Fiji - The Rainbow Reef to Matagi Island

Our mooring in Taveuini at the Paradise Resort was very exposed, there was a high wind warning and a quick departure was necessary.  We headed for Viani Bay on the main island of Vanua Levu - we’d visited last year and dived the White Wall, so this time we wanted to try the Rainbow Reef - again we were going with the local dive school as the reef is too far from the anchorage for our dinghy.

The dive centre organised a Lomo which is a local feast - a fire is lit in a rock filled pit, once the rocks are sufficiently hot, cassava roots are placed over the rocks, then a selection of fish and chicken in baskets woven from palm leaves were placed on the oven, along with a vegetable and coconut dish.  the whole thing is then covered with palm and banana leaves and left to it’s own devices for the next couple of hours.

White cassava roots are placed in the centre, and the fish and chicken round the sides of the Lomo fire pit.

Coconut shells filled with green vegetables and a cast iron pot of pork stew were also placed in the Lomo before it was all covered with the leaves.

A couple of hours later the Lomo was opened up and diner was served!

There is a small village in Viani Bay and of course a school - most of the children had gone to Taveuini for a 7 a side rugby tournament - it’s the national sport - and this little girl showed great potential.

After a few days in Viani bay we decided to move on - a slight delay was caused by our friends on Rebell who managed to get their chain wrapped round a large piece of dead coral.  

It was so well wrapped that Ian ended up swimming over to help un hook it.

Our next stop was in Albert Cove, Rabi Island - another place we’d visited last year, but certainly worth a second visit.  There are a couple of basic houses here that are occasionally used during coconut harvests, but apart from that the place is fairly deserted so it was a surprise to suddenly find 50 or so  people turn up for a picnic.  We went to introduce ourselves and learnt that a small group of students from the University of the South Pacific were touring the villages on an environmental education field trip.

From what we could see, there was considerable emphasis on Cava consumption on this picnic!  The Cava roots have been placed in the sun to dry, the larger roots have been sliced up.

Once the fire is ready, the drying process continues in this specially constructed oven.  The dried roots are then ground, mixed with water, drained and finally drunk - usually from a coconut shell or other round bowl.

The island is very lush, the interior virtually impregnable, but at low tide we did manage to walk round the bay.

Low tide in Albert Cove, there is a fringing coral shelf around much of the bay - you have to step carefully to avoid walking on the coral.  Nautilus is one of the yachts in the distance.

We knew from our last visit that there was an excellent coral wall just outside the bay - we headed off in our dinghy for a dive.

Diving in Rabi Island, Albert Cove - There is so much to see it’s hard to know which way to look!  

Albert Cove in the rain - it’s tropical, and you don’t get all that greenery without a lot of water.

After Rabi Island we wove our way carefully through miles of reef to Yanuca - a tiny island with a population of just 65 people.  We anchored in School Bay,  and with some difficulty managed to get ashore through the shallow coral reef.

School Bay, Yanuca Island - what you can’t see is the swell:  it was a rather exposed anchorage, anything not tied down fell over on board Nautilus.

We finally made it ashore just as the school day ended, the 15 primary school children were thrilled to be able to lead us to the village, practicing their already very good English on us as we walked along.

We followed the children to the village where we met Willy, the acting Chief, and presented our Sevusevu - a gift of cava. Due to the difficulties of getting ashore and the extreme roll in the anchorage we turned down his offer of a cava ceremony as we really didn’t think we’d be able to make it back to the boats afterwards.  Willy was also keen to take us to one of the other islands, Cobia, for a hike and some snorkelling and suggested an anchorage for us over there.  Bernt and Birgit on Rebell were not keen on this suggestion so headed off in search of a more peaceful anchorage and we headed off on the 2nm trip to Cobia.

The anchorage was tiny and surrounded by multiple reefs, but it was beautiful - we took the kayak ashore and walked around as much of it as we could.

Cobia - Yanuca is the bigger island in the distance.

Our decision to stay the night in Cobia was not a good one - towards the end of the afternoon the wind began to shift, there was very little swinging room between the coral reefs so we put out our 16kg stern anchor in an effort to hold ourselves in position (our main anchor is 25 kg with 80 metres of chain, the stern anchor has only 10 metres of chain, the rest is rope).  With absolutely no light pollution, there is a whole new level of darkness on the Pacific island and although the moon was almost full, it was not due to rise until a good 3 hours after sunset, so in that absolute blackness we experienced a series of fairly strong squalls complete with torrential rain and a 180 Degree wind shift.  Every alarm we had on board was going off - we were way too close to the reef, it was windy and shallow, the stern anchor was dragging.  Anyway - an impressive  level of calm was maintained onboard as we managed to winch up the stern anchor and then our main anchor and very carefully retrace our track through the reef to School Bay on Yanuca. 

We re-anchored at midnight, by that time the sky had cleared and although it was still blowing 25kts the moon light made everything seem much more manageable. 

After two uncomfortable nights in Yanuca and the excitement of the trip to Cobia we have now headed to Matagi, a volcanic crater again surrounded by coral reefs. Apparently it’s a private island belonging to one of the resorts, but we’re hoping to get ashore for a quick walk and also hope to go for a dive before heading further south to Banua Valavu in the Lau group.

Back to Fiji

After 5 months away from the boat, we returned to New Zealand in early April, flying straight to Christchurch to spend some time in South Island. We arrived in Methven to find Mount Hutt already snow capped, it’s  not long until the start of the winter ski season this far south.

The Canterbury Plains, with Mount Hutt in the distance

With Greg as Tour Guide and Leonie as Chauffeur we set off towards Queenstown, stopping for a night in Wanaka on the way.

Wanaka - a very beautiful tourist haven, bizarrely famous for having a tree growing out of the lake - this must be one of New Zealand’s most photographed trees!

As we left Wanaka we  made a quick visit to Puzzling World where we experienced intriguing little collection of optical illusions, one of which you can see from the photo of Leonie and Greg.  

We stopped at Te Anau and then took the Milford Road through the Fiordland National Park and on to Milford Sound itself.  The Milford Road certainly deserves it’s reputation as one of the world’s most scenic highways, it was spectacular

The Alpine Scenery on the Milford Road, Fiordland.

The annual rainfall in this area is 7 metres, there are an average of 180 rainy days per year, however when we visited there was not a cloud to be seen - 5 consecutive rain free days and it was considered a drought.  Milford Sound is a 16 km long fiord, surrounded by 1200 metre cliffs - apparently it’s more atmospheric in the rain, but it was wonderful in the sunshine!

Our Milford Sound Cruise Ship - although you can bring a yacht here, anchoring would be incredibly challenging due to the depth, and the surrounding 1200 metre cliffs regularly funnel winds of over 100 km/hr down the fiord.

Thanks to the unusually calm conditions we were able to go all the way out to the Tasman Sea at the end of the fiord.  We thought it couldn’t get any better, but we were then accompanied by a pod of dolphins on our way back along the fiord.

Heading back from Milford Sound we stopped at Curio Bay to see the remains of the 180 million year old petrified forest in Curio Bay - also the home to a colony of very rare yellow eyed penguins.  Unfortunately we didn’t see any penguins, however the petrified tree stumps and logs were very easy to spot.

One of the many petrified logs in Curio Bay, believed to have been caused when the forest was covered with volcanic ash which later became impregnated with silica turning the remains into stone.

Another natural phenomena  I was very keen to see were the Moeraki Boulders on the Otago coastline.  Although not unique to New Zealand, scientist claim that they are formed over millions of years in marine mud and are gradually exposed as the coastline erodes.  Maori tradition dictates that they are the remains of eel baskets and gourds washed ashore from a giant fishing canoe, and the cracks and marks on them caused by the fishing nets.

We spent a few more days in South Island with Leonie and Greg before heading back to Auckland and returning to Nautilus.

New Zealand from above.

We returned to Nautilus and spend a hectic couple of weeks re-stocking the cupboards, cleaning, antifouling and generally sorting out Nautilus after leaving her on the hard standing for 5 months.  Even getting the sails back up is quite a laborious job as we’d taken down and washed all the halyards and running rigging before we’d left the boat.

Once we were back in the water, we headed in to Town Basin Marina, Whangarei to have some canvas work done on our cockpit enclosure and to wait for a weather window to head for Fiji.  All went according to plan - dozens of boats were preparing to leave for Fiji and Tonga, some from Opua in the north and others, like us, from Marsden Cove .  The forecast looked good, we all cleared customs and were literally at the point of releasing our mooring lines when we realised there was a problem with our hydraulic rudder control box.  We couldn’t leave - an emergency search for hydraulic engineers revealed one in Whangarei - and within 24 hours Craig from Mc Raes Global managed to locate and fix the problem and we were ready to clear customs again.

Our delayed start meant that we were a couple of days behind our travelling companions, Bernt and Birgit from the yacht Rebell.  We first met them in Sicily in 2014 and sailed with them in much of the Caribbean.  We arranged to meet them in Minerva Reef, 6 days and 850Nm later we duly arrived - and so did the wind!  

Minerva consists of two reefs, only visible at low water, located about 450 Nm south of Fiji - we were there for 7 days, but we were certainly not alone!  By the time we left, there were 22 yachts sheltering with us, all waiting for a weather window.  Most had access to forecasts - they were the subject of much of the VHF chatter amongst our Minerva Cruisers Community.

Anchored in the middle of nowhere!  Minerva North - there were 4 ½ metre waves breaking on the edge of the reef.

Photo from Rebell, Nautilus is the yacht on the left.

One of the many forecasts we got whilst in Minerva - it did not look welcoming outside the reef!

The weather finally settled down, and much as we would have liked to spend time on the reef itself, we wanted to get on to Fiji - we headed for Savusavu  to clear customs - and the wind died completely.

We motored for 24 hours - there was not even a ripple on the Pacific Millpond.

Savusavu, we are one of the yachts at the left of the photo.  

Customs formalities completed, we restocked with fresh fruit and vegetables from the local market and headed a few miles along the coast to anchor off the Cousteau Resort - finally able to enjoy some of what Fiji has to offer.

Our next stop was Taveuini island.  We had caught a large Mahi Mahi on the way across, far too much for us to eat, so we presented it to a resort there - they cooked it far better than I could have, and the four of us ate a delicious meal in exchange for them keeping the rest of the fish.  We felt it was an excellent deal!

Our plan is to continue heading round Taveuini island and then make our way on to Vanua Balavu in the L’au Group, an area relatively untouched by tourism due to its inaccessibility.