From Vuda to Musket to the Yasawas Enjoying the Sidewinder Life

Two days ago, I swam with an incredible, graceful, huge manta ray and what a rush that was!!!!Three weeks after leaving Vuda Pt, we are now back in Korovou Bay on Naviti Island in the Yasawas,  hanging out with Guava and Quickstar and will continue to work our way up the chain of the Yasawas. With a new chain and new prescription drugs, a few more jars of peanut butter, pickles and Best Foods Mayonnaise from Cost U Less, and fresh veggies, we escaped one more time from Vuda Pt and headed out for Musket Cove with Riki on Guava Jelly, close behind. We took advantage of the calm seas to go out to Cloudbreaks and watch some of the Volcum Surf Contest and were delighted to be greeted by dolphins and good waves, although the surf had dropped. Friends, Christi and Greg from Seattle hitched a ride with Guava and joined us in the festivities.We had more barbeques at the Sunset Bar and touched base with wonderful friends we will miss, but it was very much time to finally get away.  We headed out on our last Mamanuca/Yasawa adventure in Fiji with Guava and Helena, a little over a week ago, with the intention of hooking up with Quickstar. After a pretty rocky first night off of Yanuya Island, with strong wind, we had a great sail up to the beautiful bay of Nalauwaki, on the north shore of the first Yasawa Island, and found a stunning place to hide! We looked up at magnificent rock spires with green hills all around; the village was neatly nestled at one end of the bay and a fresh water stream emptied not too far away. Our next four days included sevusevu with warm, smiling villagers, an incredible hike to the top of one of the spires with Tiko, wonderful fresh water baths, two days of fabulous snorkeling, Capt David catching the first fish of the season, drinking kava on Quickstar with Tiko and his girlfriend, and, of course, just sharing good times with our friends. Tomorrow we will head up to Blue Lagoon and deliver some items for a local friend whose family lives up there, and then we will make our way back down to ready ourselves for leaving Fiji and heading to Vanuatu. It is so great to be back in the warm water again and the time spent with the manta has been the highlight so far. Riki took a video of our swim with the manta, but we need to figure out how to send some still pictures from that. The photos will help show our venture so far and at least give you a sense of living the life. Love to all. and Happy Fathers Day to all of you dads.

Finally the new chain appeared and David quickly got it read to load up on Sidewinder

While in Musket, we discovered the main wenches needed to be re-built.

Those who surf Cloudbreaks are some of the best surfers in the world. It was a mellow day.

The dolphins kept us company as we watched these athletes perform for Volcum