More Magical Memories

The chief and elders gave us the blessings of the village and welcomed us to thoroughly enjoy ourselves.

 The caves, the coves, and our cruising friends full of adventurous warm spirit all contributed to this special time in the Bay of Islands, Vanua Balavu.   The pictures speak for themselves!

 Carolyn, Linda, and I had so much fun exploring the lagoons.......and left us all smiling.

 Daliconi villagers embraced us and shared their lives with us. How fortunate we are!

Still in Musket Cove .....Waiting and Reflecting

It is reflection time which brings to mind wonderful memories with new friends.

Here at Budd's Reef, we found ourselves with great people from four other boats. We hiked the rim of this vocano and thoroughly treasured the views at the top. Wonderful friends, Beth and Ken joined in the fun.

After hiking, we snorkeled one of the passes, and had a wet, wild ride home.

Ken finds his dive mask useful even out of the water!

Sidewinder and Eagle's Wings sailed side by side on the way to Budd's Reef

What a joy to meet the villagers at Daliconi, who danced with us, sang, and gave us a great feast!

Flying Foxes are plentiful in Vanua Balavu, the Bay of Islands. They look like little monkeys when they move from branch to branch.  So interesting to watch them.

Passages between island groups were pretty spectacular and comfortable.

The kids delighted in having their pictures taken by me. What fun it was to re-connect with the children.

An excursion to the caves gave us the opportunity to see the whole area.

Linda, from Chesapeake, and I enjoyed early morning tranquil kayaking trips around this exotic area.

Fun times on Riada II, with Dave, Carolyn, Rickki (Guava Jelly)  and others. Think we got crazy?!!

Carolyn and Dave cooked us yummy food and often times we played music together.

What an awesome place, both in the still of the mornings, afternoons, and at sunset time. WOW!

Early mornings are such a wonderful time to connect and think about all that is good.

It has been a whole week since the last night party, and we are now on a mooring, more settled in than ever. I am just recovering from a bug which took away my voice, and the weather has been very stormy. We had major lightning and thunder a few nights ago, and we feel lucky not to have been hit; several boats lost all electrical and we are counting our blessings. Being here has its advantages.  I have found a flat area where I can go ashore and do yoga postures, there is good hiking/walking in the hills, David has been playing lots of good VBall with the locals every evening, and warm showers are the best.  My voice has finally returned, unfortunately for Cpt David, and the energy is back. We have talked about going somewhere, but it is quite fun just hanging out here, while the money lasts, and since I have been sick, the diving elsewhere is not a possibility. It is time to reflect on our awesome cruising season after leaving Taveuni and the ones above are just a few of the pictures for all to enjoy.  I will continue to add some each day.  We certainly have been blessed with wonderful weather, great new friends, and amazing Fijian local experiences which we will always cherish.

More Regatta Fun

 
 Race day started with breakfast on Jemellie with Steve and Lindsay and what a glorious day it was with perfect wind and nothing but sunshine.

After the start which Geoff, the owner and skipper or Flashback, hit perfectly we were in the middle of the pack with the bigger faster boats ahead and the boats of our size well behind.

The racing was fast and intense and we had front row seats.

After rounding the island the shoots were popped and we were headed for home.

The crew of Flashback at the end of the race and just before the beers started opening.

The Hobie races began with a grand prix type start.

The day of the finals the wind picked up which made for a lot of excitement

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With another perfect weather day the beach was lined with cruisers yelling and hooting support.

The father and son team off Ivory Quays won it all, Good job Bill !!!!

Pete and Diana off s/v Quickstar displaying their winning trophies for their victory in the Merling races. Great job you two, we were cheering for you.

The final evening was special with a great sunset, fantastic food and lots of wine to wash it all down. We all danced till our feet hurt and then limped back to our dingies and a star lit ride back to our boats. I can't believe the week is already over, it was a ton of fun and if there is anyway we can do it again we will be here again next year. 

From Village Life to Musket Cove Regatta!

 Peter and Diana, Canadian friends we have not seen since last year, invited us to race with them in the Pirate's Day Regatta to Beachcomber Island.. Although there was no wind, the pirates still made it and successfully took over with gusto.

 Kiwi friends from Adamite, Lynn and Graham, and Conor from s/v Kiwi enjoyed the rowdy day.

 Suzi, Lindsay, and Lucy found it hard to smile, but they managed to join in the fun.

 A great opportunity to meet new friends and connect with those we have missed for a while.

Here we are, anchored off of the island of Malolo, the most southern island in the Mamanucas, and deeply involved in the serious fun of the Musket Cove Regatta. There must be over 50 yachts here and everyone is in the party mood! EEEHAAA!  The Friday Night Opening shindig inspired us all to dance way into the night and kicked us into high gear for a week of continuing fun. It is already Tuesday and I have had no time to update the blog until now! Hopefully these few pictures will at least let you know we can still rise to the occasion and do our share of partying, enjoying a re-connection with lots of people we have not seen for a while and meeting many great new,  interesting adventurers.  Life is good!

Back to Civilization

We just arrived in Port Denarau but they have no moorings available, so we have anchored outside and are going in just to see what's up. Had a good sail last night and all is well. Will catch up with you later. Love, S

Tavuki Bay

We are now around the corner in Tavuki Bay, just south of Namalata Bay and Vunisea, and it has been raining non-stop since late yesterday afternoon. We now have full water tanks (yay!) and are getting ready to go into the village of Soladama for the wonderful veggies we ordered. After arriving yesterday noon, Ricky, David and I jumped into the dinghy and headed for what seemed to be the largest of the villages in this bay, with our papers and kava bundles; the tide was coming up so we got stranded by shallow reef, dropped the anchor, and waded the rest of the way in. We were met by a wonderful welcoming family who invited us inside a beautiful big house and proceeded to hold court with the grandmother, a beautiful 73 year old woman in a wheel chair. She had visited Seattle in her 40's, so she an Ricky had much to talk about, and her late husband had been a government official for many years, before he passed away. Tavuki Village is the home of the most important chief in all of Kadavu, but by the time it came to doing sevusevu, the weather was so bad that we just gave the kava to the headman, who blessed us and welcomed us to the village, and he will take it to the chief today. Before the rain started, we were guided by the daughter, an elegant fiesty woman who said she would stand in for the chief (with a smile :)) through two other villages so that we could get some veggies and some more grog (kava).

David here to finish this as we had to go into the village to do another Sevu Sevu with ( a different village than the one we did it with yesterday)  as well as pick up our veggies. After we made the wet dingy ride in and did the Sevu Sevu we were sitting in the meeting house when we noticed that Riata 11 seemd to be moving. The wind had picked up big time ( 25-30 knts ) and Riata 11 was dragging her anchor. A mad dash for the dingies and off we went in chase of the run away boat. Riata's crew got there in time pull up the now dangling anchor ( 120 ft. of anchor chain out and now in 180 ft. of water ) and motor back to our anchoring location where they dropped the old hook again and this time it seemed to really set. Like I've said many times before, never a dull moment around cruisers. So here we are hanging out in our warm and cozy Sidewinder waiting for the rain to stop so we can venture out and get ourselves into some other trouble. We'll let you know how that works out.....see ay,  David & Suzi

Vunisea Bay

We are anchored in Vunisea Bay  19 02.7695 S  178 09.3649 E but will be moving today around the corner to the south to a different bay that has the fresh veggie market that Suzi is soooo looking forward to. We did go into the village here yesterday and there were a few different small stores where we were able to get lots of the little things we have become use to like cookies, peanut butter, cokes for our rum, fresh bread, a fresh cabbage and some little apples, baked beans and even some frozen sausages. The internet here is very slow to say the least. Fact is we can't even get into gmail but can hook up to the internet connection for sailmail which is too confusing to explain right now. What this means is we can send and receive messages using our sailmail address with the same restrictions applied but it comes in much faster and without having to connect to the radio. So no photos yet !! Sorry, I'm sure anyone reading our blog these days is getting tired of only reading text with no pictures to help support the stories. Oh well, nothing we can do about that now. In a few days we are moving down to the south side of this island to Cape Washington that is world know for its waves. Has a place there called "King Kongs" which might tell you a bit about the wave size and strength. Won't be seeing me on any of those suckers but there are suppose to be other breaks in the area that are more user friendly. I'll keep you updated......David       Hi there! 

We are having some weird clouds and a front is moving into the area tomorrow; big winds and rain are predicted, so looks like we will be hanging out here.  Luckily, Guava and Riada are still here and will be moving around to the next bay with us. After that we will part ways and that will be very sad for me. It has been really special having some friends to play with. The energy is so fun to share; laughing and carrying on adds so much to life, as we all know. -S