Cruising the Yasawas

We have just arrived back from cruising the Yasawa Islands. They are well known as this is where the Blue Lagoon Cruises tour.

This is THE cave!

The first stop for us was at Kuata Island. This is an island that Lindsay spent time on with a local when he was a young hydrogropher in the Navy. (about 23 years ago) The island was uninhabited and they slept in a cave. When we arrived we found that there was a back packer resort there now. The people were very interested and friendly and showed us around. On the way there we saw a turtle swimming past which was amazing. We were really surprised at how fast it could swim.


Next we went to Waya Island and anchored in a rolly anchorage. We left early the next day and endedup in another slightly rolly anchorage further up. Sick of the swell we took off for Blue Lagoon which the guide books say is the best all weather anchorage - and they were right! We met up with friends on a cat called Motu who are from Nelson and have 10 year old twins a boy and a girl.

We spent a couple of nights there the children enjoyed snorkelling and swimming with their mates. We had an interesting trip to a garden, hidden in some mangroves, to buy fruit and vegetables. We bought a huge stand of bananas which have rippened alarmingly fast.

We were running out of time as we needed to get back to Lautoka to pick up a new propellar as our old one looks like it either has worn out or we have hit something. So we headed south and anchored between two islands where we were told that it was possible to swim with giant manta rays.

The next day that is exactly what we did. There was only one there at the time but still it was a fantastic experience. Hamish got the closest to it. Some of the others there touched it. In addition to the ray there were lots of brightly coloured fish on the reef and some of the coral was incredible. There was a strong current and swimming against it soon wore us out. We wish we had an underwater camera to capture our experiences maybe next shopping spree!

More pictures

Enjoying the pool. And the view.
















I think I sent a postcard of this to school.











Iam not putting the straw up my nose! It was a yumy blue raspberry lemonade slushy. Delish!

Unwinding

Here are a few pictures of what we have been doing since arriving. Our first port of call was Vuda Point Marina. It is bewtween Nadi and Lautoka. We took the bus into Lautoka for fresh food - quite an experience. It was very hot and sticky especially as we hadn't aclimatised.

Afterwards we headed off to Musket Cove. A well known place for yachties and very family friendly. Here the children got to learn to snorkel from an expert - Dad. The place is so beautiful is is easy to take postcard like pictures.



The Fijian people are very friendly and kind. They love children and the guy at the resort let Hamish have a go at wind surfing. He is now keen to have another go. He will have to wait until we return. In two days time we are heading up to cruise the Yasawa group of Islands. These are the ones that the Blue Lagoon Cruises go through. I went on one when I was 19 years old. Can't remember much other than some beautiful islands and great swimming places. Lindsay is also keen to return to a small island he spent time on when he was surveying up there.

The Passage from Whangarei NZ to Lautoka Fiji.

Hamish Hand steering.

Cooling off.
Kate helping in the galley.

The Famous Fish that Lindsay caught in his bare hands!

Our time in Whangarei was pretty hectic as we frantically worked at getting things done before departure. Some of the main ones were: finishing the benchtop access to the storeage cupboard in the galley, inserting a stand for Kate’s keyboard, putting netting round the guard rails, securing the laptop by the chart table, installing navigational software, buying, labeling, vacume packing drygoods, storing food for the passage and for longer term, fitting spray cover over our companionway, filling in forms for customs and cooking 7 meals and deep freezing them (that worked well on the trip)and installing the watermaker.

The days sped past but the list took a long time to go down. The weather was fine for the first two weeks then, like everywhere in New Zealand, it turned nasty. There did not seem to be a break in the weather which would allow us to leave NZ safely. It was very frustrating although the children didn’t mind as they made some good friends nearby and got to do some cool things like go to a highline park which a friends parent was setting up and go out with the Marina manager on the ex-police boat to help clear logs and debris washed done in one of the storms.

Well now we have arrived in Lautoka after an 8 and a 1/2 day passage from Whangarei. We made it!!! We left New Zealand after a small low had gone through so the first 2-3 days were quite rough. It took one day for the sea sickness tablets to wear off then we had a day of heads in buckets as you can see from the photo. But by the third day we were on the way up again and soon recovered.

The children spent most of the colder days down in the salon playing on Hamish’s Nintendo or reading. Once it got warmer they would spend their time out in the cockpit. A good challenge was to search the deck for stowaways or visitors. The boat collected 3 flying fish (the first one Lindsay pretended to catch in his bare hands – but fooled no one!), one small mackerel and about six squid.

We did not see much marine life – just a whale's tail, lots of petrels and 9 gannet like birds which were called ( much to Hamish’s amusement) Masked Boobies. The weather was quite varied but we had little rain just different types of wind and wind strength. We would have liked it all to have been in the right direction but in the way of sailing, had to make do with what we got, and we made the best of it. We only used the motor when the generator broke down 3 days out of Lautoka and the motoring was for helping our batteries rather than for propulsion.

We have stopped in at Vuda Point Marina while we sort out our generator. It is near Lautoka. Lucky for us they are installing a new internet system and it is free for the moment. Our generator problem looks to be a minor glitch so we hope to head out of here tomorrow. Once we have sorted out the boat and got fresh food.

We hope you like our photo’s. Lindsay would probably have liked some of when it was rough at the start but we were all too sick or too busy to think of pictures.