Underway Again

We have been watching the weather carefully over the last few days, trying to decide when to leave Savusavu, and the decision was made yesterday afternoon to leave today as conditions looked pretty good. We were up at 5.30am this morning, a still, sunny morning, and motored out the bay at 6.30am. The wind stayed light, between 3 and 7 knots and we enjoyed using the new big red reacher sail successfully, cruising along between 3 and 4 knots on flat seas. We are at the start of a 4-5 day cruise along the coasts of southern Vanua Levu and northern Viti Levu to the Lautoka region, anchoring in a different spot each night. We are currently anchored in Navatu Bay, a peaceful and sheltered spot behind the reefs and up near the mangroves. We have just had a visitor from the local village, a 13 year old lad on a bamboo raft, who was most interested in Katipo.

We found it hard to leave Savusavu. We so enjoyed our time there, an interesting place and very social. In between meals of Wahoo, we ate out at some great Indian restaurants with fellow yachties. We also spent quite a few fun evenings at the Savusavu yacht club watching some World Cup Rugby games while testing the Fiji Beers. Watching the All Blacks defeat the French was a particularly fun night - there were quite a few French yachties there as well as Kiwis and other nationalities - so some friendly rivalry.

We boarded the bus to Labasa at 7.30am one morning for the 2 1/2 journey over the mountains to the north coast of Vanua Levu. The craggy, jungle clad scenery was dramatic and we had plenty of time to admire it as the old bus ground up the hills in first gear! Labasa is centred in one of the main sugar cane areas of Fiji. It is harvest time at the moment and we saw dozens of trucks with huge loads making their way to the Sugar Mill in Labasa. At the mill itself, long lines of trucks were waiting to have their loads weighed and processed. Labasa has more Indo Fijians than Savusavu, making it a colourful place. We saw a couple of temples, one Hindu and one Sikh, and could not resist the Hare Krishna restaurant for morning tea and lunch. We tried some interesting delicacies such as spiced taro leaves, made into a flat patty and fried and Masala tea. We meandered through the fruit and veg and fish markets and also the general market, the air heavily laden with the scent of exotic spices. The return trip was even longer. The bus was full to overflowing with school children and workers heading home. It stopped often to drop off and collect passengers, an opportunity to see the mountain villages. It was very dark for the latter half of the journey and we were amazed to see people climb off the bus into what seemed very remote places - they disappeared into the blackness, no sign of habitation to be seen.

Tomorrow, we are heading through the Nasonisoni Passage, across Wainuni Bay to Coconut Point - we are hoping for a sunny day so that we can see our way through the coral heads.

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Savu Savu Fiji

We are really enjoying this small Fijian town. We are on a mooring within easy rowing distance of the boat club wharf and the centre of Savu Savu is only 5 minutes walk away. There are plenty of supplies in the supermarket and an excellent and very cheap fruit and vegetable market where we bought bananas, paw paw etc and a huge avocado. This type of avocado is about 4 times as big as the ones available in NZ . We are very careful to wash all fruit coming onto the boat to make sure we are not bringing stowaway insects onboard. We have found that there is an insect which looks like an earwig, but much more loathesome, which hides in bunches of bananas. We first came across them in Samoa. What we now do is to suspend the bunch on a piece of line and leave it hanging off the back of the boat for a while in the sea. After a while a gasping earwig or two comes to the surface and floats away. I found one in today's bunch and rushed off to get my camera but it had gone by the time I got back! However we will try and get a picture of one soon and hopefully organise for some more photos to go onto the blog.

We lunched on vegetable samosas and cassava chips today washed down with a Fiji Bitter beer. There are quite a few small restaurants here, especially Indian ones. There is a high percentage of Indians here, descendants of the Indian workers brought in to work in the sugar cane industry about a hundred years ago. On Monday we will take the local bus across the island to Labasa which apparently is a spectacular ride across the highlands and is one important centre of sugar cane farming.

Last night we had a meal with a bunch of Yachties at the Marina where they put on a Fijian Feast of taro, cassava, breadfruit, taro leaves and coconut sauce, crab, plantains, fish and much more all for about 7 $NZ

We will be here at least a week. We want to see a lot more of this lush island. The creek where we are anchored is surrounded by mountains densely covered with tropical rain forest.

There is huge interest in the Rugby world cup here and we will be watching the All Black game against France on Saturday at the Savusavu Yacht club bar at the Copra Shed!

The long bearded American running the moorings here is a great character and he also is an expert in Led lights which he sells for boats, so we have bought an LED anchor light to hang off the forestay since we are awaiting our replacement tricolour and anchor light which failed at the mast head in Samoa. Crewman Ted will be bringing the new mast head light with him when he comes up from Auckland next month.
We will send another blog within a few days before we leave here.
Now let me see - what is for tea tonight - oh yes Wahoo!

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Safely in SavuuSavu

We are now safely on a mooring buoy in Savu Savu in the calm of an estuary - it us just like being at home ! Great place , a bustling little town along the shores. We have just been into the yacht club for the first hot shower since May! We also had a quick shoping expedition for fruit, vegetables etc
There are many folk here who we have seen in other places and it has been good to catch up hence we have just come back to Katipo for a late blog
Had little sleep in the last 48 hours since stronger winds in latter part of trip than expected. Last night we spent 8 hours hove to in the lee of Taveuni Island which was amazingly successful, sheltered from the 20 to 25 knots with gusts to 30 in the Nanuka Passage.
We did so to take a break and get some rest and also by leaving at midnight we came into Savu Savu mid morning.
Will write more tomorrow - we are just cooking Wahoo for tea - yahoo!

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Update

Coordinates:17 05 179 58 W
Bearing:257M
Boat Speed: 5
Wind Direction:SE
Wind Strength: 20
Sea state: 1.5m swell

We are currently sailing along the Fijian coast but it will not be possible to get into Savusavu today in daylight so we will likely heave to and go in tomorrow. We have slowed down the boat speed at this point to try and just tick along !
Will write more tomorrow.

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at last an Acanthocybium Solanderi

Coordinates: 16 13 S 178 47 W
Bearing: M
Boat Speed: 3.7
Wind Direction: south but squall so will likely go back to SE
Wind Strength: 9 Kn
Sea state: mild swell

Crew health: jubiliant

Fish caught: A giant Wahoo - I just checked its full name in my fishing book - see above

A nasty squally night and heaps of rain today - must be a front going through and in the middle of this we hooked a large Wahoo this morning!
We had to immediately drop the genoa while we tried to bring him up to the boat. It was impossible to lift the gaffed fish up and over the side of the boat as he was too heavy - he must have weighed somewhere in the 35 to 40 kg range so we lowered the stern ramp and slid him up there - I have often joked with people about the fact that we use the ramp to land fish - but it works a treat!

I measured the fish for length with the gaff and if I was to pick him up with his tail touching the ground the end of his jaw would be at my eye level!
The freezer is now stocked to the top with Wahoo so we will not be fishing again for a while.
It seems like it will be a fairly slow passage to Fiji with the weather as it is.

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Bound for the Fiji Isles

Coordinates: 15 08 S 177 49 W
Bearing: 210 M
Boat Speed: 3.6 Knots
Wind Direction: NE
Wind Strength: 6.5 Kn
Sea state: slight swell

Crew health: Great

Fish caught: any moment now !

The wind is light as forecast and we are just thinking about getting out the light weather reacher sail.
We left Wallis yesterday morning at 09.00 and motored through the long lagoon to the pass out through the reef. As expected the water was flowing out at a good rate with heaps of upwellings and turbulence of the water. The South Pacific Pilot Book warns of a current which can set you onto the reef on the West side, so we were on our guard. However the current and the boat's motor
shot us out at 6.5 knots and we were on our way.
Good wind to start this leg of the voyage but today is another sunny, hot clear day with a dropping wind. We have just spied another sail on the horizon which seems strange when you are used to having the ocean to one's self. We suspect it is another yacht which left before us yesterday.
We are looking forward to reaching SavuSavu in Fiji where we can stock up again and buy more fresh fruit. There seemed limited fresh food available to buy in Wallis island although they had for example a splendid range of imported French cheese!

Today we removed the dressing and gingerly removed the half cast from Denise's wrist. The swelling has all gone and it looked pretty healthy in there! The joint is still fairly sensitive however so we have strapped it up again - it would not do to knock it at this stage.

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bound for Fiji

Coordinates: 13 42 S 176 28 W
Bearing: 210 M
Boat Speed: 5
Wind Direction: ENE
Wind Strength: fluctuates 9 to 15
Sea state:1 m swell

Crew health: great

Fish caught: just lost a Mahi mahi - he shook the hook loose as we were pulling him in !

Other points of interest: all well - we will write more tomorrow

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