We're in Fiji! Wow! Fiji is exotic by anyone's standards and it has exceeded our expectations by a long way.

The main island is enormous! It's huge! Like Hawai'i, it has a wet and dry side and we arrived on the dry, west side. It looks like Mexico or the California coast with dry-looking, grass-covered mountains surrounding the lagoon. The lagoon we entered at Malolo Pass (love that name) required over 3 hours to cross! Fiji is the crossroads of the Pacific and is large enough for some economies of scale: shipping and air travel are major industries. Large container ships arrive here and cargo is offloaded onto smaller ships for distribution to other islands.

They have a sugar cane industry, and they sell unrefined sugar, lumber (and the by-product, chips, to China), and, of course, Fiji bottled water, to the whole world.

Fiji has hundreds of islands with only 1/3 inhabited, The population is about one million. The citizens are fairly cosmopolitan in the cities and very primitive on the small islands.

On the smaller ones, there is a traditional chief who must be contacted on your entering his domain by a gift of Kava and participation in the traditional Kava ceremony. Kava is a local plant out of which they make an infusion. To me, Kava has a licorice flavor and gives a rapid numbing of the tongue and lips. It's supposed to be slightly narcotic, but I probably didn't drink enough to acquire that desirable state. The islands, especially in the Lau group of islands, are as spectacular as any in the world, rivaling the beautiful and exotic "mushroom" islands around Phuket, Thailand.

We didn't have any Fiji money on arrival, so we were unable to pay our fees to Health (they sprayed the boat for mosquitos that might carry Dengue fever) or BioSecurity. We arranged with a taxi driver, Ali (a second-generation Indian Muslim) to take us into town and visit the two agencies to pay our fees.

The marina is great and Fiji has been outstandingly beautiful and the people very nice. The Fijians are not Polynesian, but attractive just the same. Since Fiji was part of the British Empire (the Sun never sets on England, the saying went), they have acquired the British sense of politeness and decorum that we enjoy. They seem to have a functioning government and society, and even sent troops to Iraq with the US. The functionaries with whom we have dealt as we cleared in (Customs for the boat, Immigration for us, BioSecurity, and Health) were all courteous, efficient, and welcoming.

There has been a substantial influx of population from other British colonies, or ex-colonies, India being the largest contributor. There is a substantial Indian population here and both Hinduism and Islam figure prominently in the culture. While waiting in various government offices, we've seen women with the brightly-colored Indian clothing, nose rings and such, as well as veiled Islamic women. We've heard that there is some antagonism between the Indians and the local Fijians.

The exchange rate is about FJD$1.80 to US$!.00, so it's in our favor. We wanted to celebrate our safe arrival on Thursday night after completing some boat chores, paying our clearing fees, and such, so we strolled to the shower (ahh…hot water and a stand-up shower!), dressed in clean clothes, and continued on the bar overlooking the channel into the marina.

Oh, yeah…the channel. I've posted some photos of that channel. They cut the channel out of the coral, about 75-ft wide, 7-ft deep, and all the way from the deep water into the marina, about 1/4 mile. There are some buoyed lights at the channel's entrance, but they've done a superb job in arranging their range lights. As you know, range lights are used to guide vessels along a specific path by having two unique lights (they're vertical strings of green lights about a meter long), that show one above the other when one is aligned with them. The rear light is always higher than the front one, separated by a useful distance. If you are too far to the right of the channel, the lower light shows to the right of the upper one, allowing sure correction. They've been in use around the world for a LONG time. Finding the range lights is sometimes difficult, but Conni spotted them quickly and we slowly motored in. Some dufus had anchored in the outer channel so there were a few minutes of frantic turning to dodge them, but it was uneventful for the majority of the traverse. Conni read off depth values for me and I steered: there was only a foot or so below our keel so we had some doubts, but we never touched.

We've arranged for Wings to be stored in a hurricane pit, quite literally a trench in the ground. Depending on the depth of the trench and the depth of the keel, the hull rests on tires on the ground or on short stands. In either case, she can't tip over and storm surge should not damage her. As I've mentioned, insurance company's love Fiji's renown trenches.

We have a week to dismantle the boat and make arrangements with the local service providers to complete various boat chores. We've got some engine work, of course. We have a dinghy with several holes, requiring that I inflate it before we go anywhere. Grrrr… We've got some sail repair, some wood to be varnished, and other things to be done in the 10-months until we return.

Marina life is GREAT! I can tell you that not having a boat healed over in wind and seas for days on end and requiring that one constantly grab for handholds while moving below; no pounding through seas that make sleeping difficult; no wet butt (since either rain or breaking seas always soak cockpit cushions); no care to conserve electrical power so we can run cooling fans; no cool water-sitting-in-the-cockpit showers, are all very civilized and desirable improvements that exist in the marina. Example: our life jackets are inflatable ones, so less bulky than the older types, but still they're heavy and we must wear them all night watches. We also must use tethers to connect ourselves to the boat so that the twain are not separated (the great fear of blue water cruisers: watching as your boat sails away without you), and each jacket has a personal strobe attached. it's about 15 pounds of stuff to don when we are on watch, and it hangs from your neck. We've suited up, and to get our coffee to the cockpit, we make instant coffee in a drinking bottle so it won't spill everywhere. On arriving in the cockpit, we attach the tether to some substantial point on the boat: I installed two "D" rings in the cockpit for that purpose, and we sit on our wet butts for a few hours. I'm not complaining, just pointing out how it's the combination of minutia that provides such a relatively large level of comfort in a marina. It's been said that sailing, especially open water sailing, is like standing in a cold shower, in the dark, and burning $100 bills. There is some truth to the analogy.

We have some interesting photos on the site, IF I can get them posted. We've yet to get the Wifi to work.