Vanua Balavu to Suva

Our stay in the Bay of Islands continued to be relaxed with lots of snorkelling and buzzing around in the dinghy. Our outboard engine has been having a few tantrums either not starting or just stopping mid journey. It was nice to have Blithe Spirit around on rescue stand-by in case we had a failure too far from base. As it turned out we only had to get a tow once.

X-Pat at anchor for the week

 

Beautiful Corals

More Beautiful Corals

... and more Beautiful Corals

The bay was initially quite quiet but a number of boats with the World ARC rally turned up at the weekend, which made things a little busier. There were some very large and very nice boats appearing as part of the rally and both Stuart and Pat started to have boat envy. This was followed by scanning the boat brokerage pages on the internet, checking out prices. Fortunately the mobile signal was poor in the bay and so the activity wasn’t pursued too far.

Day wear in the Bay of Islands

Stuart and Sally up the Creek with only one paddle

In and around the many islands

On Tuesday Blithe Spirit departed back to Savusavu to re-provision and on Wednesday we set off for Suva. We left the anchorage around 0830 and headed out through the reef. It was another blustery day with winds around 25 knots but thankfully this time they were on the beam or behind us. Once outside the reef the sails went up and the engine went off and away we went. We were reaching at speeds over 7 knots for most of the way and covered the 161nm in 24 hours. The sea state was a bit messy again and so it wasn’t the most pleasant of trips, but at least it was quick.

We arrived at the Suva harbour entrance at around midday, to be met by a nasty squall and a large container ship exiting the narrow entrance. This meant we had to motor around for nearly an hour waiting for the ship to clear out the way so that we could enter. We were both pretty tired by this time and so were very glad to finally drop our anchor.

We are now anchored in a very sheltered bay off the town of Lami, directly in front of the Novotel hotel. This is very handy for a meal, but unfortunately doesn’t have any landing dock for the dinghy. However, the base for the Fiji Water Police is just a short distance away and they have kindly let us tie up to their dock.

Fiji Water Police Base - our landing point

Eying the dinner menu at the Novotel

It has been raining since we arrived here and is forecast to continue for the next few days. Yesterday we got a taxi into Suva and took our laundry to be done. Whilst we were waiting we headed off to the Suva museum, which was very good. We then had a walk around the town and finished off by topping up our provisions at a very good supermarket. After a taxi ride back, we had a very nice meal in the Novotel in the evening, looking out over the bay to X-Pat anchored outside.

A wet walk in the centre of Suva

Ocean going canoe - apparently capable of 25 knots!

The remains of the rudder fro HMS Bounty

Suva Cathedral

Today we had another wet trip ashore. We walked the 3km to Lami town centre with our jerry cans and got 60 litres of diesel to top up supplies. We also picked up some fresh vegetables at the local market.

Tomorrow is predicted to be even wetter so we have designated it a day for cleaning and clearing up – we have to get the boat presentable for our visitors, Clive and Doug who will be joining us on Monday.