I’ve been here a while now and not really explained how we came to be here or who we are with: The Von Engelbrechtens. With huge respect and thanks and love this is a short tale of this Fofoa based family.
My friend Karyn is one of my oldest and dearest friends. We go back to meeting aged 14 at school. She was the experienced cool girl, I was the utterly shell shocked new girl. We bonded over photos of Africa, she’d just returned from a family holiday in Kenya, and I was able to tell her a little of my childhood. A shared spirit of adventure, a love of noodles, and a good sense of just and righteous naughtiness bonded us as best mates.
Years later I’m squatting in London, living on the road protests, travelling the world, leading adventure holidays abroad or filming random not to be aired documentaries…and I wonder where my old pal has gone. She’s been sucked into a comfy life and a (not to be sniffed at) good job and long term partner. They seem so settled I think we have travelled far apart. I find myself wondering sometimes if she took the better path, she has more money and ‘success’ than me, she seems so much more grown up. (Do you know what; she still does – maybe that’s just a habit of mine, to always be the eternal teenager amongst my friends?)
Then suddenly I’m at her flat, the usual bunch of close girlfriends all around, celebrating her leaving party. She’s quit her job, her boyfriend, and sold the flat. She’s off alone aged 29, to travel the world. The best decision. Not just for her, but for so many of us close friends. It reminds us that life can always change, we can take big leaps in life towards a change we want. Karyn has been an inspiration. As I settled, struggling with conforming to a more stable life and a tricky partnership that I felt should work, and we almost swopped lives. Hearing of her adventures kept me afloat.
On her journey Karyn travelled through Africa and visited the exotic island of Zanzibar along the way. There she met the super cool and lovely Boris Von Engelbrechten, running his own beach front hotel. They fell in love but Karyn was determined to continue her travels, only realising just how much she missed him when she was sleeping in her ashram in India so far away. A year later that same bunch of girlfriends and I, partied on a tropical beach celebrating their wedding. With them, their new friends and family, and their 6 month old baby Jack.
Not much later, with a desire to bring up a family somewhere safer but still close to nature, they move to New Zealand. They spend a happy 5 years there with another 2 baby boys completing the family, but still Boris had itchy feet, and yearned for something more. Having lived the high life in Zanzibar life felt a bit flat and tame. Boris would head off on solo explorations to pacific islands with a hope to finding a new home. One day he stumbled upon the land overlooking the Blue Lagoon. 8 acres with no building but with beach front and water tanks and the most stunning azure views. He phoned Karyn to tell her about it and she said; “we could have a happy ordinary life here, or we could have a happy extra-ordinary one….” They chose the later of course and here we are today 7 years on with them.
Considering just how far away she has been living, I have seen a fair bit of my friend Karyn over those last 7 years. Not a lot, but enough to have laughed together and kept our friendship alive. (A joint 40th birthday celebration with our same special girlfriends in Marrakech was awesome) but in all that time I never really realised just how hard their living was and how much she has been through to get to where we are today. We have arrived at the end of an epic 7 years of hard toil, adventure, and a labour of love. We arrived at a dream home, the off grid beach front log cabin of glossy lifestyle books. I finally understand how much it took to get here and I have a whole new found respect for my friends.
In our first few weeks of being here there was so much to take in and so much to learn. We stumbled through days like sleepy toddlers, feeling clumsy and inept in our new surroundings, trying to acclimatise, fit in, and rediscover, or begin, friendships. We went straight into busy days of the beach house season catering for guests, but in the evenings, after serving the dinner and washing up, we’d sit round and drink and talk late. It was so exciting to hear their tales of life out here and to fill in the gaps of what I already knew.
At first they rented a house in town, a good way to get to know the community, begin to understand Tonga, and much easier with 3 young children. Boris would spend weeks alone out on Fofoa, gradually clearing the land with the help of some hefty Tongans. Lots of trees had to be felled from the beach up in order to make a clearing big enough to start building. Everything had to be done by hand and Boris had to learn how to fell and mill the timber. The log cabin build began but changed shape and form at various times learning by mistakes along the way. Over the years many people got involved; Woofers, old friends, Tongan friends and neighbours all got stuck in. Progress is slow here with anything. Everything needs to be delivered from the main island (11 nautical miles away) and most things have to get there by being shipped in from New Zealand or further. The salty sea air takes it’s toll on anything with moving parts here, tools rust and age dramatically fast, and it’s near impossible to replace broken parts. Of course there was no phone reception, no internet, no mains water, and no electricity, indeed so many of the thing we take for granted. Electricity generation had to be learnt and batteries were (are) charged from solar, wind, and diesel genies. Food was scarce and Boris had learn to eat like the Tongans, cooking up shells from the beach or tasteless hunks of yam and chicken. Meanwhile Karyn was caring for the kids and sending Jack to local school. Soon enough she realised that however hard it was, it would be better to be to be out on the island with Boris, than separated by staying in town. So, after 2 years in town they all moved out to Fofoa. They lived in tents for 6 months, through sunshine, rains and hurricanes. Karyn had to learn to cook on an open fire, overcome her big fear of sharks in the water, and learn to drive a boat.
All whilst looking after 3 small kids. What’s even more remarkable is she raised money and founded a kindergarten for the local village of Hunga, taught there, and sent her own kids there. The kids and Karyn has to walk over the island each day, get the small dinghy and chug over Hunga lagoon, moor it, and walk up the steep hill to the village to get to school. I’m sure there were beautiful idyllic island days but I know there were also tougher days with high winds and rain and tired crying kids.
As the house build continued slowly but steadily, whilst they lived in its incomplete shell, money supplies were dwindling and Boris and Karyn realised they needed to swiftly find a sourced of income. They had to leave their own home build for a while in order to begin the Beach House build. A vision in Boris’s head has evolved into a stunning and mad creation overhanging the blue lagoon. It took 9 months to complete and gave them a wonderful place to live for a few months last year whilst they completed the final work to their home Happy Api.
There were times over the years when Karyn returned to live in Vava’u for the kids to go to school, or because she felt she’d loose her head in the isolation. Moving to Tonga put a huge strain on their marriage but they have both found the courage and love to continue.
Over the years Karyn has worked hard at loosing her fear of sharks (or, like all of us 80’s kids at least learning to stop the music) and a few years ago trained as a whale swim guide.
We are so lucky to be joining them the year when finally things begin to get easy, finally they are seeing the fruits of their labour.
This year Karyn started homeschooling again, and the whole family is living full time together again. The final touches went into Happy Api so it’s a lovely home complete with coral rock open showers and now has doors on the bedrooms. They successfully launched their first full season of renting out the guest house, offering catering, fishing (Boris is the skipper and champion game fisher!) and whale swimming to the guests. All leave charmed by the beautiful place they have created and by the Von Engelbrechtens.
I’m so proud of my friends following their dream to fruition and I hope to see it grow into something even more. Ultimately the Beach House enables them to live here in this special place, and gives the kids a wild and free childhood, but I’ll be interested to see what Karyn does next to further her personal, intellectual and creative side.
I hope we’ll be around to share more of their story and be part of it, just like I hope they’ll be joining ours…when we finally discover what it is.
The programme yesterday was very interesting but I was left confused at how on earth they made a living and could’nt quite believe that Boris could have built that amazing house all on his own. Reading your blog has filled in the gaps but I think the programme perhaps should have explained a bit more like- how were they going to afford to send Jack to boarding school in NZ?
Your friends are amazing and have a lot of guts to live this lifestyle. If I could afford it I would love to stay in their beach house for a couple of weeks with my family but I would most certainly stuggle to live there!
Good luck to them !!!
Glad I could fill in the gaps! I am yet to see the programme (now in Vietnam) but was also surprised they chose not to talk about how they made their living – setting up a business in Tonga is just as challenging as building a home. It is indeed an amazing place and they are great people. Thanks for reading x
Found your posts through doing a quick internet search after the fascinating Channel 4 programme about your friends. Love your interesting pieces and beautiful photos. Will look again on a dull Nuneaton afternoon when I am in need of wider horizons and inspiration.
Thank you for sharing, x
Hi, Thanks for reading. I hope I gave a fuller picture of life in Tonga than Kevin did! S x
Hi Susie, I just saw Karyn’s Kevin McCloud program tonight and then came across her and your websites. Fascinating! I emigrated to Australia 10 years ago… and am also a fan of New Zealand. Feel free to email me if you would like to catch up. Cheers Caroline from school… and from up the road in our primary years!