2. How To Get There

Travel in the Pacific usually consumes either too much time or too much money. Sonsorol remains one of the least accessible islands in the entire area. No commercial airline lands there. Freighters carry cargo to Sonsorol from Mindanao, Java, Taiwan, Hong Kong and other ports, but the only ship which calls there with some regularity is The Queen of Yap, a rusty tramp steamer which plies between Zamboanga and the Caroline Islands, roughly once a month. (Information and reservations can be obtained from the Ngulu Maritime Co. Ltd., Kalabat, Yap, U.S. Trust Territory of the Pacific.)

Port Watson is now the only port of entry for Sonsorol, and no Customs & Immigration Authority exists there. However, no one can hope to escape notice in a town so small. Anyone who stays more than a month or so will probably be asked politely either to apply for residence or else leave (see How to Become a Resident).

Visitors to the Republic of Sonsorol (outside the Port Watson Enclave) are encouraged to have their passports stamped at the Post Office at Government House in Sonsorol City--the "visa" stamp is quite beautiful--but no one will insist on this. Neither Port Watson nor the Republic have any police, so the residents tend to watch out for trouble and take responsibility for solving problems. Unfriendly, abusive, thieving or obstreperous visitors have been beaten up by vigilantes or Peoples' Militia, and exiled on the next ship out. Generally however visitors are welcome ("not tourists, but visitors," the Sultan said once), and the inhabitants are friendly, even excessively so.

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