Robinson Crusoe Island:

By now, you all probably know the real story behind the tale of Robinson Crusoe. The story is modeled after the real life marooning of Alexander Selkirk on the Island of Juan Fernandez, located in the South Eastern Pacific well off the coast of Chile.

The movie Castaways, loosely based on Robinson Crusoe was filmed here in Fiji at various locations in the Mamanucas and at Likuri Island, (unofficially called Robinson Crusoe Island). The raft used by Tom Hanks is right here on the beach on Malolo Lei Lei smack in front of the Plantation Resort. Don't be disappointed when I tell you that there isn't a stick of wood in the whole thing. It wouldn't float if your life depended on it; being constructed of iron pipe covered in fiberglass.

Likuri Island Is about five miles on the outside of Navolo Pass on the Southwest side of VIti Levu (Veetee Le-voo'). tucked inside the reef and anchored in the lee of the island in fifteen feet of water over a coral sand bottom you're well protected from weather from any direction. The island itself is about a quarter of a mile long and a couple hundred yards wide. The owner, Wayne, has built a nice little restaurant/bar and dive shop with some Backpacker style accommodations scattered among the palms. The place also has some of the best island dancing we've seen since Tahiti and Samoa! None of the performers are professionals. They're all employees you see around the grounds throughout the day.

Although the Bures are virtually empty, Wayne does a booming business bringing in tourists from the big fancy hotels along that stretch of coast. Day trippers pay $120 Fiji for the buffet dinner and the show. Yachties? Ten bucks... Fiji. That's five bucks twenty U.S. money. Well... we do have to dinghy in from our boats and we are last in line at the trough, but I'd say we're getting a good deal, wouldn't you? For one thing, most of those poor slobs from the hotels have to go back to work in a couple of weeks! Ha!

We were sitting aboard one fine morning and received a belated Tsunami warning for the quake that did so much damage in the Samoas and Tonga. Thirteen minutes wasn't enough time to get the anchor up and get out of the pass before the expected arrival of the wave and fifteen feet of water under us would have been a catastrophe had anything come of it. We thought of getting ashore but the island is so small any wave worthy of the name would have swept it clean. Nothing to do but sit there watching the clock with a heat rate of oh, one forty? Whew! Dodged a bullet.

Being so tiny, ,with not much going on beyond the dance show and the few yachties hanging out, Likuri has a shelf life of about a week. Time to weigh anchor for Vuda to do a quick visit to the city of Lautoka to hit the cash machine and stock up on a few things, then back to Musket the next day.

Lucky us! We arrived back in Musket just in time for another Tsunami warning. This time off Vanuatu. With forty five minutes warning this time, most of the thirty some boats around us dropped their mooring and took off for deeper water. Everyone else went ashore and ran up the hill. All we saw was about three sets of half meter swells that came through on schedule. The surfers outside the reef noticed a few nice sets but we'd dodged another bullet. Two scares in less than two weeks is off the hook.

Internet out here away from the big city is sketchy with long download times so pics will be slowly coming over the next few days.