Lightening, Thunder and Squalls, oh my!

Bula from Fiji....from Diana and Peter

 We wrapped up our incredible week at Musket Cove, but had to spend another day due to unsettled weather.  This gave me the opportunity to go to church on the Island, which is one of my favourite things to do.  Not because I am at all religious, (although highly spiritual) but because church is such a central part of the island culture. 

    Minister preparing himself to get ready for the sermon

                         Inside roof of church

It is at church that we get to meet the locals in their environment and also get the chance to see all kinds of different services. This church was a small Methodist church high on the hill-side and was very evangelical, although nothing compared to my bizarre experience last year.

               Suzie from Sidewinder joined me.  

       Cool  “free-will giving” coconut collections

 This is where Peter was while we were at church.

 Even though the weather was still a little unsettled we decided to head to the  mainland, as we had a few boat projects to do (including ordering a new hot water tank since ours finally gave out) before we head offshore again. 

The boys came over in the morning to exchange photos and say goodbye.  Note they are drinking coffee, lest you start to think we only spend our time drinking alcohol.

              A local school-boat taking the children to school.

 We arrived in Vuda Point Marina and got to work.  That night we had a wild and crazy electrical storm, which is unusual for this time of year.  We were up for a few hours in the middle of the night listening to the booming of the thunder and watching the lightening.  

Luckily for us and for those in the marina, there was no damage.  However, over on Musket Cove (which we had just left that morning) four boats got negatively affected and they lost their electronics.  We were lucky to have dodged that bullet.  Last night we were in a remote anchorage all by ourselves (which is our favourite kind of anchorage to be in).  W were awoken at midnight from a dead calm situation to gusts of about 40 knots within about a minute.  The squall came out of nowhere and kept us up for about half an hour…and then it just blew by.  

The good thing about this cloudy weather is that we get lots of kitchen dancing in after dinner.  I lost a really good friend 4 years ago and her husband told me one of his regrets was not kitchen dancing more often.  We have taken that to heart and are dancing fools as often as possible.

Getting ready to leave the anchorage this morning.

Very muddy bottom and our deck pump decided to give out, so we couldn’t wash the chain as it was being brought in to the anchor locker.  Another “to-do” list item, but Peter seems to enjoy the ongoing repairs and maintenance of QuickStar

We listen to the ham radio every morning for updated weather reports and to connect with our fellow cruisers.  The ham net is being broadcast from New Zealand and it reaches all the way across to Tonga, Fiji, American Somoa, New Caledonia, Vanauata, etc.  We love being part of this global network and hearing about their escapades and following along on their passages.

We are now making our way over the top of Fiji and heading to Suva Suva.  It is really surprising how large Fiji is.  It will take us 4 days to get there and that is with covering distances in excess of 30 nautical miles each day.  We are heading against the prevailing winds so we are anticipating having to motor most of the way, as it is too dicey to be tacking in these reef invested channels.  

Once we arrive there, we will await the weather window to make our offshore passage to Futuna.  While we were in Musket Cove, we heard the tale of a boat doing this exact passage just three weeks ago.  They hit a reef and lost their boat.  I of course asked if anyone was hurt, but the three fellows telling the story said “Oh, I don’t know, but they lost the boat”.  It is bizarre that generally the first question a woman asks when told of accident, wreck, etc. is if anyone got hurt.  For the men, the question is “did they save the boat?”.  To add insult to injury the captain of this boat that was sunk was made to pay 20% import duty on the boat since it is staying in Fiji.  NO KIDDING!

QuickStar under sail with her brand new main.

We have to be especially careful in these waters as the charts are not very good and there are deadly reefs throughout.  Our friends from Sidewinder have already hit a couple of reefs this year, nothing serious, thankfully, but enough to remind us all that we have to be super diligent and give the reefs a really wide berth. We are also extremely cautious because we hit a reef at the end of last season and sheared off 18 inches of our rudder.  Ouch! Added to the reefs, there has been lots of deadfall in the water that we also have to navigate around, due to the storms and squalls.  Just part of the adventure.

                                            

Until next week….."If you want more, you have to require more from yourself."

-- Dr Phil, Motivational Author and Talk Show Host 

P.S.  I am also doing a weekly Financial Fitness Blog on Tuesdays at www.financialfitnessbooks.com (not sure why the link isn't showing up but if you click on the blank space before this it will take you right to the website -  financialfitnessbooks.com, which include tips, suggestions and hopefully insightful content relating to money management.

A week of fun and nonsense.

The annual regatta at Musket Cove was even better than last year (although we missed our friends Don and Martha from Canada who were with us last season).

Peter makes me a tropical breakfast each day after my sunrise Yoga session. 

The opening night began with each country singing their national anthem.  Since New Zealand was the largest contingent they also entertained us by performing the “Hakka”, which is the war dance that their national rugby team, The All Blacks commence every match with.  In addition to a wonderful hosted cocktail hour and dinner, we danced the night away to the sounds of the Culture Club.

Our old buddy Suzie from Sidewinder taking the shuttle with us to Beachcomber

 The highlight of this week is reconnecting to old sailing buddies that we have met over our six seasons of sailing, as well as meeting new friends from around the world.  We have spent a good deal of time with Suzie and David from Sidewinder who we got to know last year.  

Being met by pirates as we landed at Beachcomber Island

The first day of the regatta we had them aboard for our race to Beachcomber Resort.  It was just a fun day with little wind so all of us motor-sailed for 2 hours each way and enjoyed a great afternoon on the island.

The first heat getting ready at the start line 

 

 

Sunday dawned sunny and bright (as per usual for Fiji) so we headed in on our dinghy to defend Peter (and Don’s) 2^nd place finish last year in the Merlin Match Race.  I was on the helm and Peter managed the sails (plus telling me what to do every second of the race since I didn’t really have a clue).  Great news….we won 1^st place!  Peter was dead keen to call Don in the middle of the night to rub it in, but I managed to prevail and not call him till a reasonable hour the next day!

Peter checking out the competition from the race committee starting line 

And they are off (we had to win 4 elimination rounds for the championship) 

I did discover that I loved racing in this little boat.  It was my first time ever, and of course the win helped me to be even more enthusiastic.  I now want to take some racing lessons (yes, my second favourite Captain Joe, you are probably killing yourself laughing).  

  

This newfound keenness inspired us to take a Merlin in the Sandbar race where we were really dwarfed with the other sailboats.  The winds were also fairly strong and we were doing a lot of heeling and darting in and out of the boats as we all tacked through two reefs.  A little overwhelming for me, and it resulted in a few arguments between Peter and me, but I managed to convince him that we couldn’t possibly win the race against the big boys, so he dialed down his racing instinct and we made it safely home across the finish line. 

I was so relieved that we made it, I got a bit complacent.  Peter was up on the bow taking down the sails and not paying attention (he also forgot I really didn’t know what the heck I was doing in this boat).  The next thing we knew I almost t-boned an anchored sailboat.  I had been communicating to Peter that we were getting closer, but he has a habit of tuning me out when it pertains to sailing.  It wasn’t until almost the point of impact when I yelled bloody murder “We are going to hit the boat”, and the four guys on board jumped up that Peter looked up and yelled at me “hard over with the tiller”.  We managed to squeak by and drop below their stern, but everyone had their heart in their throat.  As you can imagine Peter & I had a pretty colourful conversation following this near miss.

Peter and David from Sidewinder sharing a few laughs - see the cool houseboat in background beached right on the sandbar.

That afternoon on the sandbar beach was filled with frivolity and fun.  It is a really cool sandbar that gets buried at high tide, but is a long sandbar during low tide so the organizers set up games and a bar. 

David and Suzie (Sidewinder) being good sports in the beer drinking competition 

Not only are the days filled with sailing and beach activities but each night is chock full of fun as well.  For the costume party, everyone was supposed to come dressed in the letter S.  I went as “Sexy” with my swim suit cover-up.  The only thing I could talk Peter in to doing was going as “Stick in the Mud”, which meant he didn’t have to dress up or participate, so he was happy.  

 Let the party begin....

 Doing the costume parade

 

 Okay...so David and I having way too much fun with Suzie egging us on!

The premier event during the week is the race around Malo Island.  We decided that just Peter and I would be aboard and that Peter was going to practice “non-yelling”.  (I’m sure that cracked a couple of smiles for those of you who know how competitive he is and how his communication style is rather robust).  Anyway, he agreed that we would hang back at the start so that we didn’t have the stress of jockeying for position, since this is a race that most of the sailors take quite seriously.  I also got a “promise” that we were out for a nice afternoon and that we weren’t going to heel excessively or push the envelope.  To Peter’s credit, after only a few little “yells” (which he says were not yelling at all) we ending up having a lovely day on the ocean and finished 11^th out of 16 boats, so we didn’t do too badly in spite of my “wimpiness”.

Following the boats heading around the first bend. 

 During the farewell evening, we accepted our championship trophy (and rum, of course) for the Merlin Match race and had a wonderful time with our friends…old and new. 

Could life get any better?

 With our winning hardware

 

 Yesterday we had a lazy (non-alcohol) day to recover from the week and for Peter to gloat over the big win.

 We are now just planning our routing to leave Fiji and head to the country of Futuna (a French overseas territory).  This is just a formality as we need to leave the country and re-enter Fiji in order to renew our 18 month visa.  Our plan, as of this moment, is that we will spend the rest of this season in Fiji and fly home for Christmas and the winter season around December 15^th.  As always, though cruisers plans are written in sand at low tide.

 

Until next week…."Life without risk is not worth living."

-- Chuck Lindbergh, aviator

Life is tough.....another beautiful sunrise

Fiji Temperature 89 degrees and sunny.

It is great to be back out sailing again. We cast the lines this morning in a lovely 18 knots of wind and sailed across to Musket Cove in three hours at a speed of about 7 knots with just the geneker flying. Ideal conditions. We are now tucked in on a mooring ball with the breeze keeping us comfortably cool as I type this. This past week has been spent getting the boat organized again and provisioned, since we completely strip QuickStar when we left her last year during the cyclone season. The mooring system is what is called “Med-tied”, which basically means you moor bow first and there are no docks. Makes it a bit tricky to get on and off the boat, but is an efficient use of space. Was a bit of a challenge loading on all the groceries (and beer) at high tide. Getting put in the sling to be moved from the hard back in to the water

Going in....

Getting launched into the marina

During this week, we have witnessed three different “rescues”. The first was a sailboat that left Vuda point and then came limping back in being towed since their engine died on them. It’s just a really good thing that the motor didn’t give out as they were exiting the narrow opening in the reef. This is real danger zone and what keeps so many boat repair yards busy. The next day, Peter was setting up the outboard engine in the dinghy when a marina worker starts hollering at him to save his powerboat that had broken free of dock lines and was being swept out. I missed all the excitement as I was belowdecks, but Peter got a kick out of his first “rescue”. Being towed back in to Vuda Point Marina

This afternoon as we were returning from our visit onshore, a boat was trying to moor here at Musket Cove. In a blink of an eye it was almost upon the reef. Luckily the dive boat rushed out to assist it, so the drama was averted. Last year a large boat was dragged out almost to the reef, so we will sleep better knowing we are on a mooring ball. All the same, Peter has hooked up a safety line, in case the mooring lines breaks. ooops....another rescue in progress

We have come to Musket Cove for the annual regatta week. It is basically a fun week full of nonsense, tall tales and lots of laughs. We miss not having Don and Martha on board this year. Drunken air guitar late at night will probably not happen this year! I will, perhaps try to defend my #1 championship from last year - which is for women only - telling a humorous story as to “Why I hate sailing”. Not sure I’ll enter the wet t-shirt contest again (not kidding, I really did this). I might if Peter isn’t judging again since I only lost by one vote (in the mature category or something like that) and that lost vote was Peter voting for someone else as he claims he didn’t want to appear biased, ha,ha.As you can imagine lots of wobbly pops were consumed to make me go in this one! We will be defending Don and Peter’s 2nd place finish in the Merlin Match Race. I am not at all comfortable in this – as it is a little dinghy boat – and Peter says “no reefing”. The things we do for love. Later, in the week it shouldn’t be hard to beat our 3rd from last finish in the around the island race. I forget all the excuses for that poor showing, but I think the fact that 18 inches were sheared off our rudder by the reef we hit factored in to the justifications. We might need to start working on new excuses now. Entrance to Musket Cove

Needless to say, it is just a fun week, meeting fellow cruisers from all over the world. Tonight it kicks off with a free cocktail party and dinner with each country signing their national album. We will miss not having Martha to sign the French half. We hope to fit in a couple of dives if time allows. The beach at Musket Cove

We got some great news this week from home. Our son Danny and our daughter-in-law Ashley found out the gender of their second child and they were thrilled to share with us that little Addison is going to be a big sister to a baby brother in mid-January. Peter is grinning ear to ear and already talking about when his grandson plays hockey and how he might be able to coach, etc., etc. Captain Peter shopping in the local market

On a sad note, one of our dear friends has a brother who has been missing since August 31st in Quebec. We send all of our love and prayers that he will be found safe and sound. Be sure to hug someone you love today! Until next week…"The bad news is time flies. The good news is you're the pilot." -- Michael Altshuler P.S. Here is Peter's definition of putting on Sunscreen...enough said!