A MUCH NEEDED AND WELL EARNED BEER FOR THE BURMESE BREEZE RACING CREW.

2nd Sept: Having promised ourselves not to get 'bogged-down' as we had in Tonga and in French Polynesia, we still spent more than a week moored in Savusavu, though to be fair we weren't 'bogged down'; Vanua Levu and Savusavu in particular have been like a breath of fresh air. Better weather and not having streaming colds no doubt helped, but the hospitality and downright friendliness of the Fijians has been the key. We spent a day taking the local bus across the island to the main town of Labasa, which other than being bigger and hotter (no cooling sea-breeze) wasn't a lot different to Savusavu, though the Indian food was if anything even better! The scenery between the two towns though was spectacular, heading up almost immediately through tropical rainforest into the mountains which to a large extent were planted with softwood forestry, before dropping back down into the sugar-cane fields of the coastal plains.
It was the sugar cane which accounts for the high proportion of ethnic Indian & Chinese within Fiji, their forebears having come here as indentured labourers to work the cane plantations - the local Fijians wouldn't, seeing cane farming as too much like hard work. Sadly, whilst all Fijians seem friendly toward us, there does appear to be a good deal of friction between the ethnic Fijians and these immigrants, albeit that most have been Fijian for several generations - a lot like home in that respect. The reasoning too sounds very similar, with the Chinese/Indians being heavily into education and with a strong work ethic, they seem to hold most of the white-collar jobs and certainly own and run an overwhelming proportion of the businesses. The more laid back, island-time, Fijian-Fijians being employed by the Indians & Chinese in predominantly blue-collar/unskilled jobs - including harvesting the sugar-cane! - or working as civil servants; the ethnic Indians and Chinese might have the money, but the Fijians still have the votes!
We caught up with several yachts we knew from further back whilst in Savusavu, so lots of excuses to go ashore for meals out, or a few beers; as with Tonga the beer's pretty good and whilst no less expensive in the grocery stores than it was in French Polynesia, the price of beer over the bar's far less. Again, there's not a big alcohol-culture amongst the locals, but Savusavu had a 'Yacht Club' bar at the marina which not unexpectedly welcomed visiting yachties and just down the road was the 'Planters Club' which as you'd expect, started life as a haven for the European Gentleman Farmers back in the 18th Century and it too offered temporary membership to visiting yachties too; it's still a very genteel place for a game of billiards or to watch the sunset over a beer, rum punch or G&T, we visited several times.
Monday 9th September was a Public Holiday for Independence Day - Fiji is one of sixty-odd countries that 'officially celebrates' it's independence from Britain, so if the remaining twenty seven members of the EU choose to do so once we leave, that'll mean almost to half the countries of the world will have a 'Bog-Off Britain' Day. - so we got our marina bill paid and collected our cruising permit on the Saturday and set sail soon after first light on Sunday morning, aiming for the west end of Fiji. The winds were again a little livelier than we'd have liked in the beginning, but we couldn't wait for them to ease as we needed to cover about 50 miles and clear two reef-passes before dusk. The brisk winds and predominantly favourable tides had us achieving that easily and by 16:30 we were safely back into the deep/clear waters of 'Bligh Sound' which lies between the two main islands of Fiji. After that our sail-plan went the other way completely, with us hauling down virtually all the sails as we now didn't want to cover more than 40-45 miles and reach the reefs at the far side before sunrise. With flat water within what's effectively a giant lagoon and no need for speed, it was a very pleasant star-lit night.
Around 10:30 the following morning we arrived at Nanuyasewa Island, where the 1980s(?) Brooke Shields movie 'The Blue Lagoon' was apparently filmed, though whereabouts precisely I can't say; I don't recall ever actually watching the film and it seems that every holiday resort on Nanuyasewa seems to claim that it's in/on the prime filming location. The scenery and snorkelling were very pleasant, but the 5* resorts ashore weren't to our taste, so we soon headed slowly south through the Yasawa and Mamanuca Island Groups, aiming for the yachty centre of Musket Cove on Malalo Lailai Island. We did find and visit a couple of the more 'traditional' islands, taking part in Sevu Sevu ceremonies: Upon arrival at the island you head to shore with a gift of kava root which you present to the village chief, he then welcomes you, indeed I believe 'adopts' you for the duration of your stay and you're then welcome to wander anywhere you want on the village and that part of the island which it owns/controls; apparently you're even entitled without further invitation, to enter people's houses and even stay the night, though our British Reserve didn't allow for that. Sometime's the village chief will have someone prepare your gift of kava into the drink and share it with you, this we never had, in part it seems due to the kava root which we brought: Our kava was Tongan and that apparently has the reputation of being the very best & strongest, so it wasn't something to be 'wasted' on a couple of Papalagi.
Sky Bursters: Amongst all(?) the south Pacific Islanders - we never heard mention in French Poly. - the generic term for a foreigner is 'Papalagi' or similar, which stems from the arrival of the very first Europeans. Though the islanders knew from their oral histories that their own forefathers had sailed to the islands many generations earlier, it was by then held that nobody could cross the vast ocean which surrounded them. So, when the European ships arrived, to explain how they got there if the ocean was un-crossable, it was decided that they must've 'appeared out of the sky' and christened them Papalagi.
A good proportion (perhaps ½?) of the Yasawa & Mamanuca Islands seem to have a holiday resort of some sort on them and their operation shows the Fijian attitude to life: The resort land is leased from the village and that lease contract invariably includes clauses giving priority to the local islanders for jobs once the resort's operational. However, as each villager's share of those annual lease monies is sufficient to keep the family in corned beef and kava, few take up the opportunity of a job so most of the staff have to be shuttled in/out on the daily ferries. I find nothing wrong with their having that mind set - it's the Caribbean way too - but I feel it somewhat undermines their resentment the Indians/Chinese for usurping them economically; the ethnic Fijians in the main seem to want the money, but are not interested the work required to earn it?
20th Sept: We arrived at Musket Cove - the most 'resorty' island of them all? - during their regatta week, so amongst the various parties we got involved with, we did do a yacht race 'around the island'; not in Moon Rebel, but as crew for Colin & Thant Zin on Burmese Breeze whom we'd met back in Tonga. I don't know what place we actually achieved, but we did complete the course and given the number of yachts behind us and those we saw either drop out, start their engines or take a short-cut, I suspect we must've been about midway in the fleet of 40-odd starters; given the wind rarely reached ten knots and we were on a twenty tonne Halberg-Rassy, we were all quite pleased with our finish.
With the regatta parties over, we headed to the mainland (Viti Levu Island) in search of more 'authentic' Fiji and some decent Indian food - catering primarily to the package tour Papalagi, the fare at Musket Cove was a poor and very expensive version of what you might expect to find in NZ/Aus/USA - We also began the process of checking-out of Fiji. Whilst the islands have been our favourite by far in the Pacific, the time we lost weather-bound in French Poly is beginning to bite and we need to press on if we want to visit Vanua'tu and New Caledonia enroute to Australia and still arrive there ahead of the Cyclone Season Ah Cruising Plans: We got the paperwork done, but the wind's all but disappeared and there's no forecast of any returning in the short term at least; after a week on the mainland, we headed back to Musket Cove to wait for some wind, at least it was easy to get ashore in the evenings to watch the Rugby World Cup on TV.
Given the cost and difficulty of checking in/out of Vanua'tu, the 'just a few days' that we're likely to be able to stop-off meant it just wouldn't be worthwhile and as the light winds/unsettled weather extended, even visiting New Caledonia was looking like becoming a brief stop too. They're both island groups we particularly wanted to spend time in and to be honest we'd like to see more of Fiji too; we've already done the pre-arrival paperwork for us and the boat to go to Australia, but as the days went on, we began looking into alternatives. We could just stay in Fiji, but the Cyclone risk is high and storing Moon Rebel/flying back to he UK will be expensive, the other alternative, though we'd always said we wouldn't do it, is to sail down to New Zealand, from where we can return easily (OK, relatively easily, if we get a lucky break with the weather) to Fiji after the Cyclone season's over and then make our way leisurely through Vanuatu and New Caledonia. It seemed like a plan, so we began compiling and sending all the pre-arrival paperwork through to New Zealand's Border Control, so all options were open.
We saw the England/Argentina RWC game and due to a likely looking weather window closing, we were still there for the France match tht got called off due to their Typhoon (Hurricanes -Cyclones-Typhoons are all exactly the same animal but just different names - a circulating low pressure system. There was a small one (not big enough to get 'named') spun off the east coast of Australia about a week ago, indeed uncertainty as to where it was headed proved the final straw with regard to our sailing across to New Caledonia and instead begin to consider New Zealand. That said, the weather system continued tracking SE and is today battering the north end of NZ with 40-50 knot winds; I'm glad we're not there, but no doubt some of the yachts which recently left Fiji bound for NZ will get caught in it.
16th October: Well, we're back anchored off Denerau at the west end of Viti Levu once more, with little wind and the rain hammering down (a good job we went provision shopping yesterday) though the forecasts all promise things will be better tomorrow, which is when our latest check-out inspection from Fiji is booked for - this'll be the third attempt, we've cancelled the two previous inspections. Our paperwork states that our 'Intended next Port of Arrival' is Opua New Zealand, so in the first instance that's where we'll be pointing towards, though we still have the Australian pre-entry paperwork 'live', so if the weather does threaten to bite us, we can always bail out to Norfolk Island, or indeed even away west to New Caledonia.