Fiji - Part I. Vanua Levu, Taveuni, Rabi and the Ringgold Isles

Last June (2020), the Island Nation of Fiji developed the Blue Lane Initiative which opened borders to the remarkably safe and naturally socially distanced population of cruising yachts who maintained strict protocols for entry.  This creative enterprise provided a haven for vessels continuing their journeys westward through the Pacific as well as a financial boost to related industries who were suffering from a lack of business during Covid.  As almost every other Pacific nation has closed its borders to travel, the hope was that this Blue Lane Experiment in Fiji would be an incentive and shining example of possibility going forward into 2021, especially since the vaccine rollouts were imminent.  We were hoping other nations would be so inspired to open their borders to cruisers in 2021, diverting north to Hawaii for cyclone season which would have allowed us to sail back south to pick up our journey west of where we left it and visit the Cook Islands, Tonga and beyond.  Unfortunately, all the Pacific Nations are still closed as of this writing including French Polynesia and even Fiji has suffered an outbreak earlier this year, not due to visiting yachts!, and has locked down its most populated capital city, Suva, and surrounding areas, on the largest island of Viti Levu.  

This is not to say that we arrived in Fiji by default.  We were always planning to visit this astoundingly beautiful area of over 300 islands all along and now are ever more grateful to be here and under the circumstances especially.  Our arrival was perfectly timed on Monday, June 21, Fiji Time, after sixteen and a half days of a fairly uneventful passage.  We were safely moored in the quarantine area with four other sailboats and by mid-afternoon we had already finished our Covid swabs and first cocktails!  We immediately observed how friendly everyone seemed from the Navy Escort to the anchorage and the medical personnel to the cruisers on other boats cheering us in.  This continued with the Immigration and Customs officials and staff at the Copra Shed Marina, where we spent our first ten days, to everyone else we met in town and on the streets.  Fiji is a very friendly place and people seem genuinely happy to see visitors here.   Another observation in our first week exploring the town of Savu-Savu, was how affordable everything is.  Most of what we need is either the going market price on average or enticingly priced like the restaurants, marina stays, fresh market and grocery.  Of course, compared to Hawaii and French Polynesia, all the prices seem reasonable! 

Friendly nurses doing unfriendly things!

Copra Shed Marina

The population of the main islands of Viti Levu and Venua Levu and Taveuni are predominantly Indo-Pacific (or Indo-Fijian) and are citizens of fully or partially Indian descent who trace their heritage mostly from the Southern regions of the Indian subcontinent who arrived in Fiji as indentured laborers.  This demographic constituted the majority of the Fijian population between 1956 and the late 1980s but subsequent discrimination and emigration opportunities have reduced these numbers.  The populations of the outer islands are village dwellers of mixed Austronesian and Melanesian descent with some Polynesian influences.  They practice a subsistence lifestyle much in the way it has been done for hundreds of years with a moderate economy of emerging tourism.  Most of the Fijians we have met so far come from diverse backgrounds but the Indian influence is very obvious to us, of course, having spent six months in India, so we are very comfortable here and are absolutely delighted with all the delicious food available in all our favorite dishes and flavors and even the local spoken language is largely Hindu even though English is widely understood. 

Rested, repaired and restocked, additionally with Kava Root for the Out Islanders, and flying our Blue Lane Flag indicating our Covid-Free status, we set forth on our first Fijian Adventure!  We had read about a cruiser friendly resort called Paradise that offered free moorings and access to their pool for a bit of patronage at their bar and restaurant.  Who could resist that?  And what we found was so much more!  The resort is operated by a nice couple from Australia, Alan and Terry, who have made an absolute paradise of the grounds and pool area with tropical plants and flowers.  The walkway up from the dinghy dock over rocky cliffs adorned with flowering vines is so inviting as is the pavilion at the edge of these cliffs for cocktails at sunset with a magnificent view of the anchorage over the infinity pool.  On our first visit, we pre-ordered dinner, perused the on-premises bakery and walked the dogs down the road along the shore where we found the local Halal Butcher.  We later discovered that Alan smokes his own bacon slabs, raises chickens for eggs and has a small garden.  In addition, the chef will buy fresh produce for us along with his own shopping on request.  Not only are all these locally sourced ingredients fresh but absolutely delicious!  The staff is expertly trained and rarely seen without a smile and so very attentive.  The dive boat captain even stayed on a neighbors boat for a few nights while he took a ferry to another island on business.  And if all this weren’t enough, they offer discounts on their SCUBA excursions!  Needless to say we have indulged ourselves in every one of these services and have met other visiting cruisers at dinner and cocktails doing the same.  It is a popular place and well located as a stopping point within a days sail from SavuSavu or the Southern Lau Islands and even the Northern Ringgold Group which was our first itinerary.  What we had planned as a two day stop here flew by in about ten days!

We eventually tore ourselves away from Paradise and it helped that David had arranged to trade the Pearl Drilling Machine we bought in Hawaii and no longer needed to Jone at the Fiji Dive Academy in Viani Bay for some of his services.  Now is a good time to interject how absolutely impressed we have been with the diving and snorkeling here in Fiji.  We got a taste of it at Paradise, noticing how warm and clear the water is and the Rainbow Reef dives we did were both abundant and colorful in marine life and coral formation that is just stunning.  In fact, Fiji is a world renowned top spot for diving spectacular soft corals!  And Viani Bay is located even closer making it easier to time the famous Great White Wall perfectly.  Here we were offered the only secure mooring in the bay, which is a tricky anchorage for the numerous bommies that abound, and we were lucky to be the only boat in the bay on a sunny calm day perfect for drone flying!  Not wasting any time we were ashore with our machine by late afternoon to meet Jone, who is Fijian, and his partner, Marina, from Germany who run a Dive School and budding resort only accessible by boat.  We arranged for some dives and dinner with them the next evening.  During our week in Viani Bay, we snorkeled and paddled our SUPS around the bay almost every day and dove twice on the incredible White Wall.  The white soft coral flowers ‘bloom’ during the turn of the tides and last only about a half hour or so at their optimum viewing.  This is when they open to feed on the nutrients churned by the change in tide direction and the immense and steep walls transform from brown into what appears to be a white crystalized winter wonderland!  In all my years of diving, I have never seen anything like it.  It was so amazing that we couldn’t be satisfied with just one dive and had to do it again and might even do a third dive later!   In addition to the Dive Academy, Jone has a coral reef regeneration project in the bay and has worked with the people in the area to educate them on sustainable fishing and protecting the reefs.  He has done an incredible job refurbishing damaged corals by grafting live growth onto dead ones with great success and even gets visitors involved.  Most yachts are happy to help out being conservation minded themselves.  In addition to all the water activities, Jone has a side gig of harvesting Fleur de Sel, which is the top flaky layer of open water salt collection.  He has developed an interesting and flavorful line of infused salts such as garlic, pesto, kumquat, citrus and ginger.  All delicious!  We have a few in our own spice rack now!

Moving on, we skirted the coast to the mouth of a river on the other side of the mountain from Viani Bay.  We were told by fellow cruisers that it was an interesting dinghy ride up river at high tide and had timed it for the afternoon of our arrival.  It was a very scenic jaunt through the thickets and brush and a great way to spend an afternoon!  It was also a protected spot to anchor out of the swell on our way to the island of Rabi where we had planned a stop in a secluded bay tucked behind the reefs.  We sailed past a small island called Kioa the next morning which was purchased as a freehold settlement by people of Tuvalu who are predominantly fishermen and artisans.  There wasn’t a protected anchorage to stop but we waved back to many smiling people in boats.  Rabi is also an outlier to Fiji in that its inhabitants are displaced Banabans from Ocean Island in Micronesia.  Phosphate mining devastated their home so the island of Rabi was purchased by the British for their resettlement.  Arriving in Albert Cove late afternoon and navigating through the outer reefs to the narrow entrance channel suddenly became trickier when we encountered a satellite glitch affecting our electronic marine charts on both phones and the iPad.  It is the first and only time it has ever happened and we thankfully had enough light and intermittent signal to get inside the bay!  It made for an exciting finish to our day and we are happy to report that it was well worth the effort!  The bay is gorgeous as you will see in our incredible drone shots of the area.  We stayed a few days, again the only boat in the anchorage, and waved to the copra collectors camped ashore but didn’t make contact.  Our attitude is to let the villagers come to us as they feel comfortable in these strange times of Covid.

Our next stop was on the Island of Yanuca (Yan-u-tha) also surrounded by extensive outer reefs.  No glitches on this day and the anchorage unfolded its staggering beauty as we approached from the southwest.  Here we found a beautiful sandy spot a respectful distance from the village and settled in before sunset.  Remembering an article I had read from previous sailors in this area, we tried to contact the village by VHF Radio.  Receiving no response, we concluded that this would be another place to enjoy on our own, until a man showed up in an official looking skiff wanting to come aboard.  It turned out to be Willy, who is obscurely relatedly to the chiefdom somehow, but the one and same man I had read about in the article.  He spent a few hours onboard chatting with us and invited us to the village at higher tide later that day as it is another tricky entrance to shore.  He disembarked with an entire tray of freshly baked brownies and some containers and other loose items he could use.  We beached the dinghy and Willy’s young sons led us up the hill where Willy and his wife run a small bungalow rental.  The view was impressive and after a while we made our way back down to meet the villagers and experience our first rather impromptu and certainly informal Kava ceremony.  To be honest, it was mostly a drinking session of young men and I was the only female, but it was pleasant and the conversation flowed smoothly while we learned quite a lot about village life.  And the Kava?  The powdered version we brought was mixed with water and served first while the guys took turns grinding the roots with an oversized pestle and mortar.  The result looks like a muddy liquid out of a dirty river and tastes pretty much like it looks but it does leave a tingling and numbing sensation on the lips.  As the night progressed, we drank many rounds out of a coconut shell in levels of high tide or half tide measurements.  I wouldn’t say we got a buzz in the end, but it was a very mellow evening under the stars made even more entertaining when Paul arrived with his guitar and another guitar was given to David who played the base line to some popular covers and sang along.  I have missed my husband as a musician and it was a delight to see him smiling all night.  It was a great exchange with our very first Fijian village and we look forward to future encounters!

The weather was beginning to change as we dropped south from Yanuca to Matagi, a horseshoe shaped island at the eastern most end of Taveuni.  We had now completed a circular route of northern areas and from here had a choice to make about how we continued.  Originally we had thought to continue further south to the Bay of Islands but as the weather deteriorated and we spent a whole day in torrential rain in otherwise pretty Matagi, (and we were running short on supplies and out of beer!), the decision was made to head back to Savu Savu by way of Paradise to break up the return voyage.  Our parts for the windlass anchoring system and the line for the topping lift where waiting for us at the Copra Shed and it was a perfect time to regroup before our second excursion to the Lau Group of Islands.  We now had a better idea of what to expect from our own adventures and had the benefit of conversations with other sailors to better equip ourselves.  After all, we had already spent a month exploring in the two week time frame we had initially planned!, which proves that once you are out in the Island Wonder World of Fiji, you never want to come back to civilization!  We will be better prepared this time for a much longer stay!

For Christina