Musket Cove was nice, and turned out to be good that we moved and got there when we did. The weather turned a little, got windy and overcast. Wednesday was nice though, we checked out the Marina and resort at Musket Cove and the Plantation Resort next door. They had some activities planned for Fiji day too. We also checked out the dive shop and dive spots. Decided we would do the Plantation pinnacles. The moorings at Musket Cove are 15FJD per day, seem to be pretty solid, good thing, because we saw some sustained 27-30 knot winds that evening.
Thursday (Fiji Day) started out sunny, but windy so no diving for us. Josh and Dennis did homework, Paul and I went in and walked around. Not much going on at Musket Cove, and too lazy (me that is) to walk back to the Plantation Resort to see if they had anything going. So we read our books. By then it had gotten overcast to go with the wind. Friday was more of the same, sunny but pretty windy. Dennis and I did a walk around Malolo on the beach. We decided to complete our circle at the golf course, and as we were walking through, one of the maintenance workers headed over on his mower. We though for sure we were gonna get kicked off, but instead he offered us a drinking coconut! Nice. Just what we needed after our walk. A little further on I asked another maintenance guy to cut it open so we could eat the soft nut - yum my favorite.
Everyone has now used the paddle board. It works kinda for Dennis - the paddle is way too short though. Josh took it out for another really long paddle while we were there.
Saturday turned out to be the perfect morning for a dive. Dennis, Josh and I were off in the dinghy by 0745. Finding the place was not as straightforward as we thought it was going to be. We were just about to give up, when a panga from the Lamolo resort came by and pointed us in the right direction - easy to find if you know where it is! Was a nice pinnacle dive to 70 feet with a swim thru tunnel at the base. Cool! We saw a school of bigger (read shootable by Josh standards) fish, some moorish idols the size of dinner plates and at the top of the pinnacle (apporx 25 ft) there were lots of anenome with the clown fish (? or anenome fish?) hiding in them - I love those. So it was a nice dive. Dennis snorkeled some, but didn't dive. Right at the end of the dive, my BCD started to leak, so was good that only one set of us dove.
Back at the boat it was waffles for breakfast, plus eggs and sausage. Diving works up an appetite. We took my BCD in to the dive shop and were told "very old gear". No kidding, I figure it is about 24 years old. Bob and Nancy - remember helping me choose it? My regulator is still in good shape, no problems with it. We decided not to refill the tanks as there is enough air to do another dive or retrieve an anchor. Picked up a few things at the marina store and back to the boat.
Sunday we took off for our next destination which turned out to be 3 islands close together, the only one whose name I remember is Vanua Levu (not the big one). We wound our way thru the reef, past what would have been a great lunch spot if it hadn't been over run by tourists from a small cruise ship. Nice little sandy atoll surrounded by snorkeling reef. Oh well. Instead we anchored next to a 138 foot catamaran. Had lunch and a snorkel then onto our anchorage, which we made by 1730. A little late, but it was still daylight. There was a big motor yacht (at least 100 feet) named Dragonfly and 3 other small boats like us. In the morning we were joined by a beautiful 153 foot ketch, and a cruise ship. The cruise ship inundated the snorkel area by us. We figured they would be there about an hour then leave, then we would snorkel. Turned out to be a true prediction, but... No sooner had the original cruise ship left, then the big ketch moved to their place and another smaller cruise ship came. It happened so fast that Dennis didn't even realize the cruise ships were different. So, we had breakfast and then did our snorkel and walked on the beach. I took a picture for the group from the cruise ship as they all hung out in the water with their sodas and fiji bitters. On the way back we chatted with them (from KiriKiri in Northern NZ) nice folks. Maybe we will catch up with them again.
Another 2 hour hop and now we are anchored on the southern shore of Waya. Officially in the Yasawas. It is another pretty anchorage and better yet - internet. I think we will do our first real sevusevu here. I will let you know.
Hard to believe it is the middle of October already. We will probably head back to Vuda Point within a week, and start prepping for the jump to NZ. Guess there is a good weather window even as we speak. Hopefully we can time it just right to be ready for the next one.
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