Yesterday started off really nicely - we went snorkeling outside Manta Ray Resort, which was magical. No manta rays, but thousands of fishes and brightly coloured coral. It was simply amazing sticking your head under the crystal clear water and swimming amongst the fish. There were big schools of tiny fish that were all swimming together and as one entity they sunk into the coral as you swam through them. It looked like somebody had turned a vacuum cleaner on them and they were immediately sucked down. So constantly swimming through them was a lot of fun. There were some ridiculously colorful fish nibbling on stuff around the sea bed, some beautiful angel fish, amazing flurescent coral and every other kind of fish you would expect to find on a reef. And as I was snorkeling back to the boat a few metres above the reef, a white fish that was almost see through very nearly smacked me in the face as it swam past, because I didn't think to look ahead of me when there were so many interesting things down below. What was he doing up there anyway? All his friends were on the bottom of the reef.
So that was exciting. Getting into the reef was not as enjoyable - we went through a gap between two islands, where the water was a scary light blue colour. Dark blue - good. Blue - good. Aqua - medium. Light blue, brown and white - bad. That means it's ridiculously shallow and the water is ridiculously clear so you can see what's underneath. Light blue is sand, and as we went through Garth was up the front yelling directions at me so we didn't run into any rocks or coral, which I could clearly see underneath us on either side as we navigated through. Looking down at rocks and spikey coral does not make me happy. It got down to four metres, and I can't explain the relief I felt when the depth sounder started climbing up again - we've already established that we get stuck at two. The snorkeling was worth all the stress though, and I'm sad to say it's probably the best reef we'll swim in for a while. I hope it won't be, but it's unrealistic to expect anything better than that to exist.
Then we headed up the coast to our next anchorage, motoring the whole way as we headed straight into the wind with reefs all around us. Only half of which are marked on the chart, even though its a very recent chart. Some of them are there, but not in the right place. It's like somebody said 'oh, there's one over there somewhere' and just put an X on the map in the general direction of it. I discovered that navigating reefs by the satellite map view on my phone was much more reliable - you can see anything that's a different colour. We had waves smashing into us the whole way up the coast, with increasingly strong winds making them bigger and bigger. We were both drenched very quickly, and discovered what happens to our bed when the hatch is locked on the cracked position instead of closed properly - water was pouring in and our bed got soaked. Lesson learned, shut everything no matter how hot and calm the day starts off as.
I never get pictures when the weather is bad, but here is Garth steering into waves and getting drenched the next day
At one stage we had to 'thread the needle' as Garth put it, which means going through a tiny gap in the reefs with no room for error and impending doom a few degrees to either port or starboard. That sucked. And there was one point where Garth handed me the wheel and about 5 seconds later yelled 'hard to starboard!' at me - the depth was down to 5m. Thank god he was paying attention - I had just been concentrating on staying our course. So after our swim the whole day was stressful and wet.
You're 100% supposed to be anchored in Fiji by nightfall, because you need to be able to see all the unmarked reefs in order to avoid them. We were heading for the next island but it was getting dark, so we sailed very fast downwind into what was supposed to be a popular anchorage. I was holding my phone with the satellite map in one hand and Garth's phone with the chart in the other as we went in, trying to avoid the reefs marked on the phone and some shallow bits marked on the chart. I started furling the headsail (we only had a corner out) as Garth started the engine, and just as I almost had it wrapped up there was a 'clunk' and the engine panel turned off. In amongst reefs, as the sun was half under the horizon, with a very strong wind behind us. I see. Garth tried to fix it, while I steered us away from the reef under bare poles with my collection of navigation instruments on my lap. Luckily I spotted two yachts anchored in another bay, so instead of continuing to fuss around trying to find somewhere protected from the wind, I just headed for them. Garth eventually gave up fiddling with the engine and we stuck a corner of the headsail out again. We'd been going a comfortable two knots without any sails, but once we had a plan it was safe to sail again. So we anchored next to the other boats, very close to a reef, under sail, with no anchor winch (it needs the engine), just as the sun disappeared below the horizon. Which was incredibly lucky. I'm sure we would have been okay after dark with my gps and the satellite images, but it was still incredibly nerve-wracking. We then had a very restless night knowing the reef was right there, with the wind howling above us and knocking us around. But of course we were fine.
The one month old engine had done the same thing a few days before, in another stressful situation - it wouldn't start when we had to get John to the airport. Garth had fiddled with a few things and it had mysteriously started without him figuring out the original problem. It only took ten minutes this morning to figure out that the connectors on the engine battery were loose, and the problem was solved. We expected it to be simple with a brand new engine, it was just a matter of finding the problem. So hopefully we won't end up in a situation like that again.
We're anchored in the place where they filmed Blue Lagoon right now - I haven't seen the movie, but it's beautiful here. We walked the whole way around Nanuya Island, stopping at a little tea house on the other side for some cake and chips. It took ages for the food to be ready. Garth stuck his head into the kitchen to see what was happening and the lady was peeling and cutting potatoes to make the chips. You can't really ask for anything better than that, and they were a delicious treat.
Today we also discovered that Garth is some kind of dog magnet. A happy looking dog came running out as we walked past a marine research station on the other side of the island, smelled Garth's hand when he offered it, then decided they were best friends forever. He followed us for ages, although he probably thought he was leading us on an adventure - whenever we stopped he would stop too, staring at us wondering what was taking so long. Garth yelled at him numerous times to go home, but he was having such a wonderful day with his new friends. He was frolicking in the water chasing fish, then sniffing interesting smells on the beach, then running through the water again. We came to a big pile of rocks, and he went to the left. Garth quietly snuck around to the right, hoping the dog would get confused and wander back home. Garth was leaning out over the water and peering round the rock when the dog came and sat behind him, trying to see round the rock as well. Classic comedy. There was no shaking him, until he stopped to eat something on the beach when we were almost back at our dinghy.
Then a tiny little puppy came running out, sniffing Garth. He jumped up on his leg, trying to get attention, then ran round his feet for a while and started following us when we kept walking... I think we'll have to stay away from animals in the future, because there's just no room on the boat for them all. Garth led the puppy back to his house, but the first dog watched us pump up the dinghy, put it in the water and motor off - he sat in the water watching us go with sad puppy eyes for ages. I wanted to go give him a hug!
There's reefs everywhere here, so I think we'll do some snorkeling in the morning then head to Nadi for a day. We promised Mike we'd get a new winch handle and have the dinghy repaired, and it would be really interesting to jump on a bus and go through some of the villages while we're there. We're checking out of Lautoka on Thursday and heading for Noumea in New Caledonia. The weather keeps changing, but Thursday looks good for now. It will be our first solo passage, so I hope we're ready. Before we leave Lautoka I'm filling the entire boat with pineapples from the market. I need at least two a day, they're amazing.
Xxx Monique
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