Category: Narrative

It turns out that Father’s Day in Fiji is in September, and we were invited to church and then afterwards to a lunch with the Chief’s clan, so of course we accepted.

Being Father’s Day it was a special kind of church service. Instead of the pastor giving a single sermon, several dads of the village got up and read scripture and did a little of their own preaching. It was all in Fijian so we couldn’t understand a word, but it was interesting to observe the different styles of the men who were speaking. Some were quiet and reserved and some were real fire and brimstone. However, this format produced the longest church service ever! Well over 2 hours. The kids did great, and so did the adults. As usual, what really made it bearable was the singing. It’s also in Fijian, but so beautiful you feel like you can understand it anyway.

After church went to the big family lunch with the entire chief’s clan, something like 50-60 people including many, many kids. It was an enjoyable afternoon, and I must say that this was the nicest, most welcoming village that we had been to since the Lau group. As is the usual Fijian custom, the men and children ate first and then after they had dispersed from the meeting hall, the women had a turn. Being the guests, it was expected that Liz and I eat in the first round, which we did, but then we hung around with the women after, and even helped with washing the dishes. I liked Liz’s observation that she shared with the women… it’s good that they wait until after the men and children leave to eat because then they get to eat in peace! There was a little bit of laughter at that comment.

One day the guys hit the walu jackpot. Brenden got a big one, while Max got a HUGE one. We still had some of the last one in the freezer, so we decided to split Brenden’s fish between our two boats and then give Max’s to the village.

For a change of scenery and to be closer to the village we moved around the top of the island to the east side and anchored inside the reef just off of the little islet called Motubua. This was a gorgeous spot, but although we were closer to the village, visits had to be timed with the tide since there is quite a swath of reef between where we were anchored and the village.

Just south of where we were anchored there is a small patch of sandy beach on the island proper of Yadua. One day we did a bit of exploring and ended up in the middle of a dried-out mangrove flat. It was eerily quiet back there and there wasn’t too much to see, but it was a nice little walk and good to get off the boat for a while.

The boys didn’t come back into the mangroves with us, instead they climbed up the sheer cliff at the edge of the beach. OK, it wasn’t a sheer cliff, but I swear from time to time those boys need reminding how far away a hospital is!

The kids decided they wanted to swim back to the boats, and in the photo below you can see that for a short moment Victoria had second thoughts and started to turn back. However, in the end the boys reassured her, and they all made their way all the way back to Exodus. It was heartwarming to watch Alex and Brenden swim alongside Victoria and Jonathon. Liz and I watched pretty much the whole time, because it wasn’t a short distance, but we were reassured that the big boys weren’t leaving the smaller ones behind.

Tim had arranged with one of the guys from the village to go out with them to dive for cucumbers, so one morning he was up early, and I made biscuits and popcorn for him to take and share. The people of Yadua seem to LOVE popcorn. Anyway, they never showed up, so the boys enjoyed snacking on the biscuits and popcorn all day long. Tim was disappointed, but the upside is that he and Max (Fluenta) ended up going out spearfishing and they came back and filled both of our freezers.

I was just getting out of the shower when I hear them pull up in the dinghy yelling, “anybody home?” After hearing that a couple more times, I thought I should see what’s up, so I poked my head out and asked if he needed anything. His response was priceless… “just a photographer.” Clearly there was something to see so I dressed quickly, and wow, was it a sight. The biggest dogtooth tuna that I’d ever seen BY FAR, but the thing was, it was only half a tuna… Because a shark took the other half! And just that half a tuna weighed 35 lbs! And of course, they also came back with a couple good sized walus as well. I told Tim we needed a fishing ban now, and he gave me the stink eye. We saved the heads from all these fish to give to the village, and as you might imagine the tuna head was enormous, but somehow Fluenta’s magic freezer was able to accommodate it.

Cucuvou was a beautiful bay, but there wasn’t much space for a proper run. So, I got in the habit the few days we were there of paddle boarding to the beach and going for a walk. That might not sound like much of a workout, but with the wind blowing offshore at about 20 kts most of the time, the paddle to get from Exodus to the beach would really get my heart rate up. Sometimes I wouldn’t even be moving forward, and it would seem like I was on some sort of paddle boarding treadmill. And then when I finally made it to the beach, I would reward myself with a leisurely walk along the sand, picking up this rock or that shell and making the most of my “me-time.”

Luckily, one of the last days we were there the wind eased, and I got to enjoy a long paddle around the entire bay and enjoy its beauty from almost every angle.

We had read that it’s possible to hike from Cucuvou across the island over to the village, and so we decided to give it a go. The fact that we had no idea where the trail was and that it was a gray drizzly day wasn’t stopping us. It turned out to be quite a long hike, three hours in all, but I’m pretty sure we weren’t breaking any speed records. Other than the dampness, it was an enjoyable hike, mostly along a ridge with views of the different bays around the island.

The people of the village were pleasant and they appreciated our effort to come all that way to present Sevusevu. The chief wasn’t there, so we presented our Yaqona to his son. We ended up getting a ride back to our anchorage in one of their small fiberglass fishing boats. Quite a ride, and it sure beat another 3 hour hike back.

The primary source of income for this village is selling sea cucumbers for sale in Asian markets. They were doing that as well in Matuku, and there they told us they had a Korean buyer. Not sure who the specific buyer is here at Yadua, but they dive every day, and while we were in the village they were filling all their dive tanks. It is unclear what the sustainability of this operation might be. Tim told me that in Matuku they said they keep having to dive deeper and deeper to find the sea cucumbers, so that seems to indicate that it may not be a long-term endeavor.

Cucuvou is not a harbor, it’s just a regular ole bay, but for some reason it’s listed as a harbor on Navionics, so I’m going with that. It’s a west facing heart-shaped bay with a narrow entrance and north and south lobes. When we first pulled into the bay we anchored in the north lobe next to Fluenta, and after Tim and I exchanged some very typical anchor time, let’s call it banter, and turned the engines off the sheer silence was deafening. We were pretty sure Fluenta had to have heard our exchange, but it’s OK, because we were pretty sure they wouldn’t judge.

Once we were settled and relaxed and hanging out in the cockpit, we had that cruisers bliss feeling that we were missing in the resort laden, high traffic area of Yasawas. There’s only one village on the entire island and it’s on the other side from Cucuvou. So, the bay was completely missing any evidence of human activity, and it was absolutely gorgeous and peaceful.

The next morning, both Exodus and Fluenta reanchored over to the southern lobe in preparation for the trade winds to fill back in.

We departed Blue Lagoon early in the morning, before 7 am. There are two routes around island and out of the reef heading east, and Tim had expressed his desire to take the northern route because it was most direct. However, on the satellite imagery it was clear that the southern route was wider and didn’t have any concerning shallow spots, while the northern route had one spot that looked a little sketchy. So, me being who I am, the day before we left, I paddled out to the shallow spot to take depth soundings. It was a narrow, shallow patch, but it was both wide and deep enough for Exodus, so upon departure, it was the north route we took.

The day passage was a pleasant one except for the drone of an engine. There were a lot of reefs to avoid, but they were easily visible and avoidable. The fishing was great. The boys caught two yellow fin tuna (our first ones in Fiji!) and they also caught and released a skipjack tuna, a barracuda, and a sierra.

We pulled into Cucuvou Bay on Yadua in the late afternoon and visibility was quite poor. We tried to survey the bay but ended up having a much too close encounter with a bombie and so decided to just drop anchor somewhere deep and safe for the night.

September 6 – October 18, 2015

Almost three months previous we had left Savusavu to cruise around Fiji, and now we were poised to close the circle and make our way back to the starting point. This leg would be challenging from a weather perspective because we basically wanted to head east against the trade winds from the Northern Yawawas back to Savusavu. Since tacking in Exodus isn’t much of an option (we love her, but she goes to weather like a fat pig) our strategy was basically to wait for light winds and then motor or if we were lucky, motorsail. This strategy mostly worked.

We departed Blue Lagoon up in Northern Yasawas in the very early morning on Sunday September 6th and we had a pleasant light air upwind motorsail to the island of Yadua. We stayed a few days at Cucuvou Harbor on the west side of Yadua and then eventually made our way to the other side to anchor inside the reef near the village. When the winds were right, we continued heading east back to the island of Vanua Levu (the island where Savusavu is located). We stayed a couple days at Bua Bay and then a couple days at Coconut Point until we had light enough winds to motor down to the small island of Namena in the world-famous marine reserve and dive location. We stayed three days at Namena before sailing, yes sailing, up to Savusavu.

We ended up staying in Savusavu for about three weeks, because we had to order a new membrane for our watermaker, but there are definitely much worse places to be stuck. We enjoyed getting to know Savusavu a little better and catching up with old friends. I was also able to slowly and methodically complete a massive reprovisioning as we prepared for our upcoming adventure north for cyclone season. We eventually departed Savusavu on Sunday October 18th, but we weren’t leaving Fiji just yet. Stay tuned for the final upcoming Fiji chapter that will cover the islands of Koro, Rabi, and Rotuma.

(Blue Lagoon) –> Cucuvou Harbor (Yadua) –> Motubua Islet (Yadua) –> Bua Bay –> Coconut Point –> Namena –> Savusavu

By the time we made it up to the north end of Waya Island, our kid boat posse was briefly down to three: Exodus, Fluenta, and Honey. Nalauwaki Bay is a large, north facing bay with dramatic volcanic geography which was stunning in the rising or setting sunlight.

Shortly after arriving went to shore with Fluenta and Honey in order to do our Sevusevu. This one was one of the most impersonal ones we’ve had, but after we got a bit of a tour of the village. The Octopus Resort is just over the hill from here and many people of the village work at the resort, so it boosts their “local economy”, but it also means they have a lot of access to tourists. We were all quite interested in hiking to the top of the mountain (shown in the picture above) and the villagers were tripping over themselves volunteering to guide us. It seemed very nice, but after delving a little deeper and asking a few questions it turned out that they wanted us to pay $30 each for the hike. Of course, we recently had guided hikes in both Matuku and Gau without any price to pay, and while we did give our guides gifts afterwards, it didn’t have that feel of an impersonal transaction like this one was shaping out to be. In the end we passed on the hike, and we also passed on the coconuts they tried to sell us. When I mentioned I thought the price seemed very high, their response was that “this is what we get at the resort.” Our friends on s/v Honey were interested in trading for some local fruits, but it took a while to convince the villagers to trade rather than charge cash. To be honest, unlike some island countries, trading is not so prevalent in Fiji, because their infrastructure makes most of the basic staples accessible to most people. Even in the more remote villages of the Lau group they didn’t need to trade for food items and preferred to accept money over trading. Of course, if you have something they cannot easily get, like a mask and snorkel or some fishing hooks, they may very well be interested in trading. But breakfast crackers just aren’t going to get you much.

After the sevusevu and the village tour we hung out on the beach for a while. Tim and Max (Fluenta) made some friends and of course the kids found some village kids to play with. Truth be told, our boat kids all wanted to back to the boat right away and play amongst themselves, but we made them hang out for a while. I can always count on Alex to just make the most of it, and he started playing catch with some of the village kids, and pretty soon, there was all kinds of fun to be had.

We stayed in the bay for a few days before continuing on up the Yasawa chain. There is a tiny surf break on the coral in the middle of the bay and at the right tide conditions you can surf it. Most evenings Tim and Max spent an hour or two surfing the breaks on stand-up paddle boards. Before we left, we were happy to be joined by Field Trip again, so our kid boat fleet was back up to four.

Our friends on Lumbaz were the ones who introduced us to “special project days” where the kids research whatever they want and then give a presentation on it. Our four boats continued the legacy and we had a special project day when we were at Waya. The kids are usually pretty nervous, but when they all get through it they are relaxed and happy to have gone through it together. This time, even some of the moms got into the action and gave presentations.