June 26, 2013
Tonight Jack had arranged a lovo for the cruisers. A lovo is a Fijian feast prepared in an underground oven, the food wrapped in banana leaves and cooked over hot stones. Generally it includes seasoned pork or chicken, palusami (taro leaves, onions and sometimes corned beef baked in coconut cream), baba (green salad made with taro stems) and things like cassava, taro and breadfruit.
After sunset, we dinghied our way towards the beach and started to see a lot of shallow coral as we neared the shore. Just then a big Fijian guy appeared on the beach and waved us over to a clear spot. We made our way in, beached our dinghy and finally met the famous Jack, who we’d been hearing on the radio all week. He’s a very nice guy, and it was fun to finally meet him in person.
Other cruisers started to arrive, a big group because boats in the ICA rally had just come in. After being holed up for a week studying and taking dive classes, it felt great to just sit on the beach, drink wine, and hang out with the other cruisers! We also checked out the umu (the underground oven), and got a demonstration of how to open a coconut.
We were called to the feast and found it beautifully laid out, already served up individually on woven palm frond plates. On each plate was palusami in a half coconut shell, fish, grilled chicken with this wonderful BBQ sauce, green salad, potato salad, and taro, cassava, and breadfruit. Jack’s daughter, a professional chef, was visiting and had been in charge of this particular feast. The food at lovos is generally pretty tasty, but this one was especially good!
After the meal we finished our bottle of wine on the beach, enjoying the evening until the rain clouds started to come in, marking the end of the party. A gentle rain started as we dinghied back to our boat, but the light was so beautiful that we were glad to be out there. What a great evening!
Below is a gallery of pictures from our lovo. Click to enlarge and scroll.–Cyndi
