some water crossings but those were only knee-deep openings in the atoll. The people are great, all 1000 of them.
The only way to get here is by ship. Or when you think you can swim 800 miles, you can try to leave from Hawaii. Possible but not recommendable....I guess.
If you could run around the island, you would run 40 miles but there aer several openings in the atoll which makes it impossible to do this.
I did half a marathon and that's as far as I could run till I reached a big opening where the currant is too strong. I did some water crossings but those were only knee-deep openings in the atoll. The people are great, all 1000 of them.
