Author: richwest3

June 19, 2013

As easy as it would have been to linger in Savusavu, we had incentive get going. The trade winds had died, giving us a weather window to get to Viani Bay, about a 46-mile trip yet still on the island of Vanua Levu.

Viani Bay is one of the most popular anchorages in Fiji, often the first place cruisers go after clearing in. But you have to go against the prevailing southeasterly trade winds to get there; so it’s best to wait for a very light wind period, fire up the engine, and motor sail all the way there.

Our new friends Kari and Helena on Merilelu were going, and I planned to take the Padi dive course with Helena in Viani Bay. Our friends Craig and Bruce on Gato Go were also headed that way. After attending Curly’s terrors-of-Fiji seminar, Rich and I were intimated about cruising here, and it was nice to head out among friends.

We all ended up leaving about the same time and kept in contact as we motored along the south coast of Vanua Levu. It’s a day-long long trip to Viani Bay, but there’s a convenient bay to stop in on the way: Fawn Harbor, about 35 miles out of Savusavu.

Generally cruising boats try to get to Viani Bay in one day, but if the easterly breezes pick up in the afternoon, it’s nice to duck into Fawn Harbor for the night. And that’s what happened: the southeasterly breeze picked up and we all decided to head into Fawn.

Around this time our fishing pole made it’s zzzzzzz noise. Rich sprung into action, and it wasn’t long before we had a really large mahi mahi on board. Excited, we called our friends: we caught a big fish and intended to share it! That’s when one of those magic moments of cruising happened. Craig and Bruce kindly offered to host everyone on Gato Go for dinner and cook the fish. Helena from Merilielu would make her chocolate cake. It turned out the boat Champagne, with Clark his young crew, were behind us and stopping at Fawn, and they would be happy to join us and bring a dish. Suddenly our old friends Ronnie and Chris from Lady Bug came up on the radio! They were coming from another island and stopping at Fawn, and they, too, would love to come and bring a dish. And then come to find out Caps Tres, whom we’d met last year, were already in Fawn spending a second night, and they could bring a dish, too. Within minutes our fish had created a party!

The conditions were calm, the sky partly cloudy, as we approached Fawn Harbor. We watched our friends on Merilelu and Gato Go head in through the pass with no problem. Since we were all using the same waypoints, we felt confident when it was our turn. As it turned out it was really easy, the reef clearly visible and marked. We wound our way into the anchorage area, which had plenty of room for everyone, and picked a spot.

We thought this place was beautiful, surrounded by high mountains and thick with palm trees. Mangroves lined most of the shore, blocking the view of any beach there might be but still making a lovely shoreline. The water was dark, and the increasingly gray clouds around us made the scene more dramatic and cooled the air. Two frigate birds hung in the sky above us. The whole thing was absolutely magical. We were surprised this was not considered a destination anchorage, just a place to stop if convenient. If this is merely a place to pull in for a night, we couldn’t wait to see the real anchorages!

This evening as we prepared for the dinner gathering, we noticed the sunset getting more and more beautiful.

We arrived at Gato Go with bags of fresh mahi-mahi filets, letting Craig perform his culinary magic on them. People began to arriving bringing plates of food to share. Soon we were all having a fabulous fish dinner and enjoying the libations we’d each brought. We had 13 people on the boat, and it was a fun, spontaneous party.

Nights like this are one of the things that make putting up with the difficulties of cruising worthwhile. You can have this sort of coincidence anywhere, but when you have an unexpected convergence of friends in an out-of-the-way anchorage, coming together in one particular place on one particular night, everyone far from home, it feels like a special moment. Tomorrow we’d all be heading on, but we enjoyed our dinner together that night. –Cyndi

June 19, 2013

After ten days in Savusavu, we’re out cruising again.  That’s fast for us.  We left this morning to make the two day-hops to Viani Bay on the east end of Vanua Levu, Fiji.  The wind is usually from the southeast and since we’re going east, it’s best to wait for a time with light winds and that’s what we had today -we motored all the way.

We had a nice treat on the way – a big mahi mahi.  Tonight, we’re going to have a potluck on Gato Go (gato is the spanish word for cat – it’s a big catamarin  or ‘cat’, get it?) with lots of very fresh fish.  Arriving here was a nice treat as well.  It’s a beautiful, beautiful bay!  -Rich

June – September, 2013

With all the great and inexpensive eateries in Savusavu, we didn’t need to do much cooking on the boat while in town. Going out cruising in eastern Fiji was another matter. There were very few places to provision, and even fewer eateries.

Thus we had to provision as much as possible before we left Savusavu. We found that we could turn down our fridge enough to make some of it freeze and keep meat frozen. This enabled us to stay out for weeks at a time.

I found it’s actually more work to provision for periods at anchorages than it is for a long passage. On passage, we eat a fraction of what we usually do because of boat stomach (that vaguely nauseated not-very-hungry feeling), but at anchor after days of swimming and hiking, we have hearty appetites.

Luckily we had good stores in Savusavu which provided pretty much everything we needed.

MH Supermarkets

This is Fiji’s main supermarket, and there were two of them in town. It wasn’t exactly Albertson’s, but it had a pretty good selection of stuff and some decent produce. This was our go-to market for cereal, milk, butter, cheese, things that came in jars and cans, carrots, onions, potatoes, apples, garlic, red bell peppers and occasionally broccoli.

Savusavu Wines and Spirits

Our favorite store! This is part liquor store and part gourmet market. Any exotic ingredient I needed for a recipe, I could find here. Plus they had a lot of familiar goods from America and New Zealand. It was cool, quiet, and the people were so nice. We’d go in there sometimes just to look around even if we didn’t need anything. They had some great sale prices on wine, too.

The Small Markets

There were numerous markets that were small but crammed with goods so you never knew what you might find. Usually we’d come to these places when the bigger markets were out of something, hoping to find it here. I was overjoyed once to find my elusive favorite breakfast cereal high up on a shelf in a small, one-room market.  It was the last of that cereal in town just when I was provisioning for a long trip to a remote anchorage.

Bakeries

There were two bakeries in town, one a large Fijian chain, and the other, Lee’s, individually owned. Lee’s was our favorite; we could get decent brown bread (wheat bread) here. Otherwise, I would say Fiji has a lot going for it, but this not the place to find good bread.

Butchers

There were two butchers in town, but we only tried one: Fiji Meats. We liked it so much we stuck with it. We could buy vacuum-packed, frozen-solid meat that would stay frozen in our fridge if we put it against the cold plate. We always stocked up on boneless chicken breasts, steaks, hamburger, and a pork tenderloin or two. (They have more to chose from than that; those were just the things we liked). The meat always tasted fresh and delicious.

Savusavu Farmers Market

This is the big central market in town, filled with produce grown by local farmers. Many people love the energy and excitement of a market like this, but I find it a stressful way to shop. It’s annoying to get tomatoes at one table only to spot nicer ones down the way. And it’s distracting to look at the wares and have the vendor start trying to sell me stuff. And bargaining? Forget it! It’s hard enough trying to hear above the din without creating a discussion to try to get a better deal.

Unfortunately for us, the central farmer’s market is how you have to buy a lot of the produce. Green beans, lettuce, cucumbers, papaya, pineapples, chilies, eggplant, bananas, lemons, green bell peppers, and tomatoes were staples for us, and we could only buy them here.

Shopping at the farmer’s market was worse for Rich than it was for me; so I’d volunteer to enter the fray. I found if I went early and on a weekday, things were much quieter and the vendors more relaxed. Shopping on a Saturday would require more valium than I have on the boat. –Cyndi

June 16, 2013

Another neat thing to do in Savusavu is the walk out towards Lesiaceva Point. This walk is not cruiser mandatory, nor is it mentioned in the guidebooks. That’s a shame because, while it’s a long walk (about 3.5 miles each way), it’s well worth the effort. Plus there’s the option of taking a bus or cab one way.

The first thing we noticed as we walked out of town was the quiet. Vehicles seldom come out this way, making the road easy to walk on. On one side was the shoreline, a strip of brown sand fronting still, cornflower blue water. Across the bay we could see the mountains of the west side of the island. This image was punctuated by the palm trees that frequently arched out over the water.

On the other side of the street was the hillside, covered with thick green vegetation and some fantastic trees. There were a few houses and inns tucked into the greenery, usually fronted by beautiful gardens and brightly-colored tropical flowers

The best part of the walk was out near the end of the street where some spectacular trees arched over the road, creating a tunnel effect. The lovely beach nearby was scattered with rocks and palm trees.

We ended up doing both directions of this walk on foot, hardly noticing how long it was because it was so beautiful to look at. We hadn’t seen much of Fiji at this point, but after this walk we had the same thought: Fiji is paradise.

Below is a gallery of pictures from the Lesiaceva Point walk. Click to enlarge and scroll. –Cyndi

June 15, 2013

There are several possible excursions to do from Savusavu, but one that’s pretty much cruiser mandatory is the 3-hour bus ride to Labasa, the Indian city on the north side of Vanua Levu. It’s not so much a mainstream tourist thing to do as an interesting, “authentic” travel experience.

We met up with some friends and boarded the early morning bus, the most rustic bus in the fleet. It was crowded and cooled only by open windows, but it seemed well-enough maintained and had good brakes. This was important because the road to Labasa goes up over Vanua Levu’s lush mountainous interior. There’s nothing like steep, narrow, winding mountain roads to make you suddenly appreciate that your life lies in the hands of the bus driver and whoever who maintains the bus.

It was a long ride, with Bollywood music playing the entire way, but the gorgeous tropical mountain scenery outside made the ride go by quickly, and I found I really like Bollywood music. It was interesting to see the change in the vegetation as we neared the drier north side of the island. There’s a lot more grassland, and a lot of sugar cane.  (Click to enlarge and scroll)

We arrived in the bustling town of Labasa, and the first thing we discovered is it’s a lot hotter than Savusavu. We went to check out the wares in the large open marketplace, much bigger than Savusavu’s but with the same sort of stuff: ginger, tomatoes, cucumbers, eggplant, green beans, chilies, bok choy, melons, cassava, papaya, limes, pineapple, bananas, coconut, taro root, greens of all kinds, and more rice than you can imagine, fill the market. After looking at all this food, it was time for lunch.

We decided to head over to the Oriental Bar and Restaurant, considered the best restaurant in town and most importantly, air conditioned! We immediately ordered a round of icy cold Fiji Bitter beer, too hot and thirsty to care that it was not yet noon. The menu consisted of that classic Fijian combination: Chinese, Indian and Fijian foods. We ordered our curries and sizzling Chinese dishes and enjoyed drinking our beer. The meals were, no surprise, really good.

After lunch our group of six split up, four of us deciding to take yet another bus to a place called the Naag Mandir Temple, aka the Snake Temple, about 7 miles from Labasa. This Indian temple contains a huge rock shaped like a cobra, which is supposedly constantly growing. We hopped on the bus and had no worries of missing our stop because all the very kind passengers made sure we didn’t miss it.

The bus dropped us off, and there it was, a big yellow and pink painted temple. We found the cobra rock inside, covered with garlands of flowers and tinsel, offerings of all kinds left at its base. It’s said to cure the sick and infertile. I will admit it was a very imposing rock, towering about 12 feet high or more and looking like a cobra about to strike. I actually felt a little afraid of it and would feel more inclined to stay out of its way than ask it for anything.  (Click to enlarge and scroll)

After visiting the rock and wandering around the temple, we were ready to go back. The problem: we were in the middle of nowhere. Luckily a cab happened by, which I don’t think occurs very often. We headed back to town, wandering around the shops on the street and happening on a parade put on by the Fijian fire fighters, a fun surprise.

The words that I would use to describe Labasa are hustle, bustle, throngs, noise, and heat. Bollywood music spills out from the shops, adding to the ever-present din. It felt for a moment like we’d gone to India–in our entire cruise this was as far from home as I’ve ever felt. It was neat to experience it, but I was glad when our group decided to go find the Grand Eastern Hotel, away from the noisy main street, quiet and calm. We could sit at their poolside bar, have a drink and relax until it was time to take the evening bus back to Savusavu.

The evening bus was much more luxurious, with plush seats, air conditioning, and a movie playing overhead. It wasn’t really any faster, though, as there were a lot of stops on the way. I actually liked the rustic bus the best–it was more fun. –Cyndi