Another leisurely start to the day, and oh what a beautiful day it has been - on many different levels. The hop over to Matei from matengi was a short one. Today was one of those days that reaffirms the decision to cruise. Bright blue sky with fluffy white clouds, enough wind to sail - what more is there? The sun on the reef on the way in to this anchorage was just beautiful - the colors just popped right out at us. Curly's lure came up empty today, but that's okay there is a store here. There is internet, so Josh is smiling again, catching up with his friends. We made a crew position change today - Josh drove the boat on to the anchorage and Paul (with me supervising) put out the anchor. Couldn't have asked for a better place to do this. Josh owes me 20 bucks as there was absolutely no yelling. Sun overhead helped with the normal anxiety involved with new coral filled anchorages and moderate wind made driving a little easier. All told, stellar jobs by all in their new positions. Josh hurt his back putting out the anchor in Viani - it was all piled up funny after the crossing, so was really hard to get out. So, we are spreading the wealth. It is also good to make sure everyone can do everything - even if it is not their comfort zone.
Can't say we would recommend going to Matengi on the resort side - horseshoe bay may be better. We did get a tour of the resort - It is stunning. The attention to detail really made it stand out. We thought about going in for a meal, but a little on the pricey side - and we probably would have had to dress up. (95 fijian per person for a 3 course meal. not outrageous, but more expensive than chez Evergreen).
After lunch, Dennis, Paul and I piled into the dinghy to do some 'splorin'. They had seen this bright blue roof at the end of a dock on the way over. It was on an island just off the coast of Taveuni (the island)/Matei (the town). As we approached the island, we saw people working on a building - they waved and shouted "bula". As we got closer to the dock, we saw a man working, so stopped to say "hi". Turns out Greg and his wife Debbie own the island, and the building being worked on is their house. Greg graciously invited us to have a look around. What a beautiful place! Debbie grows orchids and she showed us some of her prized babies. They also had a lattice covered kitchen garden with veggies and native plants. We were invited in to the guest house (where they are living until the big house is finished) for water and conversation. How fortunate were we to meet such a lovely couple - willing to share their beautiful home and island with us - truly a great experience. Finally we had to say our good byes - and the Evergreen crew headed to town. Greg and Debbie gave us permission to use their dock on shore, conveniently right next to the grocery store and the fresh veggie market. NICE! We were able to pick up fresh bread, lamb for dinner, potatos, veggies, cookies (we were out), plus a variety of other things, AND set up a taxi driver for the morning to take us to the Bouma gardens and the waterfalls on the east side of the Island.
Made it back to the boat in plenty of time for a swim and sunset watching. Dennis made salsa and we finished the last of our only slightly stale tortilla chips (from Hawaii). So far, this anchorage has my nomination for the best so far. I am pretty sure the sunny day has a lot to do with it, but there is a lot going for it. I am looking forward to our sightseeing tomorrow.
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Tuesday, September 17, 2013
Sunday, September 15, 2013
Mategi
Kind of a slow start today, but made it out of Alberts by 1000. We had gotten the boat all ready to go last night, so really no need to be up early. Needed as much light as possible for the trip thru Texas passage. A big pod of dolphin cruised the anchorage this morning. Is always cool to watch them. I never get tired of it. A great way to start the day.
We got the anchor up and retraced our path our thru the reef from Alberts cove. I was down below finishing up stowing the kitchen and heard Josh putting out the fishing lines. Next thing I hear is the line whizzing out and "fish on!". Well isn't that exciting in the middle of the pass thru the reef?? Mom, pull in the other line - so I did. Dennis slowed the boat down, and I prepared the deck for bringing in a fish. Sure enough Curly's lure caught another Spanish Mackerel. That lure is two for two. Josh said he didn't even get the second line all the way out before we had a fish on. Dennis had to drive, so Josh had to clean the fish - and I helped (just like shake n bake). Definitely not a favorite task for either of us. Josh has "an unreasonable fear of getting stabbed by something sharp on the fish" and I just have a hard time handling the fish and then cooking and eating it. Turns out we both had to get over ourselves today. Josh did a great job filleting the fish, and I cooked it for dinner - and ate it.
Ended up coming to the west anchorage on Mategi (ma Teng e). Was the path of least upwind sailing and we barely made it in good light. Pulled in around 1630. Is kind of tight, but we finally set the hook in a place we think we can live with. Will sleep with the anchor alarm tonight - just in case. The water here is very clear. Hope it stays that way for a good snorkel tomorrow. Internet is not so great - will let me send sailmail, but not good enough for anything else. josh is bummed. One other boat in the anchorage "Compadre". This is a private island, with a resort and dive outfit. We had to ask permission to anchor here - not sure what we would have done if they said no. Too late to go anywhere else - but they didn't so here we are for a few days.
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We got the anchor up and retraced our path our thru the reef from Alberts cove. I was down below finishing up stowing the kitchen and heard Josh putting out the fishing lines. Next thing I hear is the line whizzing out and "fish on!". Well isn't that exciting in the middle of the pass thru the reef?? Mom, pull in the other line - so I did. Dennis slowed the boat down, and I prepared the deck for bringing in a fish. Sure enough Curly's lure caught another Spanish Mackerel. That lure is two for two. Josh said he didn't even get the second line all the way out before we had a fish on. Dennis had to drive, so Josh had to clean the fish - and I helped (just like shake n bake). Definitely not a favorite task for either of us. Josh has "an unreasonable fear of getting stabbed by something sharp on the fish" and I just have a hard time handling the fish and then cooking and eating it. Turns out we both had to get over ourselves today. Josh did a great job filleting the fish, and I cooked it for dinner - and ate it.
Ended up coming to the west anchorage on Mategi (ma Teng e). Was the path of least upwind sailing and we barely made it in good light. Pulled in around 1630. Is kind of tight, but we finally set the hook in a place we think we can live with. Will sleep with the anchor alarm tonight - just in case. The water here is very clear. Hope it stays that way for a good snorkel tomorrow. Internet is not so great - will let me send sailmail, but not good enough for anything else. josh is bummed. One other boat in the anchorage "Compadre". This is a private island, with a resort and dive outfit. We had to ask permission to anchor here - not sure what we would have done if they said no. Too late to go anywhere else - but they didn't so here we are for a few days.
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Saturday, September 14, 2013
Alberts Cove Rabi
Sent my intrepid fishermen off spear fishing this morning. I stayed behind and made bread, salad for lunch, cleaned under the stove and the bottom of the refrigerator. Not sure what happened in the fridge, but it was nasty. EWWW science experiment gone wrong!!! Sadly no fish again. But very tired boys. Spent the rest of the day just sort of hanging out - sorting our our next destination. plan A and plan B if the weather doesn't cooperate. My bread was not my best ever effort, tasted good, and had a nice fine crumb, just didn't rise well. Could be the yeast - i neglected to refrigerate after opening..... Oh well no complaints from the folks that ate half of it at dinner tonight. Paul had his first electronic device demise - his mac won't charge. Bummer. Two techie types looking at it, and still not sure what the problem is - charger or battery. Hopefully we can get it fixed in SavuSavu. No internet here, but should have it tomorrow or the next day, so we will be able to research the problem. Could be it doesn't like the boat voltage. Its all magic to me.
So, tomorrow we are off to the next anchorage shouldn't be too bad if the weather (read wind and sea state) cooperates. This is a beautiful place, but time is flying by and we still have places we want to see. oh yeah, and Josh wants internet - go figure......
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So, tomorrow we are off to the next anchorage shouldn't be too bad if the weather (read wind and sea state) cooperates. This is a beautiful place, but time is flying by and we still have places we want to see. oh yeah, and Josh wants internet - go figure......
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Alberts Cove Rabi
Sent my intrepid fishermen off spear fishing this morning. I stayed behind and made bread, salad for lunch, cleaned under the stove and the bottom of the refrigerator. Not sure what happened in the fridge, but it was nasty. EWWW science experiment gone wrong!!! Sadly no fish again. But very tired boys. Spent the rest of the day just sort of hanging out - sorting our our next destination. plan A and plan B if the weather doesn't cooperate. My bread was not my best ever effort, tasted good, and had a nice fine crumb, just didn't rise well. Could be the yeast - i neglected to refrigerate after opening..... Oh well no complaints from the folks that ate half of it at dinner tonight. Paul had his first electronic device demise - his mac won't charge. Bummer. Two techie types looking at it, and still not sure what the problem is - charger or battery. Hopefully we can get it fixed in SavuSavu. No internet here, but should have it tomorrow or the next day, so we will be able to research the problem. Could be it doesn't like the boat voltage. Its all magic to me.
So, tomorrow we are off to the next anchorage shouldn't be too bad if the weather (read wind and sea state) cooperates. This is a beautiful place, but time is flying by and we still have places we want to see. oh yeah, and Josh wants internet - go figure......
----------
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So, tomorrow we are off to the next anchorage shouldn't be too bad if the weather (read wind and sea state) cooperates. This is a beautiful place, but time is flying by and we still have places we want to see. oh yeah, and Josh wants internet - go figure......
----------
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Friday, September 13, 2013
Viana to Alberts Cove
Wednesday we hoisted the anchor and headed up to Rabi (Rambi) Island. Our first stop was Katherine Bay. We were able to use Curly's waypoints with no problems. It was an easy run up - more or less. Lots of sail handling as we wound our way through the reef. East out of Viani, then north, then west, then north, then west, then more north, then east and north again into Katherine Bay. We had a bit of confusion right at the end, deciding which side to the mark to go on - not sure what was going on in the captain's mind, but we made it thru no problems. Following Curly's advice we anchored as far in to the bay as we could - ended up in about 30 feet, good holding in mud. We had a quiet rainy evening, watched the fishermen and the "schoolbus" bring the kids home from school. The internet was weak. Good enough to send Sailmail, but not good enough to check email. Josh was not happy.
Thursday we got going pretty early. The weather wasn't looking all that promising, but it did clear up. We backtracked out of the reef and headed up the west side of Rabi to the capital - Nuku. We were told we needed to check in with the police there. Yes, i know we have a cruising permit, and yes it is a fijian island. But, it is inhabited by displaced Banabans (ocean island). They let their home island be mined to death for phosphate, so they were bought this new home. We have heard that initially they were one of the wealthiest groups in Fiji. Sadly they didn't know how to deal with the wealth and were taken advantage of and squandered most of it away. Currently they are the poorest group. Anyway, we stopped to check in. Josh, Paul and I went in while Dennis stayed with the boat. The store there reminded us of Fanning, not much on the shelf. I was able to buy a kilo of flour (we are out of bread, and I donated my flour to Sophie), but nothing else. But, everyone was friendly. We were told hello in 4 languages - english, gilbertese (maori), fijian (bula) and samoan (talofa). Very confusing, but nice all the same. Was a simple check in. i wrote our names and the boat name on their chalkboard, filled out one paper and showed him our cruising permit - done. Vinaka (thank you). We could not find the place to drop off our garbage, so poor Paul hauled it all over and then back to the boat. The anchor was back up and we were on our way to Alberts Cove within one hour. Again Curly's waypoints were good and we pulled in to one of the best anchorages we have been in in a while. Good snorkeling, clear water, pretty beaches. Sadly no internet. Josh was able to get internet on the way up to Nuku and just past Nuku, but Alberts has no cell tower.
This morning we had a leisurely start and then did boat chores. The kids here were out on the beach playing at 0630 this morning. No school today??? They were on the beach having fun all day. Their laughter was infectious. Dennis was able to get the watermaker working properly - YAY! my hero. It has been running all day and so far no problems. After that the boys cleaned the bottom of the boat while I repaired our bimini. After lunch Dennis and Paul finished cleaning the brown streaks off the sides of the boat, while I played lady of leisure and floated around on my floaty. Haven't done that since Zihuatenejo with Sue and Anna. Later in the afternoon we went 'splorin' in the dinghy. Found a nice beach that donated 4 coconuts to the cause. Hungry, Hungry boys for dinner. Seems like my cupboards get bare a whole lot quicker here than they did in Fr. Polynesia. Not sure what is up with that????..... Time for Josh to go spear fishing and refill the freezer.
We are going to hang here at least one more day, then maybe the ringolds and Matengi/Qamea.
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Thursday we got going pretty early. The weather wasn't looking all that promising, but it did clear up. We backtracked out of the reef and headed up the west side of Rabi to the capital - Nuku. We were told we needed to check in with the police there. Yes, i know we have a cruising permit, and yes it is a fijian island. But, it is inhabited by displaced Banabans (ocean island). They let their home island be mined to death for phosphate, so they were bought this new home. We have heard that initially they were one of the wealthiest groups in Fiji. Sadly they didn't know how to deal with the wealth and were taken advantage of and squandered most of it away. Currently they are the poorest group. Anyway, we stopped to check in. Josh, Paul and I went in while Dennis stayed with the boat. The store there reminded us of Fanning, not much on the shelf. I was able to buy a kilo of flour (we are out of bread, and I donated my flour to Sophie), but nothing else. But, everyone was friendly. We were told hello in 4 languages - english, gilbertese (maori), fijian (bula) and samoan (talofa). Very confusing, but nice all the same. Was a simple check in. i wrote our names and the boat name on their chalkboard, filled out one paper and showed him our cruising permit - done. Vinaka (thank you). We could not find the place to drop off our garbage, so poor Paul hauled it all over and then back to the boat. The anchor was back up and we were on our way to Alberts Cove within one hour. Again Curly's waypoints were good and we pulled in to one of the best anchorages we have been in in a while. Good snorkeling, clear water, pretty beaches. Sadly no internet. Josh was able to get internet on the way up to Nuku and just past Nuku, but Alberts has no cell tower.
This morning we had a leisurely start and then did boat chores. The kids here were out on the beach playing at 0630 this morning. No school today??? They were on the beach having fun all day. Their laughter was infectious. Dennis was able to get the watermaker working properly - YAY! my hero. It has been running all day and so far no problems. After that the boys cleaned the bottom of the boat while I repaired our bimini. After lunch Dennis and Paul finished cleaning the brown streaks off the sides of the boat, while I played lady of leisure and floated around on my floaty. Haven't done that since Zihuatenejo with Sue and Anna. Later in the afternoon we went 'splorin' in the dinghy. Found a nice beach that donated 4 coconuts to the cause. Hungry, Hungry boys for dinner. Seems like my cupboards get bare a whole lot quicker here than they did in Fr. Polynesia. Not sure what is up with that????..... Time for Josh to go spear fishing and refill the freezer.
We are going to hang here at least one more day, then maybe the ringolds and Matengi/Qamea.
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Tuesday, September 10, 2013
Time sure flies
Forgive me followers for I have sinned. It has been a week since my last post. I am not going to give you a hail mary, but will continue the saga....
Friday we got up and did our final errands - paying the marina, returning Curly's CD, getting cash, fresh veggies, a sulu/lavalava for Paul, bread and meat pies. We were off the mooring by 1030 and on our way to Curly's Mistys anchorage. Paul did well on the trip over, we were still inside the reef, so it was a flat ride. The fishing lines were out - nice.
On approach to the anchorage Curly's lure lived up to his advertising and we had a "fish on". How fun was that - bringing in a fish while ensuring we didn't hit any coral heads (bommies)??? It was a nice Spanish Mackerel, at least that is what we think it is. Good eating!!!
Once we were settled on the anchor, Dennis, Paul and I set out for the little island about 3/4 of a mile away. As we were turning back (tide was out and we couldn't find a path thru the coral) a panga came out from the resort to tell us we couldn't go to the island. :( It was hard to be upset, cuz he seemed to feel so bad about telling us we couldn't go there. He said we could tie up at the resort and walk the beach though, so that is what we did. It was very nice to sit on the beach, drink our wine and enjoy the scenery. The resort itself seemed very nice - there is a bar and restaurant open to yachts. None of us had any money, so we had to pass on that particular opportunity.
Saturday we were up and at 'em early. The forecast was for southerly winds - perfect for going the whole way to Viani Bay. So Paul and Dennis had their seasickness meds and we were off! It was a pretty wild and fast ride - not the best for breaking in new crew, but what are you gonna do? We had to keep out speed up as we were expecting negative current and possibly nose-on wind. As it turned out, the motion got to both Dennis and Paul. Dennis crawled into bed around noon, but Paul stuck it out the whole way. We had the main triple reefed, the stay sail and a tiny bit of jib out - yee haw! I saw consistent speeds of 9-11 knots!! The wind ranged from 16 to 27 knots from the east - averaging around 22. The swell was pretty big; the port toe rail met the water a lot. Minutes after I had Paul move forward under the dodger I got drenched by a wave, just as I was dry i got hit again. We hit our waypoint indicating it was time to hang a left through the reef at 1445. Was a little scary as the light was a flat, but the pass was no problem. As soon as we were in, the sea became flat and everyone started feeling much better. With the wind being from the east, we chose to anchor (with all the other boats) behind the small island on the north side of the bay instead of at the head of the bay by Jack's place. Pretty sure Josh voted for this anchorage because the cell tower is on the hill above it.
An interesting note from Saturday. As Josh and I were putting up the main he noticed that the stainless steel rings on the webbing (the dogbone?) we use to reef with at the mast were broken all the way through - on both ends!! scary! Not exactly sure how we are going to fix, but for now are just tying it down with line. I guess we have been using them pretty hard. Sure love my third reef!! (I think I have said that before huh?)
Sunday was a pretty mellow day - met the neighbors, and they arranged a snorkel trip with Jack for Monday. Stupid watermaker pump was making its "the filters need changing" noise. I couldn't face it, so put it off for another day. We had a pretty good snorkel right off the boat. Come to find out Paul has never snorkeled before. He did great, so figured we were all set for the next day.
Monday was another bright and early day. S/v Seagoing (Rikki and Bruce from NZ) offered their boat as the transport vessel, so we all piled on their boat at 0800. All told there were 15 people on board, the Evergreens (4), Starship (Chris, AnnaMarie and their friend Crystal), Kereru (Val and Richard), Peggy West (Irene and Roy), Bruce and Rikki our hosts, Jack (our guide) and Debby (visiting Jack and his family from the states). Jack took us to two pretty cool snorkel places. The first was called cabbage patch, cuz the coral looks like cabbage - and green too. I saw my favorites - clown fish in the anenomes. Lots of small fish. The second spot was called mini cabbage patch/mini white wall. Saw my second favorite fish - moorish idols. Also saw a big green spotted moray eel and some white tip reef sharks. Got some reef booty too - a fishing lure - still in good shape and came off the coral easily. So it was a good day. We were back to the boats by 1500. Oh, and all that for 10 fijian per person. Sadly Paul did not do so well with the snorkeling - the open water was a bit intimidating. In the woulda, coulda, shoulda world it would have been better to have him enter the water from the dinghy (where it was shallow) instead of from the boat in deep water. Live and learn... Jack came by later in the afternoon and we set up a spear fishing expedition for today. Jack is quite the character - full of local knowledge and fun to be around.
Today I sent my great white hunters off with Jack and Paul. Josh had permission to spear fish until he got tired of it. Starfish joined them in their dinghy. I stayed behind and did boat chores - not so bad when I have the whole boat to myself. The expedition returned around 1430 - totally skunked!! They hit 4 different spots with no luck. On the positive side, Paul got in and snorkeled and did fine - everyone said the first site was great snorkeling. So, we have no new fish for the freezer, but that is okay. I got the watermaker running, so the tanks are filling as we speak. Jack's wife Sophie did some trigger point therapy on my legs this afternoon (paid with sugar, flour and rice) - Wow! I didn't think my calves were sore, but she about put me thru the roof. Not sure if it helped my neck and shoulders or not - tomorrow will tell I guess. Was totally interesting to see their home - one enclosed room and an open kitchen/deck area. Awesome view. Makes me feel bad when i complain about cooking in the boat though...Not that cooking on the boat is a walk in the park, but it is a heck of a lot more convenient than Sophie's kitchen. The lady staying with them (Debby from Buena Vista in Colorado, man it is a small world?) wrote a book about the time she spent here during her cruising days. The proceeds help pay for Jack's granddaughter to go to highschool. This bay is fortunate, they have a primary school (4 teachers/80 students), but the kids have to go to Taveuni and board for highschool. Evergreen bought 2 and Jack signed his picture.
So, thinking of heading to a new anchorage tomorrow - hopefully only a 5 hour sail or so......... Going to aim for Alberts cove on Rabi (Rambi). One of Curly's most recommended. We'll see..
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Last Wednesday Paul arrived, so now we are 4 on Evergreen. Welcome to anyone new following this blog. Yes it was still raining on Wednesday - like crazy I might add. I am sure we were quite the site dinghying over to the Surf and Turf restaurant with umbrellas. We had lunch at the Surf and Turf before the start of Curly's cruising seminar. Food is good and reasonably priced and the homemade ice cream was pretty amazing too. The seminar was very informative and well worth the price of 10 fijian per person and another $25 if you want him to send on more waypoints etc. (which we did). Dennis and Josh left to go get Paul at the airport and were back in less than 45 minutes - with a somewhat damp jet lagged Paul. He hung in there pretty well, but finally he and Josh headed back to the boat. The seminar finished up about 1630 - we bought one of Curly's fishing lures also (more on that in a minute). Lasagne for dinner and an early night. Thursday we had lots of chores to get done, and it was reasonably nice - only a little drizzly. We hit up immigration to add Paul to our crew list, then customs for our cruising permit, then lunch at Surf and Turf while we waited for the lunch hour to be over so we could go to the hospital to pay our quarantine bill. That is a 5 dollar taxi ride each way. The lady there was pretty nice - is good if you can take exact change. From there we taxied back into town and did our final provisioning, as the plan was to head out on Friday to the close anchorage at the Cousteau resort. We did a bit of a dinghy exploration of the east end on the bay - good thing the tide was in, or we may not have made the circumnavigation. For dinner we went in for more curry. Yum.
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| Josh and Spanish Mackerel |
On approach to the anchorage Curly's lure lived up to his advertising and we had a "fish on". How fun was that - bringing in a fish while ensuring we didn't hit any coral heads (bommies)??? It was a nice Spanish Mackerel, at least that is what we think it is. Good eating!!!
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| Cousteau Resort Beach |
Once we were settled on the anchor, Dennis, Paul and I set out for the little island about 3/4 of a mile away. As we were turning back (tide was out and we couldn't find a path thru the coral) a panga came out from the resort to tell us we couldn't go to the island. :( It was hard to be upset, cuz he seemed to feel so bad about telling us we couldn't go there. He said we could tie up at the resort and walk the beach though, so that is what we did. It was very nice to sit on the beach, drink our wine and enjoy the scenery. The resort itself seemed very nice - there is a bar and restaurant open to yachts. None of us had any money, so we had to pass on that particular opportunity.
Saturday we were up and at 'em early. The forecast was for southerly winds - perfect for going the whole way to Viani Bay. So Paul and Dennis had their seasickness meds and we were off! It was a pretty wild and fast ride - not the best for breaking in new crew, but what are you gonna do? We had to keep out speed up as we were expecting negative current and possibly nose-on wind. As it turned out, the motion got to both Dennis and Paul. Dennis crawled into bed around noon, but Paul stuck it out the whole way. We had the main triple reefed, the stay sail and a tiny bit of jib out - yee haw! I saw consistent speeds of 9-11 knots!! The wind ranged from 16 to 27 knots from the east - averaging around 22. The swell was pretty big; the port toe rail met the water a lot. Minutes after I had Paul move forward under the dodger I got drenched by a wave, just as I was dry i got hit again. We hit our waypoint indicating it was time to hang a left through the reef at 1445. Was a little scary as the light was a flat, but the pass was no problem. As soon as we were in, the sea became flat and everyone started feeling much better. With the wind being from the east, we chose to anchor (with all the other boats) behind the small island on the north side of the bay instead of at the head of the bay by Jack's place. Pretty sure Josh voted for this anchorage because the cell tower is on the hill above it.
An interesting note from Saturday. As Josh and I were putting up the main he noticed that the stainless steel rings on the webbing (the dogbone?) we use to reef with at the mast were broken all the way through - on both ends!! scary! Not exactly sure how we are going to fix, but for now are just tying it down with line. I guess we have been using them pretty hard. Sure love my third reef!! (I think I have said that before huh?)
Sunday was a pretty mellow day - met the neighbors, and they arranged a snorkel trip with Jack for Monday. Stupid watermaker pump was making its "the filters need changing" noise. I couldn't face it, so put it off for another day. We had a pretty good snorkel right off the boat. Come to find out Paul has never snorkeled before. He did great, so figured we were all set for the next day.
Monday was another bright and early day. S/v Seagoing (Rikki and Bruce from NZ) offered their boat as the transport vessel, so we all piled on their boat at 0800. All told there were 15 people on board, the Evergreens (4), Starship (Chris, AnnaMarie and their friend Crystal), Kereru (Val and Richard), Peggy West (Irene and Roy), Bruce and Rikki our hosts, Jack (our guide) and Debby (visiting Jack and his family from the states). Jack took us to two pretty cool snorkel places. The first was called cabbage patch, cuz the coral looks like cabbage - and green too. I saw my favorites - clown fish in the anenomes. Lots of small fish. The second spot was called mini cabbage patch/mini white wall. Saw my second favorite fish - moorish idols. Also saw a big green spotted moray eel and some white tip reef sharks. Got some reef booty too - a fishing lure - still in good shape and came off the coral easily. So it was a good day. We were back to the boats by 1500. Oh, and all that for 10 fijian per person. Sadly Paul did not do so well with the snorkeling - the open water was a bit intimidating. In the woulda, coulda, shoulda world it would have been better to have him enter the water from the dinghy (where it was shallow) instead of from the boat in deep water. Live and learn... Jack came by later in the afternoon and we set up a spear fishing expedition for today. Jack is quite the character - full of local knowledge and fun to be around.
Today I sent my great white hunters off with Jack and Paul. Josh had permission to spear fish until he got tired of it. Starfish joined them in their dinghy. I stayed behind and did boat chores - not so bad when I have the whole boat to myself. The expedition returned around 1430 - totally skunked!! They hit 4 different spots with no luck. On the positive side, Paul got in and snorkeled and did fine - everyone said the first site was great snorkeling. So, we have no new fish for the freezer, but that is okay. I got the watermaker running, so the tanks are filling as we speak. Jack's wife Sophie did some trigger point therapy on my legs this afternoon (paid with sugar, flour and rice) - Wow! I didn't think my calves were sore, but she about put me thru the roof. Not sure if it helped my neck and shoulders or not - tomorrow will tell I guess. Was totally interesting to see their home - one enclosed room and an open kitchen/deck area. Awesome view. Makes me feel bad when i complain about cooking in the boat though...Not that cooking on the boat is a walk in the park, but it is a heck of a lot more convenient than Sophie's kitchen. The lady staying with them (Debby from Buena Vista in Colorado, man it is a small world?) wrote a book about the time she spent here during her cruising days. The proceeds help pay for Jack's granddaughter to go to highschool. This bay is fortunate, they have a primary school (4 teachers/80 students), but the kids have to go to Taveuni and board for highschool. Evergreen bought 2 and Jack signed his picture.
So, thinking of heading to a new anchorage tomorrow - hopefully only a 5 hour sail or so......... Going to aim for Alberts cove on Rabi (Rambi). One of Curly's most recommended. We'll see..
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Tuesday, September 3, 2013
Fiji Monday Tuesday
Happy Labor Day to all our friends and family state side. Hope you enjoyed your day off work.
So Sunday ended up being a busy boat chore day. My big project was changing the watermaker filters and rearranging the anchor locker so it would absorb the rest of the stuff in what will be Paul's bunk. Changing the water maker filters is one of those dreaded projects. There are two filters - 20 and 5 microns, and a strainer. The 20 micron prefilter is actually pretty easy - it is under the sink in the forward head. So, no problem there. The other two, not so easy. They require everything in the aft section of the anchor locker to be removed. The strainer is all the way at the bottom. Visualize head down, ass up for real. Got them taken care of without too much cursing under my breath. Somehow or other I managed to shoe horn everything back in plus several other items. Stowing in a boat is like doing one big jigsaw puzzle. The only things left in Paul's bunk to stow some other place were my bike, 3 packages of toilet paper, the popcorn pan, snacks and the paper charts. Not bad. Dennis spent most of the day trying to get the stupid router to work - never happened. I was pooped, and hit the hay at 8pm!!!
Yesterday (Monday for us) was no holiday on Evergreen. There was homework to be done, stowing and sorting, laundry to be gathered to take in, letters to pick up and immigration to visit - a full day. We started the day with coffee and breakfast at the dock while our letter saying we are, for real moored here in SavuSavu, was being prepared. So, coffee here is actually espresso - no drip, and they tend to bring it with the meal. Not that that particular deal worked for us as we left the boat uncaffeinated. Poor waitress - weird ass tourists. Breakfast (and the coffee served with warmed milk) was good. The letter was ready so it was off to immigration. The lady there looked at us like we were asking for the moon. She said she could get the letter ready, but there was noone there to sign it. I explained that Friday we were told to come back today and it would be no problem getting the letter. She told us to come back at 1500 - maybe someone would have come in by then..... Oh well, what do you do???? Smile and say Tanaka (thank you) , see you at 1500.
Did a little exploring of the east end of town. Found a great little store with lots of US foods and a large selection of beer/wine & liqour. We want to try some Fijian rum, just not sure which to try. Like Fr. Polynesia, liquour is quite expensive, at least here beer is cheap. Checked out the other laundry $4 a kilo, so put that on the afternoon list. Also went in the meat shop - prices are per kg, and pretty comparable to the US. Picked up some goat curry to try. From there we headed to the Vodafone kiosk where I left Dennis with my laptop and all the patience I could "beam" over to him. While he did that, I went to the atm, checked out several stores, bought buns for the hamburgers we were having for dinner and went in the market and got eggs. I got back to him just as he was finishing up. We ended up with a different product altogether - like a mobile hotspot type deal. Works great! Yay!!! Cost more, but I don't care, it is worth it to plug and play. From there back to the boat to wait for 1500.
Josh did homework, I started the watermaker - it made funny noises. That sucked. I had reused filters (supposed to be able to, and we have in the past) and I guess the water maker wanted none of that reuse/reduce/recylce crap. It wanted fresh filters. Well, I couldn't face it so decided to play Scarlett and worry about it tomorrow. Instead, rearranged the food lockers. Yikes! big job. Not sure how it happened, but there was mold growing on some cans and boxes of mac and cheese in the port locker. EEWWW! Out came the bleach, out came everything from that locker. Got it all sorted out and everything put away. It is tight, but works. By then it was 1500 - time to go get the letter. Josh wanted a shower - hopefully hot - at the marina, so he dropped Dennis and I and our laundry off at the Waitui marina and headed back to CopraShed for his shower. Dennis and i dropped off the laundry and yeehaw the letter was ready and signed. We were finished a lot faster than Josh can shower, so we went to the yacht club at the CopraShed for a beer.
Back at the boat I scanned and sent off Paul's letter. For our dining pleasure the evening's menu included hamburgers on the grill, salad and banana chips. Of course the banana chips are not straightforward to cook. So, I had to get going on those. Start with 3 plantains. Boil until skin turns brown, peel the skin off. Start oil heating on the stove. Slice the plantains very thinly - the thinner the better. i did some lengthwise and some crosswise. The crosswise were easier to make thin, so turned out the best. When the oil gets to 350 degrees, start cooking. If you can keep the oil that hot, the chips cook in 2-3 minutes. i had trouble keeping it at that temp, and being of the impatient variety, didn't wait for it to heat back up between batches, just pressed on. They turned out okay. Not as good as the ones we had at Tesa's in Am. Samoa - but not bad for the first attempt. After dinner we watched the latest Die Hard movie which was fun - shoot em up bang, bang!!! Bruce Willis sure has held up well huh?
Yay!! i managed to sleep until 0730 today. Nice. Didn't have all my coffee in though, when the Waitui marina person stopped by and told us we needed to mov.e from our mooring. Seems ours was a hurricane mooring and the boat that reserved it is arriving tomorrow. So 0930 found us in the dinghy scouting moorings. Finally decided on a Coprashed mooring. The Waitui mooring was too far out. 1030 found us settled on our new mooring - easy peesy. Gotta love it when the marina guy comes out in his dinghy and threads your lines through the mooring for you. He even put our shackle on the line for us. Nice, made Josh's job super easy.
Today i had to tackle the water maker filters. Oh yeah yesterday - no rain, today when I need to move the bike - back to rain, and forecast to last til Friday. We are going to turn into ducks......
So, the watermaker filters.... did I tell you how much I hate changing them? and what a PIA they are to change? I did, so I won't whine anymore. Got it done - is working fine. Next up was getting the bike out of Paul's bunk. The plan is to put it under the blue dinghy on deck until we leave Fiji. So, I carefully taped all around the lid. Went to take it out of the boat - wouldn't fit. I had forgotten that the case doesn't fit through the companionway. I didn't cry or kill anything, but I wanted to. Fortunately we tried taking it out with the lid off the case (before removing the bike) and that worked, so it wasn't as bad as I thought it was going to be. But, did I mention it is raining??? Have you ever tried to apply tape in the rain? Not the best plan. So, my poor bike is sitting on deck in the rain - half taped. It may just have to go under the dinghy that way.
Good thing we live on a boat, cuz otherwise we would probably be working on an ark in our backyard. Just sayin' ya know?
The port bunk is empty!!!! The port bunk is clean, linen fresh, curtain hung, screen being fixed as we speak, lee cloth re done, wood oiled - totally unrecognizable as our spare bunk. oh yeah and Dennis even emptied a drawer. Both heads are clean and the rest of the boat got dusted and oiled. Only thing left to do is clean the kitchen, but that is a daily chore anyway. Never did go in for our laundry, but didn't see much point of paying to get it dried only to soak it again on the trip home. Had the curry we bought yesterday for dinner. Lots of bones = bad, very spicy = good. Will have to keep trying, cuz would love to put some of those packages in the freezer for easy crossing meals.
Tomorrow I am going to go look at our neighbor's genoa. The stitching on one of the upper horizontal seams gave out on their way here from Tonga. I will resew for them if I can fit the sail into my machine. I don't think I will be able to, but I promised I would look. Paul gets in tomorrow afternoon. We hope to get him settled and head out Friday or Saturday. As you know, that is all weather dependent... but hopefully. SavuSavu is nice, i really like it here, but again - can't get in the water. Not that it has been warm enough to even want to, but that's not the point.
More later
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So Sunday ended up being a busy boat chore day. My big project was changing the watermaker filters and rearranging the anchor locker so it would absorb the rest of the stuff in what will be Paul's bunk. Changing the water maker filters is one of those dreaded projects. There are two filters - 20 and 5 microns, and a strainer. The 20 micron prefilter is actually pretty easy - it is under the sink in the forward head. So, no problem there. The other two, not so easy. They require everything in the aft section of the anchor locker to be removed. The strainer is all the way at the bottom. Visualize head down, ass up for real. Got them taken care of without too much cursing under my breath. Somehow or other I managed to shoe horn everything back in plus several other items. Stowing in a boat is like doing one big jigsaw puzzle. The only things left in Paul's bunk to stow some other place were my bike, 3 packages of toilet paper, the popcorn pan, snacks and the paper charts. Not bad. Dennis spent most of the day trying to get the stupid router to work - never happened. I was pooped, and hit the hay at 8pm!!!
Yesterday (Monday for us) was no holiday on Evergreen. There was homework to be done, stowing and sorting, laundry to be gathered to take in, letters to pick up and immigration to visit - a full day. We started the day with coffee and breakfast at the dock while our letter saying we are, for real moored here in SavuSavu, was being prepared. So, coffee here is actually espresso - no drip, and they tend to bring it with the meal. Not that that particular deal worked for us as we left the boat uncaffeinated. Poor waitress - weird ass tourists. Breakfast (and the coffee served with warmed milk) was good. The letter was ready so it was off to immigration. The lady there looked at us like we were asking for the moon. She said she could get the letter ready, but there was noone there to sign it. I explained that Friday we were told to come back today and it would be no problem getting the letter. She told us to come back at 1500 - maybe someone would have come in by then..... Oh well, what do you do???? Smile and say Tanaka (thank you) , see you at 1500.
Did a little exploring of the east end of town. Found a great little store with lots of US foods and a large selection of beer/wine & liqour. We want to try some Fijian rum, just not sure which to try. Like Fr. Polynesia, liquour is quite expensive, at least here beer is cheap. Checked out the other laundry $4 a kilo, so put that on the afternoon list. Also went in the meat shop - prices are per kg, and pretty comparable to the US. Picked up some goat curry to try. From there we headed to the Vodafone kiosk where I left Dennis with my laptop and all the patience I could "beam" over to him. While he did that, I went to the atm, checked out several stores, bought buns for the hamburgers we were having for dinner and went in the market and got eggs. I got back to him just as he was finishing up. We ended up with a different product altogether - like a mobile hotspot type deal. Works great! Yay!!! Cost more, but I don't care, it is worth it to plug and play. From there back to the boat to wait for 1500.
Josh did homework, I started the watermaker - it made funny noises. That sucked. I had reused filters (supposed to be able to, and we have in the past) and I guess the water maker wanted none of that reuse/reduce/recylce crap. It wanted fresh filters. Well, I couldn't face it so decided to play Scarlett and worry about it tomorrow. Instead, rearranged the food lockers. Yikes! big job. Not sure how it happened, but there was mold growing on some cans and boxes of mac and cheese in the port locker. EEWWW! Out came the bleach, out came everything from that locker. Got it all sorted out and everything put away. It is tight, but works. By then it was 1500 - time to go get the letter. Josh wanted a shower - hopefully hot - at the marina, so he dropped Dennis and I and our laundry off at the Waitui marina and headed back to CopraShed for his shower. Dennis and i dropped off the laundry and yeehaw the letter was ready and signed. We were finished a lot faster than Josh can shower, so we went to the yacht club at the CopraShed for a beer.
Back at the boat I scanned and sent off Paul's letter. For our dining pleasure the evening's menu included hamburgers on the grill, salad and banana chips. Of course the banana chips are not straightforward to cook. So, I had to get going on those. Start with 3 plantains. Boil until skin turns brown, peel the skin off. Start oil heating on the stove. Slice the plantains very thinly - the thinner the better. i did some lengthwise and some crosswise. The crosswise were easier to make thin, so turned out the best. When the oil gets to 350 degrees, start cooking. If you can keep the oil that hot, the chips cook in 2-3 minutes. i had trouble keeping it at that temp, and being of the impatient variety, didn't wait for it to heat back up between batches, just pressed on. They turned out okay. Not as good as the ones we had at Tesa's in Am. Samoa - but not bad for the first attempt. After dinner we watched the latest Die Hard movie which was fun - shoot em up bang, bang!!! Bruce Willis sure has held up well huh?
Yay!! i managed to sleep until 0730 today. Nice. Didn't have all my coffee in though, when the Waitui marina person stopped by and told us we needed to mov.e from our mooring. Seems ours was a hurricane mooring and the boat that reserved it is arriving tomorrow. So 0930 found us in the dinghy scouting moorings. Finally decided on a Coprashed mooring. The Waitui mooring was too far out. 1030 found us settled on our new mooring - easy peesy. Gotta love it when the marina guy comes out in his dinghy and threads your lines through the mooring for you. He even put our shackle on the line for us. Nice, made Josh's job super easy.
Today i had to tackle the water maker filters. Oh yeah yesterday - no rain, today when I need to move the bike - back to rain, and forecast to last til Friday. We are going to turn into ducks......
So, the watermaker filters.... did I tell you how much I hate changing them? and what a PIA they are to change? I did, so I won't whine anymore. Got it done - is working fine. Next up was getting the bike out of Paul's bunk. The plan is to put it under the blue dinghy on deck until we leave Fiji. So, I carefully taped all around the lid. Went to take it out of the boat - wouldn't fit. I had forgotten that the case doesn't fit through the companionway. I didn't cry or kill anything, but I wanted to. Fortunately we tried taking it out with the lid off the case (before removing the bike) and that worked, so it wasn't as bad as I thought it was going to be. But, did I mention it is raining??? Have you ever tried to apply tape in the rain? Not the best plan. So, my poor bike is sitting on deck in the rain - half taped. It may just have to go under the dinghy that way.
Good thing we live on a boat, cuz otherwise we would probably be working on an ark in our backyard. Just sayin' ya know?
The port bunk is empty!!!! The port bunk is clean, linen fresh, curtain hung, screen being fixed as we speak, lee cloth re done, wood oiled - totally unrecognizable as our spare bunk. oh yeah and Dennis even emptied a drawer. Both heads are clean and the rest of the boat got dusted and oiled. Only thing left to do is clean the kitchen, but that is a daily chore anyway. Never did go in for our laundry, but didn't see much point of paying to get it dried only to soak it again on the trip home. Had the curry we bought yesterday for dinner. Lots of bones = bad, very spicy = good. Will have to keep trying, cuz would love to put some of those packages in the freezer for easy crossing meals.
Tomorrow I am going to go look at our neighbor's genoa. The stitching on one of the upper horizontal seams gave out on their way here from Tonga. I will resew for them if I can fit the sail into my machine. I don't think I will be able to, but I promised I would look. Paul gets in tomorrow afternoon. We hope to get him settled and head out Friday or Saturday. As you know, that is all weather dependent... but hopefully. SavuSavu is nice, i really like it here, but again - can't get in the water. Not that it has been warm enough to even want to, but that's not the point.
More later
----------
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