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I didn’t realize that the U.S. had a territory in the South Pacific, but they do, American Samoa. And, it turns out there is a 2nd U.S. territory here called Jarvis Island. These were important in the 19th and 20th centuries due to their locations as re-fueling posts for both military and commercial ships.
Interestingly, in 1889, a German naval force invaded a village in Samoa, and by doing so destroyed some American property. Three American warships then entered the Apia harbor and prepared to engage three German warships. Before guns were fired, a typhoon wrecked both the American and German ships. As they couldn’t “fight it out”, they ended up just dividing the area in two, so now there is an American Samoa and a German Samoa!
The island is lush, like all of the islands we’ve seen; it was formed a long time ago by volcanoes. The American Samoans, while having no official voting capabilities in U.S. elections, can travel freely to and from the U.S. They are self-governed and primarily follow their historic tribal laws.
We walked around the downtown area a bit and found an Internet Café where Dale, once again, tried to upload his South America blog book. And, once again, failed. It seems this is not meant to be until we reach New Zealand or worst case, Australia.
We spoke to some folks who rented a car and drove around the island. It’s a pretty island with lots of natural beauty. There was a nice park area and they said the water is warm, but there was a very rocky beach. They saw people trying to swim but it was too shallow and they ended up getting cut on the rocks! I think we’ll wait to do our next snorkeling trip in Fiji!
Back on the ship we had a bit of an incident…in an attempt to plug our power strip in an outlet close to our veranda; I ended up shorting out the electricity in the entire room! Guess you can’t put a plug converter (to plug a U.S. power strip into an international plug) on a power strip with a surge protector! The power strip “popped” and started smoking (I was holding it at the time). Oops. It took about 3 hours to get the fuse changed in our room…can’t really complain though as it was our own fault!
Tomorrow is another Sea day and then we cross the International Date Line…where we lose a whole day! More on this later…
Trip Summary » Travel with Dale & Margaret - […] Pago Pago, American Samoa […]