On Friday we had a really nice sail (as opposed to motoring) some 30 miles from our first night’s anchorage to Yadua. We’re planning to spend several days here. The island is mountainous and scenic, with volcanic outcroppinigs. There are lots of good walks, also good reefs for snorkeling and getting back into scuba diving. The grey clouds have lifted although not disappeared altogether, and we can see blue skies and therefore blue water. On the sail over we trolled for fish and were rewarded with a big dorado (mahi mahi) and a walou (Spanish mackerel). Dinner was fresh fish served three different ways – all delicious.
Speaking of fish for dinner, our new crewmember Elize has proven herself quite successfully. She is very conscientious about preparing South Beach friendly food for us (really easy with so much fish available). She learned to cook while crewing on replica tall ships – feeding some 40 crew members while cooking over an antique cast iron stove. She comes from Port Rupert in British Columbia and grew up in the fishing industry…skipping school whenever possible to go out with the fishing fleet with her dad who was a marine engineer. She is just 21 years old, very sweet and good-natured. Rod is happy with her sailing skills as well. She is smart and has a good deal of knowledge about marine ecology.
We are anchored by a small rugged island named Yadua (pronounced Yandua) off the southwest corner of the big Fijian island Vanua Levu. There are five other sailboats anchored in the bay with us. We have met some of the yachties. One is German but has emigrated to New Zealand and another couple is American but they have also emigrated to New Zealand. A huge yellow trimaran arrived yesterday. It looks very exotic and fast, but the living quarters must be pretty limited from the looks of its narrow hull.
The Fijians have a beche de mer (sea cucumber) fishing camp set up on the beach here. On Monday 17 divers are expected to come and collect the beche de mer, diving as deep as 50 meters (a lot deeper that we sport divers dar to go),. They will dry and smoke their catch, slice them very thin and eventually export them to the Orient where they are used as a very strongly flavored seasoning on rice.
The day’s entertainment yesterday was a hike to the island’s village – about 1 1/2 hours each way. It was very scenic and not too tough a walk, but enough to get Mike and I huffing and puffing up some of the hills and a few sore muscles by the end.
The village was very attractive and thriving, with a lot of traditional bures (thatched huts) and surprising signs (courtesy of the previous schoolmaster) nailed to the trees proclaiming sentiments like “Kindness”, “Faith”, “Integrity”, etc. We came to perform the traditional sevusevu ceremony, but the chief was away fishing and the village men had gathered together to celebrate the current schoomaster’s birthday. As a result we were included in the social kava gathering with perhaps 30 villagers, many more than in our past experiences. It is fun and a good ice-breaker to take digital photos of the village children. They clown around like crazy having their picture taken, and then swarm us like a football huddle, each wanting a turn to see the photos played back in the camera.
The weather for the past 24 hours has been quite blustery with strong winds. There is an instrument panel set into the ceiling above Mike’s and my queen-size bed, so that we can check out windspeed and direction in the middle of the night. The wind was gusting in the 25-30 knot range, peaking at 35 knots (about 40 mph) all night long which kept us from sleeping well as we envisioned the anchor letting loose and a resultant fast trip in the direction of a sunken coral bommie. Raven’s oversized anchor had no trouble, however, and neither did our neighbors. We were all still safe and sound come daylight.
Today’s schedule includes a scuba dive, and the evening entertainment so far has been reruns of the original Star Trek TV series – Rod and Elize have become big fans. Mike has been doing some computer maintenance on Raven’s navigational programs.