[password]waiknot
[position]18 06.547S 178 23.727E

[status]
Now in Suva! On Saturday the sun came out and we had a brilliant day. On the way to the Great Astrolabe reef (the 4th largest reef in the world) we had a large pod of small dolphins come to play. The jumped and leaped and played with the boat for quite a while. Our snorkel at the great reef was beautiful. The corals were so many and varied in shapes and colours, it looks like a terraced field of wildflowers! Energised by that encounter, we went back to Vurolevu to see if the manta rays were home. We were in luck! We snorkelled with two manata rays, for ages. The place we went to is known as a cleaning station. The Manta rays hang around while tiny cleaner fish nibble away, cleaning any parasites from the rays. It was amazing to see them, to swim all around them, to watch the cleaner fish pecking away, inside the mouth of the manta rays too! Manta rays are large creatures. These ones were 2-2.5m across, but they are harmless plankton feeders. We got close enough to touch their wings, they feel like black velvet! All of this was before lunch! We still had unfinished business at the village of Naboulwalu, so off we went, back to see the chief. Three years ago he had asked us for some specific things and he was amazed when we delivered them, along with the note his wife had written three years ago. She looked astonished to see her own handwriting! We also told them that we had found a large population of Crown of Thorns Starfish in their bay. They were unaware of this and did not understand the danger. The chiefs wife had some old wet shoes that were falling apart and asked if we could fix them. So back to the boat we went. Karl jumped in the water and grabbed a Crown of Thorns starfish to show the village, while Heather write out instructions on how to kill the beasts and why they should be killed - they are destroying the coral and if the coral dies, the village will have no fish! Luckily, the chiefs wife has the same sized feet as Heather and she happened to have a spare pair or wet shoes on the boat. So back to the village again, to deliver the shoes and the Crown of Thorns speciman and the educational sheet of paper so the chief could teach the rest of the people in the village about this menace. They weer amazed that we could produce a new pair of shoes, the right size, like magic! An promised to gather the village people together that evening to tell them about the Crown of Thorns starfish.
Yesterday, we decide to take advantage of the great weather and sailed to Beqa. The Fijian language sounds different to English, so Beqa, is pronounced Mbengga. We had an amazing sail, 12-14 knots on the beam in flat sea and sunny skies. Scooted along nicely and covered the 45 nm in 7 hours. A wonderful sailing day. Went ashore at the resort for the G&T and listened to the church choir sing for a while. The resort was fully booked, so no room for us for dinner.
Today we scrubbed the bottom of the boat, in preparation for our next passage, to New Caledonia. We then headed out of Beqa and motored all the way to Suva in a head wind. Oh well, we made water on the way and the freezer had a good run - not that there is much left in there!
We had run very short of some supplies, especially tonic, which was the biggest crisis! So this afternoon we started off in a taxi, that got stuck in a traffic jam so walked the long trek into Suva, had an enormously long wait at Digicel to get out phone/email working again, shopped for many things, as much as we could carry and got the taxi back, laden with goodies.
The nun that shared the first taxi with us told us there was an earthquake in Kadavu a couple of days ago and ever since then Suva has been very warm with north easterlies which is very unusual and must have been something to do with the earthquake. The taxi driver on the way back told us that the western part of Fiji was colder than usual and had hail stones for the first time ever, and he blamed this on global warming! Meanwhile we heard that the King of Tonga had sacked the Government in Tonga. And in breaking news, in fact headline news in Fiji, we heard that a 23 year old man has been arrested and held in prison awaiting a trial for corruption charges because he was caught driving while intoxicated and offered the policeman a $10 bribe. It all feels quite surreal, really.
Tonight we treated oursleves to a meal at the Novotel Lami. This has become a bit of a tradition now. This is the third time we have sailed to Fiji and each time we have come here and had dinner at the same spot. It really is the best place to be, if you have to be in Suva that is. We look forward to leaving the traffic jams and the throng of people behind again soon!

[weather]1 knot NE, 70pct cloud, rain showers. 1015 baro. Waiting for the right weather to sail to New Caledonia now. Suva to the Loyalties, about 5 days.

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