# [TUV] Tuvalu roads



## Satyricon84 (Feb 3, 2009)

Tuvalu islands




























Tuvalu islands have about 8 kilometers of road










Street in front of the government building


















Same point, high tide









The road after tide









Bus stop

















































































Funafuti airstrip









Funafuti harbor


----------



## alserrod (Dec 27, 2007)

Nice pics. It is interesting to know about "the other corner in the world".


P.S. Shouldn't be the name of the thread [TV] instead of [TUV]

Let's remember that thanks to .tv they have a greater number of incomings


----------



## Coccodrillo (Sep 30, 2005)

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_international_license_plate_codes


----------



## alserrod (Dec 27, 2007)

edit


----------



## Satyricon84 (Feb 3, 2009)

alserrod said:


> Nice pics. It is interesting to know about "the other corner in the world".


Right. In a year, the archipelago receives no more than around 1000 tourists (There's only one hotel in Vaiaku, the capital town), making Tuvalu one of the most unknown independent country in the world.


----------



## Satyricon84 (Feb 3, 2009)

Other pics




























High tide on the road


----------



## Satyricon84 (Feb 3, 2009)




----------



## Verso (Jun 5, 2006)

Nice pics. Were you there yourself?


----------



## Satyricon84 (Feb 3, 2009)

Verso said:


> Nice pics. Were you there yourself?


Oh no, I have never been in that part of the world. But I'm interested in Tuvalu specially because there's high risk that this country will disappear soon. The highest point of the islands is 4,5 meters above the sea, and due the greenhouse effect, soon could be totally under water (it already happens when the tide is too high). The government already asked the possibility to transfert all population (around 11,000 inhabitants) to New Zealand with a special immigration permit, if this catastropher would happen. The tide is already a problem for them, cause when the seawater evaporates, it leaves salt on the ground, killing the vegetation and the cultivations


----------



## Satyricon84 (Feb 3, 2009)

Tuvalu Road is the longest road in Tuvalu, it runs from the narrow southern tip, through the main village, and up to the northern tip.









Vaiaku Market









The new Government Building in Vaiaku, Funafuti, opened in March 2005. It is the largest building in Tuvalu









Street lights arrived in 2002. The bank is on the left, the Handicraft centre on the right.









Vehicles rust quickly on Funafuti due to the salty conditions.









The Fogafale Bypass is the quickest way from Vaiaku up to Fakai Fou. It by-passes the busy villages running parallel with the airport runway.


----------



## ChrisZwolle (May 7, 2006)

Are there traffic lights or directional signage in Tuvalu? I guess not.


----------



## Satyricon84 (Feb 3, 2009)

Some pictures of Tuvalu in 1978-80

Tuvalu Road before the blacktop









The road on Tegako. Now it's blacktopped









Old Government building









The airport. Grass runway with Air Pacific plane









Airport terminal









Old Handicraft Centre to the right.









Sea warf under costruction


----------



## Satyricon84 (Feb 3, 2009)

ChrisZwolle said:


> Are there traffic lights or directional signage in Tuvalu? I guess not.


Traffic light surely not, directional signage I think not too. There are few junctions on the island. Actually, I haven't seen neither speed limits...


----------



## Satyricon84 (Feb 3, 2009)

Funafuti King Tide, February 2006


----------



## Satyricon84 (Feb 3, 2009)

Through the streets of the capital Vaiaku, bicycle tour


----------



## tbh444 (Jul 31, 2010)

I guess some of these recent developments have been funded by selling of .tv domain names, apparently quite a big chunk of national income these days


----------



## Satyricon84 (Feb 3, 2009)

^^ It could be, better, almost surely...but not only. Another source of profit for Tuvalu are foreign relationship with not recognized countries. Tuvalu has very good diplomatic relation with Taiwan, which has the only foreign embassy in Vaiaku, and it's one of the 5 countries which recognizes South Ossetia and Abhkazia as independent state. For this Tuvalu get/got money from these states (The same was done by Nauru, in searching of founds after depletion of the phosphate mines)


----------



## GROBIN (Feb 27, 2011)

*@Satyricon84* - Pic #10 : a left hand drive car in a small country where people drive on the left ?


----------



## Satyricon84 (Feb 3, 2009)

^^ Yes that's weird... maybe they got from Samoa, cause in 2009 Samoa changed from right-hand traffic to left-hand traffic and there was the problem of the doors of buses. So they had to change it all. Maybe Tuvalu got one used from them


----------



## alserrod (Dec 27, 2007)

Nearest big countries to those islands drive on left (Australia and New Zealand)


----------



## Satyricon84 (Feb 3, 2009)

^^ right that's why Samoa changed... cause before they had to import cars for the United States, while now they can from Australia and New Zealand, where many samoans expat live.

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/8243110.stm


----------



## Satyricon84 (Feb 3, 2009)




----------



## Satyricon84 (Feb 3, 2009)




----------



## Satyricon84 (Feb 3, 2009)




----------



## Satyricon84 (Feb 3, 2009)




----------



## Satyricon84 (Feb 3, 2009)

License plate from Tuvalu. Very rare to spot


----------



## Satyricon84 (Feb 3, 2009)




----------



## Satyricon84 (Feb 3, 2009)




----------



## Satyricon84 (Feb 3, 2009)




----------



## Satyricon84 (Feb 3, 2009)




----------



## Satyricon84 (Feb 3, 2009)




----------



## Satyricon84 (Feb 3, 2009)




----------



## Satyricon84 (Feb 3, 2009)




----------



## Satyricon84 (Feb 3, 2009)




----------



## Satyricon84 (Feb 3, 2009)




----------



## strandeed (May 31, 2009)

what a crap hole... 

Can only imagine growing up there with no prospects or aspirations


----------



## Satyricon84 (Feb 3, 2009)

^^ In reality, the education on Tuvalu is very high thanks to government programs. It has financial assistance from several countries like Australia, New Zealand, Japan, France. The government sends residents who wish to become primary teachers to international institutes of higher education. Secondary school is operated by Tuvalu Christian Church, people learn technical works (carpentery, engineering...). The university is in cooperation with the University of South Pacific in Fiji. On Funafuti atoll there's also the Tuvalu Maritime School since 1981, a training school to become seamen. So I don't see it as a place without prospects or aspirations much more than other places in the world much bigger or not isolated... the bad luck of Tuvalu is that is going underwater due flooding and low avarage altitude, but this is another story


----------



## italystf (Aug 2, 2011)

Satyricon84 said:


> So I don't see it as a place without prospects or aspirations much more than other places in the world much bigger or not isolated...


I live in a small town that has around the same population of this country. Our people need to go often outside the town for many reasons: university, secondary school, work, entairment, buy particular things, etc...
But within few minutes you can see different villages, within few hours also some cities and even go abroad.
I can immagine a so small community located in the middle of the ocean, sevaral hours flight to the closest communities. Living there means not be able to enjoy some services thypical of the civilized world and growing up always in the same restricted place, seeing the same monotonous landscape and the same few stuff. I had the same feeling when I saw Greenland pics.


----------



## Satyricon84 (Feb 3, 2009)

^^ I agree in part with what you said, but there are worse places in the world in which life is harder than in Tuvalu. Think to live in a city in the Democratic Republic of the Congo, where apart the low standard of the life, you have to fight against diseases and the war. Or in the middle of australian desert (or canadian tundra) with venomous snakes and spiders. Or up to the moutains in Nepal... I dont think they enjoy much more the civilized world. And however, not everybody like it. Too much big cities have problems that they don't have for example...


----------



## italystf (Aug 2, 2011)

Satyricon84 said:


> ^^ I agree in part with what you said, but there are worse places in the world in which life is harder than in Tuvalu. Think to live in a city in the Democratic Republic of the Congo, where apart the low standard of the life, you have to fight against diseases and the war. Or in the middle of australian desert (or canadian tundra) with venomous snakes and spiders. Or up to the moutains in Nepal... I dont think they enjoy much more the civilized world. And however, not everybody like it. Too much big cities have problems that they don't have for example...


Off course living with hardly sufficient food or risking being shot every day is worse. I was about writing it in the previous post, but I tought it was a Capitan Obvious-like sentence. Having good and enough food, safety, health care, adeguate clothes, a comfortable house, clean water and electricity is enough to conduct a "human" life, but I think that most Westerners are too accustomed to many unnecessary amenities that they would refuse to live for ever on a remote island that may be Tuvalu, as well Nauru, Maldives, Greenland or even our Lampedusa that is extremely remote for European standards. Off course those lands are fashinating to tourists but living there is another thing. Here in Italy young people use to leave mountain villages because they are too remote and far away from everything. In this case remoteness means 20-30km by car from the closest important town. Not hundreds or thousands of miles of open ocean.


----------

