Fiji diving (and rambling) continue!!!

What a terrific country, how could you not fall in love with this place!!!  I see that we haven't updated the blog with our current adventures for about a month.  So just what the hell has your Bravo team been up to, anyway???


Well, after diving at the Rainbow Reef (Viani Bay) for a week or so, we needed to head back into Savusavu for supplies, and to pick up our new autopilot, shipped in from Brisbane, to replace the faulty unit that we flown in a couple of months ago (it went "DOA" after about 24 hours of driving....."bad Otto, bad"!).  In all fairness, we had bought a used "brain" from manufacturer TMQ to replace the old 15 year old one.  I guess everything has its limits. 

The lunch view of Bravo off the resort.

Stopped off at Paradise Resort on Taveuni Island along the way for a brief R&R......unfortunately the $32 burgers at the little low key dive resort scared us away after a day or 2, but it was a pretty spot for a bit of kayaking and snorkeling.

Many patches later, our inflatable kayaks are still great for exploring the reefs

TMQ's customer service had been great so we decided to buy a brand new autopilot display and brain from them.  Installation was straightforward, as we kept the old drive unit, compass, and rudder sender.  A days work and Otto is up to his old reliable self once again!!!!!  "Good, Otto, good....."

Hanging around Savusavu (like the sleepy little town a lot, we do!) we decided to take a dive boat out to the Namena Reef, also famous for its soft corals and coral formations.  We went with Koro Sun Diving, along with our friends John and Pat from The Rose.  Had a good day of diving on the spectacular reef, though the boat was packed with about 22 people total, too many for our taste.....really a diving rodeo, and all the bubbles scared a lot of the critters as we descended.  Ah well, it was great to get out on the reef nonetheless.....

Our favorite Savusavu taxi

"Gourmet Powder":  MSG and Salt.......how can you go wrong???

One day we decided to hop a bus from Savusavu to Labasa, the largest city on the island.  It's about a 2-1/2 hour ride, up and over the ridge in the center, to the dry north side of the island.  Different climate, and very different cultural experience. 

Labasa is predominantly Indo Fijian, unlike the rest of Fiji that we've visited so far.  While in town we visited a Hindu temple, Nag Mandir, home of the holy "cobra rock". 

But you already knew this, right???

Even for us, these peppers were pure FIRE!!!

The market was full of various Indian spices and foods, as well as the usual great veggies and aisle after aisle of kava sellers.....these guys take their grog seriously. 

Kava department

Standard price.....$0.50 US per pile

The bus ride was open air, no windows.  Got a bit cold on the ridge, where it was even drizzling a bit.  But all in all another great third world bus ride.  We're suckers for 'em.  (though no squirming sacks of live chickens or guinea pigs like their south American counterparts......damn.....)

Sugar cane is king here.....this is a little cane train near Labasa

We realized how special the diving at Viani Bay had been, and decided to head back around the corner (about 40 miles) to the Bay from Savusavu.  Had a great sail, and Otto drove the whole way!!!





Here are a few photos from some of our dives on the Rainbow Reef.....

Blue spotted ray (honestly, that's the name!!!)

Another dive on the Great White Wall

Unusual "lettuce coral" at the Cabbage Patch dive

Snorkeling with the mantas at Rabi Island

Old tire at a mooring covered with soft corals

Schools of fusiliers

Amazing camoflage

Typical soft coral

Eye of an octopus watches us warily from his little cave

On the "Purple Wall"

John and Adam solve the worlds problems between dives.....

While diving, Cindi and I decided to take the Advanced Open Water diving course from our favorite dive operators, Dolphin Bay.  Great people, and a terrific place to hang out between and after diving.  They'd pick us up on Bravo each morning for another fantastic day on the reef.  Sweet!!!

Finally, after another week or so at Viani it was time to start moving on.  Lots more of Fiji to explore before we need to check out in late October, bound for New Zealand.  We headed over to Koro Island, 45 miles to the west, approaching the main island of Fiji, Viti Levu.  Koro is another beautiful Fijian island, the 6th largest, with 14 villages around its perimeter.  One unique thing about Koro is the availability of "free hold land".....that is, land available for purchase by individuals from outside Fiji.  (only 9% of Fiji is like this, the rest is held by the native villages).  There is a "resort" here of sorts, really a community club for the expats from 26 countries who now own land here in the development.  The approximately 40 solar powered houses seem small, eco friendly, and unobtrusive.  We walked about a mile to the nearest village to do our sevusevu with the chief, but were told he was at the school watching a rugby tournament.  Off we went to watch the tournament, never found the chief.  But the rugby was fun, and we enjoyed another visit to a friendly Fijian village.

Went diving today with a local dive guide, Peceli.  He did a great job directing us around the fringing reefs to a dive site, "The Cavern of Whips".  The coral here has been hit hard by crown of thorns starfish and some bad storms in the last couple of years.  But it was a fun dive anyway, with some terrific caves, and Peceli knew the complex reef like the back of his hand.  Vinaka, Peceli!

66" mahi mahi, our largest so far, nearly 60 lbs!!!  We ate well, as did some of the locals!!!

Will head off tomorrow for Makongai Island, a former leper colony, now a breeding station for turtles and giant clams, about a 25 mile sail to the west.......stay tuned!

Savusavu.....a wonderful welcome to Fiji!!!

Marina gangplank gets a bit steep at low tide!!!

 BULA!!!

Local DHL office became a regular hangout waiting for parts deliveries

We've been in Savusavu for 2-1/2 weeks now, taking care of Bravo's needs developed on the last passage.  It's been a great place for us to ease into the laid back Fijian way of life.  The people in this sleepy little town couldn't be more helpful or friendly, and we've found that we can accomplish a lot with a little around here (with a bit of help from our friends Mr. DHL and Ms. Visa, to be sure).

Downtown Savusavu....see the steam vents at low tide?  Hot springs all around

Local raft.  Owner has to pay $5 Fijian (about $3 US) per year registration fee!!!

So we'll start off with the project update, then move on to more of the fun stuff!

Ready for the motor-ectomy....60hz on left, 50hz on the right.....

Watermaker motor:  Our new 60hz motor arrived safe and sound a week after we did.  A couple of hours later it was purring like a kitten after swapping for the 50hz motor installed in New Zealand.  Thanks to Rich at CruiseRO for all of the help in getting it here!

Radar:  The "malfunction" turned out to be simply that the AGC (Automatic Gain Control) had been turned off, to "manual" mode, and it was set to zero.....about the same thing as turning the volume to zero on your iPod and thinking the thing is broken!!!  Took a couple of hours to finally find it, but the "repair" took 2 seconds!!!  Sweet as, the happy dance began in earnest!!!

This is Otto's brain.....

Autopilot:  With help from the Australian manufacturer, TMQ, we figured out that the fault was in the black box, or brain of the beast.  Although it's a 15 year old system, they had a "refurbished" (whatever that means!!!) matching unit in the shop.  Shipped in 5 days, it was a true plug and play installation!!!  Another happy dance!

Hydrovane wind vane:  Found a big block of "Starboard" plastic down in the bilge and shaped a new block to replace the lower bracket ship which fell into the briny deep when the bolts vibrated loose on the passage from NZ.  A few hours of grunting and swearing, and the rascal looks better than new!!!

SSB radio:  Per the last post, the old one was truly toast due to the water leak.  We ordered a new Icom 802 from the US.  It arrived yesterday, and was on the air with great signal reports 3 hours later.  Still have to hook it up for email capability, but good to go for now.

Underwater strobe:  While getting the camera gear ready for a snorkel, we found that leaking batteries had fried the unit.  What???  Here in the land of some of the most spectacular diving on the planet?????   Grrrrrrr........no worries, again thanks to DHL, a new one arrived from Oz yesterday.

We've also been busy caulking deck leaks (remember that ruined radio???), and Cindi's sewn some cool hatch covers that will allow us to keep our hatches open for breeze when it rains!

Other than projects, Savusavu has been a terrific place to just hang out and chill for a couple of weeks.  It's a really social cruiser scene, with yachts from all around the world congregating.  Happy hours at the "yacht club" are a great spot to meet friends from past crossroads and swap tall sailing tales over a few bottles of Fiji Bitter......tasty business!

One day Epeli, a great guy who works at the marina invited a few of us over to Naidi, his small, traditional village, about a 15 minute drive away, for a "lovo" or feast cooked in a pit oven dug in the ground, same as the "umu" of Tonga.

We brought our kava (yaquona) as an offering for the chief, in order to be accepted by the villagers.   So the first order of business was that four of us were selected by an elder of the village to go for the presentation.  After about 5 or 10 somewhat tense minutes of chanting and rapid discussion in Fijian, along with lots of gestures with our kava root, the 84 year old chief smiled a huge warm smile, and said "welcome to our village.....you are part of our family now".  Whew!!!

With that, we were free to wander around the village, speaking with both kids and adults, who were mostly eager to welcome us.  The kids especially were terrific, even interupting their afternoon rugby games to join us.

 Epeli then walked us around the village, over to the lovo where dinner was just about ready.  They peeled away the pile of banana leaves, uncovering packages of fish, pork, spam, casava, taro, and other unknown delicacies (sometimes it's best not to ask.....)

opening the oven

We wandered back to a lean-to where they have their evening kava circle, and the kava did begin to flow.  One clap for a 1/2 coconut cup, ("low tide") 2 claps for a full ("high tide" or "tsunami") it was tough to match Epeli and the boys cup for cup.

Cindi powers down another "low tide"

But we held our own pretty well until dinner was ready!

Fantastic spread, with lots of good coconut sauces and other bits and pieces.  No one went away hungry.

After dinner, as the men of the village finished up with their evening chores, they joined us for an evening of great guitar and ukelele music, beautiful Fijian harmonizing, and bowl after bowl of kava.  Although they get together to talk and drink kava every evening, the music is special, and they seemed to enjoy the occasion of our visit as an excuse to party as much as we did.  Nice.

Epeli mixing up the next batch of kava...."tsunami over here, please!!!"

A really wonderful evening with Epeli and the village. Vinaka Vakelevu......thank you very much.

Outrigger canoes stored outside the WaiTui marina

Cindi has gone out paddling with a group of locals for a couple of evening training sessions.  A good workout and great social event, paddling the tippy outriggers has been a lot of fun.  Not sure if one is in Bravo's future.....we still enjoy our inflatable kayaks.



So what's next for Bravo, projects newly completed (knock on teak!!!), and her crew?  Well, it looks like we have a somewhat unusual period of calm weather, with the typical SE tradewinds "in remission" for a few days.  When the trades are blowing, it can be quite a bitch to sail to the southern Lau group of islands, about 185 miles to the SE.  It looks like we'll need to motor most of the way, but that's heaps better than a long bash to windward.

The Lau group is the most remote part of Fiji, just recently opened up to any tourists.  The villages still observe traditional Fijian ways, and offer a rare opportunity to participate in the village culture.

Grocery shopping in the public market

We've stocked the boat with about 6 weeks of supplies, including much for trading and gifting the locals, as their supply boat only comes about once per month.

Prasad and his wife wrap up our yaquona.

Naturally we've laid in a good supply of top quality yaquona (kava) for our sevusevu offerings to the village chiefs.  Each 1/2 kilo bunch is wrapped in ribbons and newspaper, which the chiefs like as a way to read the news.




 Stay tuned!













Oh, one final story in this already too long blog post.....the other day, I was speaking with JoLynn, the wonderful woman who runs the DHL outpost here.  She is of Maori and Samoan descent, and grew up in New Zealand.  She's married to a local Fijian man, Sanjay, the village ace mechanic.  She told me that last year, the family took its first trip to visit her family in NZ.  Sanjay had never been out of Fiji, and has only rarely left this island.  As he walked around NZ with his eyes wide open, Sanjay's biggest amazement, among many like elevators and escalators, was seeing that "palangis" (white people) actually work for a living!!!  In his 40 or so years living in Savusavu, the only palangis he'd ever seen were either tourists or yachties, and he never saw a white person who worked!!!    Then she told me about her 6 year old son, Caleb, who couldn't wait to get to NZ.  When they finally got to the main Fijian airport waiting to catch the flight to NZ, he was in awe.  Looking at all the glass and glitter, in an air conditioned airport terminal building, he said, "Mom, I love New Zealand.....can we live here????" 

Ahhhhh, Fiji, ya gotta love it.......

Amazing sunsets off our rear deck (pre photoshop)