Well, here we sit snuggly at anchor as the wind continues to blow outside. After arriving on Monday afternoon, we settled in on Tuesday to relax a bit and get a couple of small chores done(get both heads up and running again) and straighten out some of the mess we still had aboard.

Wednesday, we launched Puff and lowered Dragon(our Mercury 8hp outboard) and headed ashore. We've been here before so much of what we saw, we had already seen. We've decided to take a "tour" of some of the other islands. There is a boat that visits three other islands in one day. This way, we can see if we want to take Zephyr over and spend more time plus we can get GPS information to make getting in and out easier. We're currently set up for a trip in Monday. The folks at the counter tried to get us to schedule for Thursday but our weather info was that there were big winds and some rain coming. The lady at the counter looked out the wind and quickly dismissed our forecast. They have the tour everyday from 1000 to 1600. We stayed with Monday.

We walked around Musket Cove and over to the Plantation Island resort as we hear them every evening as it appears to be party central in the area. The Plantation resort appears to be better maintained than Musket Cove with a lot more people(younger)in attendance. Meals are quite expensive but then again, you are on an island where everything has to be boated out. While we were at the Musket Cove Resort, we made reservations for the bog pig roast dinner that is held every Thursday night. We've never been to one and felt it was time. We returned to Zephyr late in the afternoon and took off Dragon and hoisted Puff in case the big winds forecasted showed up. As we sat on deck in the evening, we noticed a fire on a adjacent island burning away and lighting up the island. It appeared that someone had started a trash fire and it got out of control. It was burning up the hillside. It was still going when I went to bed about midnight.

Early(0330)Thursday morning, I felt sprinkles on my hand as the rain started coming through the hatch. I dashed around the boat closing the hatches and ports. The fire was still going nicely on the hillside. The wind had picked up and was going about 15 knots(not helping with getting the fire out). The rain(sprinkles really) continued through the night but was gone by the morning as was the fire. Since then(rest of Thursday and Friday) the winds have continued to howl hitting the low to mid 20 knot range and allowing our DuoGen to make a few amps to keep the batteries somewhat charged. It's also kept us boat bound as any attempt to go ashore would have soaked us. We did call the restaurant Thursday afternoon and cancel our reservation for the pig dinner. Heck, it didn't even start till 1900 with entertainment starting at 2030! Cruisers just don't party that far into the night.

One thing we did find out on Thursday afternoon was we got an email from credit card company that an international charge had been place on our Visa card for $543.00 by some company in China. Now we had last used our card at Vuda Point Marina when I'd put in our reservation for next season(just in case we returned). I booted up Skype and called the card company. Apparently, someone had manually keyed in a transaction on our card. The Customer Service man pushed a few keys and cancelled the transaction. We were off the hook. On the down side, since there has been a fraud on our account, they will be sending us new cards to replace the old cards. I've had these cards for years and can tell you the number, date and security numbers without having to even look at the card. Now, I'll have to learn a new set of numbers. Being out in the boonies, the cards are being sent to the marina for us to pick up. The company normally uses UPS but they don't operate here in Fiji so they have to make special arrangements to use FedEX to get our cards to us. Guess we will be sticking around the area a bit longer(gee what a shame).

It's now Saturday morning and Tracy has just finished revarnishing the floor in the main cabin that we had to remove when we put in the water heater. It doesn't dry for 6 hours so she tented it in plastic to keep the hairy kids(me too) off it. Only problem is the "bungs" I used to cover the screws isn't taking on the color of the surrounding board surfaces. I'm guessing that there is so much old varnish on the boards that it will take a bit of time and applications to get them any where near the color. Time will tell.

So here we sit. Taking in the wind(died down some) and enjoying the partly cloudy day and relaxing. I'm going to do some baking in a few minutes. Add something different to our diet.

As to Blue, she is doing much better after her claw incident and is well on the way to a full recovery(thank you Janis on Tomboy). She wants to get back up in her throne(top of our cat tree) but we're still not letting her climb for a few more days. No reason the stress her claws yet. She's doing just great and is even going back on deck every once in a while. She hasn't gone up for a while. I guess falling overboard will tend to make you stay inside.