Mystery Island: An Uninhabited Cay and the Busiest Cruise Call

A cay with an airstrip

Mystery Island — Inyeug in the local language — is a small uninhabited cay off the south coast of Aneityum. An airstrip runs almost its full length, laid during the Second World War and still in occasional use.

Why the ships stop

It is Vanuatu's busiest cruise call. Passengers tender ashore, snorkel directly off the sand and buy from a market that the people of Aneityum set up for the day and take down afterwards. Nobody lives on the cay: it is regarded as a place where people do not stay overnight.

What is actually there

A beach, a reef in good condition close to shore, shade at the margins and the airstrip. That is the whole of it, and that is the appeal — but it means a visit outside a ship day requires arranging a boat from Anelghowhat.

Inyeug

Mystery Island is the name used by the cruise industry. Locally it is Inyeug. The cay covers well under a square kilometre and is low, sandy and ringed by reef, lying a few hundred metres off the south coast of Aneityum.

Why nobody lives there

The cay is held to be inhabited by spirits, and people do not stay overnight. Everyone who works a ship day crosses from Aneityum in the morning and returns in the evening. This is a customary position, not a shortage of space, and it is the reason the place empties completely.

The airstrip

A grass strip runs most of the length of the cay, originally laid during the Second World War. Domestic flights still use it, which makes Mystery Island the arrival point for anyone visiting Aneityum.

A ship day

Stalls go up along the sand, boats run snorkelling trips out to the reef, and several hundred to a couple of thousand passengers come ashore. By late afternoon everything is packed down and carried back across the water. The reef is genuinely good and is accessible directly from the beach.

Visiting off a ship

Possible, by arranging a boat from Anelghowhat. There are no facilities on a non-ship day — no shade structures, no water, nobody there — and the crossing depends on conditions.

Reef and lagoon

The reef ringing Inyeug is shallow, wide and in better condition than most reef within reach of a cruise tender anywhere. Coral cover is high close to the beach on the sheltered side, and the water is clear enough that snorkelling requires nothing beyond a mask.

What a ship day is worth

Aneityum has almost no cash economy outside the cruise calls. On a ship day the market on the sand is run by families from the main island who cross in the morning with produce, carving and shell work; the boats, the guides and the transfers are theirs as well. The visits are a substantial part of what the island earns in a year.

Arriving by air

For anyone not on a ship, the airstrip on the cay is the way in to Aneityum. The aircraft lands on Inyeug, passengers cross by boat, and the cay reverts to being empty as soon as they have gone.

The cay itself

Inyeug is low, flat and vegetated with coconut and scrub at the centre, with sand on all sides. It can be walked around in well under an hour. There is no fresh water and no permanent structure beyond the airstrip and a few open shelters.

Cruise numbers

Ships calling here carry from several hundred to a couple of thousand passengers, and the cay takes the whole complement ashore across a few hours. The scale is the reason the reef is managed with some care: damage would end the calls, and everyone involved understands that.