Aoloautuai Camping

With no weekend plans, we jumped on a friend's suggestion on Friday to go camping. After some Saturday morning debates on where exactly we should go camping, we opted for one spot that a number of palagi went one of my first weekends here: Aoloautuai. It's a remote bay on the north side of the island that is known for having good fishing and snorkeling. There are only two ways into the bay, either hike down from the end of the ridge road that goes to Aoloaufua Ridge or to boat in. Our friend who owns a boat is off-island, so we were packing our way in.

We loaded up the boat owner's pickup truck (he left the keys with another one of our fellow

campers) and headed out to the trail head. We managed to pick up a friend on layover. She'd been travelling around the South Pacific after her contract was over and had a day and a half layover in American Samoa, so she joined in our hike.

We drove to the end of the Aoloaufua road at the top of the ridge. There are a few houses there. We knocked on the door of the nearest one and got permission to leave a car there and take the hike down to the bay, a few, uninhabited miles below.

We then started the hike down. Most hikes I'm used to starting at the bottom and working your way to the top and back. It was a little disorienting to start our hike at the highest point and then head down.

The track followed a ridge line down through the rain forest. It followed a double track road for the first several hundred yards, which ended into a roughly built fale that overlooked a few bays. From there the track quickly became overgrown with grass and vines. Sara was able to pick out one of the vines that the Japanese students at her position in Australia called Kuru Kuru, something that roughly translates to curly, which is what they nicknamed her for their month there.

The trail continued to descend along the ridge line. The further down we got, the taller the forest canopy got. We even started to develop an under story, which is unusual here, since the forest is so thick, little light gets through to breed another layer of flora. Other than a few spider webs and terrestrial hermit crabs, there wasn't much wildlife to see. When the brush would open up we could occasionally catch views of the west side of Cock's Comb. I'd never been on that side of the peninsula, looking at the rock formation from the other side I realized there's starting to be only a few spots I haven't been on this island yet.

Eventually the steep track started to take its toll. This was the roughest hike that Sara and I have tried on Tutuila thus far. It started to beat up her still healing leg. The steep and slick track also took its toll and near the bottom her legs started to give out a little bit. Luckily, before all was lost we hit the flat lands and the banana

and coconut forest that led up to the beach. Once we worked our way out of the brush we found ourselves on an open beach that was made up of coral and sand.

There was some evidence of people using the beach for fishing, but it saw very little recent use. We made our camp a little upland for the high tide mark and then set about exploring the beach. I made it a point to gather up some drift wood for a bonfire. We'd had such good experiences with that at Amalau, that it was worth repeating.

While gathering up the drift wood, something on the beach caught my attention.

There were a number a blue jelly fish left drying out by the receding tide. Recalling some warnings about Portugese Man 'O'War that I had read somewhere along the way, I pointed these out to the rest of the group. Enough of us shared my suspicions that these were the dreaded stingers of the South Pacific that we didn't end up getting in the water that afternoon. Better safe than peeing on a friend's leg to try and neutralize a tentacle sting.

In lieu of swimming and exploring the reef, we made camp and went hunting for seashells. Eventually, one friend had to hike out on her own, as it was her second to last night on the island. The four of us that remained feasted on pasta salad and beans. We then spent an evening enjoying the camp bar staple of whiskey and Crystal Lite. Only the finest for us tropical campers. A bonfire carried us well into evening and we retired at a somewhat reasonable hour.

We woke up the next morning to another round of jelly fish washed up on the shore. So, again, no water time for us. After some leisurely tuna sandwiches and fruit we broke camp and started hiking back out. With only an up hike, the going was pretty easy on my knees. We made it up to the car without too many issues. The hike up ended up being easier than the hike down. Now I just need to get my legs in shape for some of the longer hauls on the island.

Aoloautuai was pretty great, but I am eager to go back and explore the reef with a snorkel mask on. We just need to hope the invertebrates will cooperate.