Savusavu, Fiji

Saturday May 8, Savusavu is located on the south coast of Vanua Levu Island, the second largest island in Fiji.

it rained most of the night, off and on all day. Great time to get my blog post published. While on passage, I write them in “Notes”, them transfer to WordPress when we have internet.

Sunday May 9, Happy Mother’s Day🌹, Dan made blueberry pancakes for breakfast!

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we walked around town. Most places are closed on Sundays.

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We had dinner at the restaurant here at the marina.

Monday May 10, we resealed the teak rails with Semco teak sealer.

Our buddies were released from quarantine. Had sundowners and dinner with them.

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Tuesday May 11, we are waiting to get out Fiji islands cruising permit and flag. The flag is to let inhabitants of the other islands know we are COVID free. There was a bit of confusion as to who was to do the paperwork, the marina or our agent. They both said the other one was to do it. In the end our agent came through and she’s doing the papers.

Rained off and on most of the day. We joined Mike and Sue at The Captains Table for dinner, this restaurant is at the marina. The crew of s/v Swell was there too, a fun evening. The food here is exceptional!

Wednesday May 12, walked to town with our wagon. Stopped at a few stores picked up provisions, fruit and beverages.

The code sail was brought to the lawn to “unroll” it, it was very tightly wound, back on Day 11, the halyard broke. We had some communication with Harken regarding this furling device. They basically said the cable should be tight but not as tight as a guitar string. Dan is going to add another turning block we’ll see how this goes. Our overpriced high maintenance sail, the saga continues.

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Later we went to dinner with Mike and Sue at Snowy House & Grace Road Kitchen, it’s an organic food restaurant.

Thursday May 13, Cruising permit issued! “Blue Lane” is a program to bring yachts to Fiji COVID safely. It also shows other islands within Fiji that we are COVID free.

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*Sourdough Notes* baked a Belle loaf this morning. the dough was quite billowy so it was baked in a cast iron pan opposed to a loaf pan.

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Together with Mike and Sue, we we toured the KokoMana Farm and Chocolate Factory. Cocoa is grown under best practice ecological principles. The tour covered the full process from “tree to bar”, concluding with chocolate tastings. A very similar process to coffee. Needless to say we purchased several bars. 85%, 70%, 70% with sea salt, fudge and Cocoa nibs. We will ration this stash as we did before, 1 bar every Sunday and Thursday.

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Friday May 14, to market to purchase Kava. When visiting a local village, it is customary to bring some as a gift to the community as a token of respect.

Kava is made from the roots of a relative of the pepper plant and has been used by Pacific Island cultures for centuries. The roots are pounded into a fine powder and then mixed with water, served in a large wooden communal bowl.

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The broken halyard was restrung down the mast. Codey was then raised at the dock. While attempting to furl it, if the cable was tight, it furled from the bottom up. When the halyard was slightly loosened, the top rope twisted, the furler was not spinning, that’s how it broke halyards. Another email was sent to both Harken and North Sails. Something is not right, we’ll never has been right since the sail was purchased.