Yap travel guide

Rumung is one of Yap's main islands. It's was once connected with a bridge, but the people on Rumung wanted to live more isolated, so they removed it. For many years, Rumung was known as the "Forbidden Island" as outsiders weren't allowed. Today Rumung is little less forbidden, as it's possible to visit, but you need a special invitation and a guide. It's still a very traditional place with only stone paths and traditional men's house - and no roads.

Yap has some of the best diving in the world, but to experience the underwater world of Yam, you need to get the outer reef, which means 30-40 min by speedboat. The Stammtisch dive and snorkel site, close to Rumung Island, is particularly famous for manta rays, as they come here to get cleaned.

Yap is a very traditional place, but not all traditions have been kept. From ancient times they have used big stone money, so-called Rai. Disks carved out of limestone (some from Palau more than 400 km away) with a hole in the middle. The biggest is 3.6 m, while the smaller ones are about 0.5 m. The most perfectly shaped are the newest ones, since they have been carved with better tools, but it doesn’t necessarily reflect a higher value, since it’s the effort and unique history that has been put into the stone money, which decide its value. Since the stone money are too big to be relocated, when they change ownership, they just stay where they are. Each village has a so-called stone money bank and since every exchange is public, everybody knows who owns what (very much like virtual currency today). And people don’t have to live in the same village as the stone money bank. Stone money are (of course) no longer used as currency in Yam, but the locals still exchange them in traditional ways, like when buying land, settle disputes, or maybe getting a wife.

This stone money is placed fairly remote in the woods close to the bridge over the German Channel. You can either reach it by road or you will pass it on a dive tour to the manta sites of Mil Channel and Stammtisch, since the dive boats use the shortcut through the mangrove forest.

As Yap's coast mostly is covered in lush and thick protected mangroves, there are surprisingly few sandy beaches, but this is one. It lies at the end of the village of the same name. As it's part of the village (and exposed thighs for females are taboo in Yap in general), you will probably wait with the sunbathing for another place. The village itself is nice with plenty of stone money. The road is not sealed and potholed at best.

This WWII memorial site is for Girvis W. Haltom Jr. (and other brave men), who was killed in action in 1944. The site only has a flight engine and a memorial stone. It can be hard to find, but there is the usual little sign at the road.

This WWII memorial site is right at the waterfront in Colonia. It's for Howard Allan Holding (and other brave men), who was killed in action in 1944. His plane, a F6F-5 Hellcat, and two others were shot down, while conducting a fighter sweep of the already battered island of Yap. Howard's remains have never been found, so he is still to this day missing in action (MIA). There are no flights remains at the memorial, just an information board. The junk in the picture is a restaurant belonging to the next door dive resort.