Now in Fiji

After having checked out on Friday, with a departure date of Saturday, I stayed out in two anchorage for the weekend before leaving the party islands of Tonga. This worked out quite well since it was raining almost the whole weekend and there was little or no wind to work with.

Spent another night in Port Maurelle, where I was lucky to find two Dutch boats: Mama Cocha and Stamper. Took all the Dutch books I could fit in my bags in the dinghy and did a giant book swap. Got some great reading material back, probably about 50 books total. Some real good books, and maybe also some lesser stuff, but always better than reading the labels of the tin cans on board (the last resort when everything else on the boat has been read, including engine manuals). Also had a great morning chatting with Pieter and Maria, who showed me their beautiful boat: a Koopmans design (which by itself is already great) that was built in Sint Annaland (of all places, that is exactly 7km from my home town, unbelievable).

Later that day I sailed (well, mostly motored) to Hunga, an outlying island of the Vava’u group, where you enter through a 20 meter narrow passage. It is quite tricky, but it all worked out ok. There was the rest of the dangerous bunch: Willow, Bodhran, Veleda, Aguja and Fearless. We had a great last night party, jamming our own music (where my minimal contribution is percussion, just trying to not screw up the beat). This was a great bunch of people with which we had been jamming before. Real musicians were Jim on banjo, Greg on mandoline and Jason on guitar. There are some pictures on Jason Rose’s web site, go check it out.

Monday morning we did a last good bye circle to the other boats, both Willow and myself were leaving for Fiji. But Willow heading for Suva, where Morning Light left for Savusavu. We ended up staying close for the first two days, but than our paths diverged while Willow kept going due west, where I had to veer further north.

Was a pretty rough ride out there, wind was over 20 knots the whole trip. With a period of 30 knots more or less consistently when I lowered main and genoa to sail just on the stay sail. It was a bit bumpy at times, but it all stayed within control: making sure the boat speed would not keep hitting into the 7 knots. There was a number of other boats around, sometimes within radio (VHF) range. One had a broken rudder (Yomana, a Beneteau, which, for the experts, is all that needs to be said). Nightwind ended up giving them a tow for over 200 miles. It all worked out ok. Navigating between the Fiji islands was supposed to be quite tricky, as it stories amongst sailors go around they keep making it sound harder and harder. But it all turned out quite ok, the charts were accurate and all the islands are high. The depth sounder never registered bottom until the harbor of Suvasuva, just the way I like it.

Checking in turned out to be quite easy, I picked up a mooring (helped by someone from the marina, making it all very easy) and all officials came to the boat. They did all the paperwork (plenty of forms) and it was done in about 2 hours. Then I went into town to get some money, and went walking to the hospital (to pay the health official’s bill) and a gas station (to pay the agriculture official). It is a nice place here, town with lots of store, looks like this is a step up (shopping wise) from Tonga. Tonga was a great stop, but shopping was a quite limited experience (onions, tomatoes, bell pepper, bread, cheese and beer was about all that was available).

Plan on doing some cruising here among the Fijian islands. There are lots of places to go to, and have to make a plan which ones to visit. Another two Dutch boats here, Sabatical and Magnet, but have not yet met their crew.

Have been adding other web sites to the blogroll, check out the Other Cruisers column on the left bottom of the page,

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