Tag Archives: fiji

Fiji Paradise

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Fiji has over 300 islands ranging from the very remote Lao group to the populated Viti Levu and Vanua Levu.  There are plenty of picture perfect, white sandy beaches, endless coral reefs, pristine forests and world-renowned dive sites.

Fiji is comprised of five unique archipelagos:

  • Viti Levu (largest island) and North West islands
    • Mamanuca and Yasawa’s are strung out over 80 nautical miles
  • Kadavu and Beqa
    • Beqa, Kadavu, Tavuki, Vatulele, Great Astralobe Reef and Lagoon
  • Central Waters: Vanua Levu and the Lomaiviti Group
    • Vanua Levu, Bligh Waters, Koro Sea, Makogai, Wakaya, Koro, Ovalau, Batiki
  • Taveuni and the Ringold Isles
    • Tavenui, Ringold Isles, Rabi, Qamea, Laucala, Matei
  • Eastern Archipelago (Lao group)
    • Nothern Lao, Southern Lao and Eastern Lao

The 300 islands are spread over 200,000 square miles and they cross over the international date line even though there is only one date/time across all of Fijian waters.  What’s funny is while navigating close to the date line, our digital charts freak out and always mis-calculate until we cross over the date line.

The two largest islands are Viti Levu (which has the nation’s capital, Suva) and Vanua Levu.  Most of the islands are volcanic in origin and most of the summits of mountains have distinct craters (even though activity has long since ceased).  Fijians own more than 80% of the lands in Fiji. However, it is not held by individuals, but rather by small tribal units.

Sugar is grown near the plains and lowlands of the north-west of Viti Levu and is their largest export..  They also export coconut oil, pearls, and copra. 

The Fijians

Only 100 of the 300 islands are inhabited. Fiji has many, many nationalities and is rich and diverse in cultures.  The population is near 800,000 with about 49% being Fijians, 46% being Fijian Indians and the remaining 5% being Europeans (most from New Zealand and Australia), Chinese, Roumans, and other Pacific Islanders.

Overall, Fijians have been truly the nicest and friendliest group of people we’ve ever met.  They stop everything to greet you with “Bula.”  And its not a softly spoken, under your breath “Bula” it is a loud, almost shout “Bula” coming from the heart.  Whether you are walking down the street, in a store, on the bus, or in a small town – big and small, young and old will greet you with a wide toothy grin and a “Bula.”

It was only 50 years ago that Fiji gained its independence from Britain (October 1970) who had control for over 96 years.  In 1987 Fiji was declared a republic and in 1992 the first elections were held when Fiji returned to an elected parliament.

Rich in Life

We spent most of our time in the outer islands where the villages are small (less than 100 people) and life is simple. Most do not have tables, chairs, utensils, appliances, or modern amenities. Several of the villagers are missing many teeth, but they are trim, happy, and healthy.  They eat what nature provides for them, they grow casava and taro root (both starches like potatoes), the enjoy lots of fresh fruits (bananas, papayas, mangos, breadfruit, soursop) and freshly caught fish, octopus, lobster, and crab.  Rich in life.

This is one of our host families.  The headman assigns a host family to us each time we visit the outer islands.  This family is in Fulaga (Lucy and Nico).

This is inside their modest home.  We are sitting in their living room, the kitchen is in the background and they have a small separate room to sleep.

Each Fijian encounter is a unique and blessed experience.  They are truly happy to meet you, know you, and share their world.  They might not have much, but they will offer you what they do have. 

Our last blog shares our arrival and all the arrival procedures in Fiji.  Events from this blog occurred the end of June.  Our blog posts run 10-12 weeks behind actual events.

Passage: French Polynesia to Fiji

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It feels like we have been preparing for this long passage for months.  Way longer than the actual passage.  But it’s all in the preparations to make for a smooth and easy sail.

Matt posted “live blogs” during the passage (which took place in June 2022) so I will try not to duplicate him, but if you are interested in reading them (he is super funny).  Click here to read the first of his 12 posts during our passage.

We left from Bora Bora and our friends from Askari managed to get a departing photo with the Bora Bora caldera in the background.

Departing Bora Bora

Departing Bora Bora

Trip Details

  • Departure Date and Time: Saturday, 4 June 2022 at 12:30pm
  • Miles to Destination (as the crow flies): 50
  • Engine Hours: Port: 4213 and Starboard: 4374
  • Estimated Arrival Time: 19 June 2022 (Fiji is 22 hours ahead of Tahiti so we lost a day)

Shifts:

Matt and I do 3 hours on and 3 hours off for passages.  Basically, Matt works the 8p-11p shift, I work the 11p-2a, Matt is back up 2a-5a and I am up from 5a-8a.  During the day we rotate however we want (sort of light schedule).   Averaging 5 hours of broken sleep a night is challenging at best.

Day 1

We purposely picked this weather window because it had light winds for the first few days.  This is crucial for me because I am prone to sea sickness.  Having light winds allows me to slowly get my “sea legs.”   Weather predictions are really guessing as they are often wrong.  But usually the first 3 days are somewhat accurate.  Four different forecasts had us going way North increasing our cross track to over 100 miles (meaning we went over 100 miles out of our way to ensure we stayed in the wind zone).

Forecasts Routing

Forecasts Routing

We flew wing on wing (main sail on port and jib on starboard) and then tried to fly the parasail.  We lost sight of land at dark, just a mere 6 hours after we started our passage.

Day 2 & 3

Lovely days with light winds.  We flew the parasail for most of the day and managed to maintain a 6.5 boat speed.  Another boat showed up on AIS (radar) called Moondance.  They were mirroring us which was odd.  We headed to port, then they did, we headed to starboard, then they did.  We eventually lost them and left them in the dust.

Parasail

Parasail

We leave French waters and enter Cook Islands territory.  The closest island is Suwarrow which is south and still over 300nm away (2-2.5 days).

Crossing into Cook Islands

Crossing into Cook Islands

Day 4:

A rather large squall came through in the wee hours of the morning bringing over 35kts of wind and super strong, large rain drops.  Just as we finished dropping all the sails, the winds picked up to 35kts and the rain pelted us.  It was a downpour and both Matt and I were soaked to the bone.  We motored during the worse part of the storm and then it left us with no wind when it passed.   Drat, we ended up using the motors for close to 20 hours.  Since it was a motor day, I made chocolate chip mint cookies.  We need all the sugar and caffeine we can get to keep us awake during the night shifts.

Day 5

We finally broke the 1000nm mark.  Yeah what a relief.  In addition, we reduced our cross track bringing us closer to our destination.

Medium Spinnaker 150m

Medium Spinnaker 150m

At night we rely a lot on our instruments.  We are running weather forecasts on Matt’s computer, we have radar on (bottom circular diagram), Vesper Marine, and B&G instruments all running at the same time.  In addition, we have 2 iPads that are running different charts.

Day 6

Two things to celebrate: (1) We reached the half way mark of 832 nm to go.  Of course, that is as the crow flies and does not take into account that we have to sail around islands (vs through them).  The second thing we celebrated was a beautiful pod of whales.  I saw a spout and thought was that a spout or just the wind kicking up sea spray?  It turned out to be a spout.  At least 4 whales played around Sugar Shack for about 20 minutes.  One came alongside our boat and then went under the boat.  Super cool, but holy h3ll that could have been disastrous if he breached the surface while under Sugar Shack.

The photos are not very good as I was frozen in place when they breached.  But they were there, I promise.

Day 7-8

We alternate between our medium spinnaker, the parasail, and the working sails.  Depends on the winds and gusts.  We had particularly calm weather and decided to swap out our sails.  As we hoisted the medium spinnaker a gust came up and made a slight tear at the top.  We had to bring her down to avoid total destruction.  Matt was able to repair the sail and get it back in the rotation a few days later.

On a good note, we caught (2) male mahi mahi in the afternoon.  The first line went “zing” and as we went to pull in the other lines a 2nd line went zing!

These are the winning lures that caught our tasty fish.

Day 9:

We enter the waters of Tonga.  I sure wish Tonga was open but alas she is shut down due to Covid still.  So, we sail on through longingly looking at the beautiful islands from a far.  Kidding we can’t see anything as it is way too far away.  But the longing is still there.

Day 10:

Another beautiful day on passage.  We were changing sails from the jib to the parasail when we had another little mishap.  Matt was raising the sock (with the sail inside) as per usual.  However, I noticed that the sock looked empty so I shouted at Matt to stop, but he couldn’t hear me over the roar of the wind.  I stepped up my vocal cords and got his attention just as the entire parasail came out of the sock and into the sea.  Holy cow!

It is 3am and raining.  We are both at the bow trying to pull in the sail.  Just as we got the sail onboard, the sock goes under the boat.  You’ve got to be kidding!  We manage to salvage both the sail and the sock and bring them back to the cockpit. What happened?  Well, there is a shackle at the top of the sock that holds the sail inside.  That shackle opened up and we nearly lost the sail.  Lucky for us, an easy fix.

Day 11

We make our first land sighting at 122nm to go.  Super cool to see land after being at sea for 11 days.  The islands are far off in the distance, but you can certainly make out the beautiful mountains.  We had a very squally and rainy day today which makes it hard to fly the lighter sails (spinnaker and parasail) which make us go faster.  But we continued on averaging 5-6kts for the day.  Today was my last day as net controller on the Poly Mag Net an SSB radio net that I’ve been volunteering for over the last 2 years.  It was hard to let go.

Day 12

We arrive into the island of Vanua Levu and go to Savusavu bay to clear into customs.  We arrived around 10:30am which was 11 days and 23 hours after we picked up the hook in Bora Bora!  Not bad, not bad at all!  We had anticipated it taking 2 full weeks and we made it in 12 days.

Trip Details:

  • Miles to Destination: 1,664
  • Actual Miles Sailed: 1,777
  • Average Speed over 12 days: 2
  • Max Speed: 9
  • Engine Hours: Port: 4233 and starboard 4384

We motored about 20 hours with the majority of that time being right after the large squall on day 4.  The rest of the time we were able to sail.

Here is our track from French Polynesia to Fiji.

French Poly to Fiji Track

How did I entertained myself?

I read 3 books, I watched Season 2 of Bridgerton and S1 of The Marvelous Mrs. Maisel and watched 2 movies.  Of course, there were lots of games of solitaire and word puzzles too.

Some beautiful moon pictures.  The moon came out during the second half of our passage and lit our way through the darkness.

And a collection of sunset photos during our passage.

Sunsets during passage

Sunsets during passage

We prepare to vamoose from French Polynesia in our blast blog.  Events from this blog occurred in early June.  Please note that our blog posts run 10-12 weeks behind actual events.

Tauna, Gambier

We Vamoose from French Polynesia

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There is a lot we need to do before we vamoose from French Polynesia and head to Fiji.  This will be the longest passage Matt and I do solo together.  We sailed 18 days with 2 other people which split the shifts up nicely.  We sailed 11 days with just the two of us (from Easter Island to Gambier), but this passage will be between 13-16 days.

So, you might think…what do you do to prepare to be at seas for up to 16 consecutive days in a row?  Drink heavily?  No, well, not really.  There is lots of paperwork to do to clear out of French Polynesia and to clear into Fiji.  We also have to prepare meals, return items, and ready the boat to vamoose.

Sugar Shack, Matt and I have to legally “clear out” of French Polynesia prior to vamoosing.  We cleared into the country 11 April 2019 (over 3 years ago).  Can you believe we have been here for that long?  We certainly did not anticipate staying here this long, but it has been a wonderful adventure!

Requesting Permission to Enter Fiji

Before we can depart French Polynesia, we have to receive approval to go to Fiji.  Easy enough for us as we hired a local agent to help us with the clearance process.  We technically did not have to hire an agent but since we had engaged with one prior to the “hiring of an agent requirement” was lifted we decided to continue to use her services.

It seems like we have to jump through hoops, but in reality, it is no different than any other country.  We submitted:

  • Copies of passports (all crew)
  • Vaccination cards (all crew)
  • Arrival health declaration form (each crew to complete)
  • Photo of Sugar Shack
  • Arrival Immigration Statement
  • C2C Form (which is 18 pages!)

The clearance approval usually takes 3 days, but since we have an agent it only took 3 hours!  We have friends who did not use an agent and they waited weeks for their approval.  So worth the $350 to use an agent!

We remain in contact with our agent and tell her when we depart.  Then again, we alert her of our impending arrival 72 hours in advance.  She then arranges for all completed paperwork to be sent to the local authorities as we are not clearing in at Denerau where she is located.  We are clearing in at Savusavu on a different island.  Let’s hope that process goes smoothly too.

Clearing out of French Polynesia

Technically, we have to vamoose immediately after we get approval to leave.  The hiccup lies in the weather.  We want to leave on a “good weather window” not because we are being asked to leave the country.  It takes 3 days to clear out, so we take our chances and start the paperwork.

Most boats clear out of Tahiti as that is where the main customs, immigration, and Douane offices are located.  But since covid restrictions have been lifted we can now clear out of Raiatea, Huahine, and Bora Bora.  We decided to clear out of Raiatea.

Documents to Clear Out:

  • Entry paperwork (original clearance documentation)
  • Boat registration
  • Passports for all crew
  • Vaccination for all crew
  • Extension letter (we got a 3-month extension to do some work on Sugar Shack)

We arrive at the gendarmerie, perform some hand signals to tell them what we want and are handed 5 more documents to complete.  30-minutes later we hand in all the paperwork and are told to come back in a few days.

Two days later we inquire about our status and are faced with several confused faces.  Oh dear.  The Gendarmerie search and search and low and behold they finally find our approval email and are able to stamp our passports and documents. 

They hand us one document that has to be mailed to Papeete and one document to hand to Fijian officials.  Then they tell us to vamoose quickly. We are officially a boat without a country!

Up Next

Now that the paperwork has been submitted, we start working on other preparations.  We anticipate bad weather and prepare accordingly.   In bad weather, it makes it challenging to cook.  So, we, well really Matt, prepares a lot of meals and freezes them.

Matt has precooked 2 meals for 2 people of the following dishes:

  • Butter chicken with bow tie pasta
  • Chicken Rotti
  • Pulled Port
  • Tuscany Chicken

Plus we have pork chops and loads of sausage and pasta we can easily prepare.

I made an army of gingerbread men (thanx to my grandma’s recipe) to take care of me and help prevent sea sickness.

We fueled up the boat with diesel and gasoline.  Got to make sure we have fuel in case the wind dies.  We hand off our Polynesian propane tank to our friend Eve on “Auntie.”  Sugar Shack have two American tanks which will keep us going until we get to Fiji and can purchase another local tank.

We have a local Vini (cell phone company) contract with a small router that we purchased 3 years ago.  But in order to cancel the contract to get our deposit we have to live without internet.  Normally not a big deal, but we want to stay connected before departure in case there are any issues with our clearance paperwork.  So, it looks like we will walk away from our $100 deposit (suckage).

The cases of beer come in a plastic 20-bottle case. There is a deposit on the bottles and case of about $40.  We turn in our last 2 cases to get that deposit back and are able to apply that credit to our provisions!  Sweet

Hidden Gems

Fiji does not allow a lot of items into the country.  For example, all meats, cheeses, dairy, fresh produce (fruit and veg), seeds (including popcorn), and honey are forbidden.  So, we have to eat all of this prior to arrival.

In addition, they do not allow sea shells, wood, feathers, and sand/soil.  You probably think that these are not a big deal, but I live on a boat and have collected these items for the past 12 years!  We have sea shells (found on the beach) from the Caribbean, Bonaire, Galapagos, Easter island, and of course French Polynesia.  I have a small feather head band from a Marquesan Heiva, a sand and soil art piece created just for me and lots of wood décor.  Oh dear!

I did manage to bring an entire bag of sea shells to my sister (thank you Kimberly). I do not plan to take any of these remaining items off my boat.  Some of these items are stuck to the boat so they don’t fall over while underway.  Those items that are double sticky taped are still out in the open – too hard to remove them and I am hoping they see they are truly décor with no living creatures.  I then did the unthinkable…I hid a few items.  We are talking about carved oyster shells, carved drift wood that have been painted and shellacked, and other items that clearly have no critters.  Fingers crossed 🙂

Safety First

The last thing that we do is prepare the boat for a long passage.  We install jack lines which are a strong tether that goes from the stern of the boat to the bow.  If we have to go to the bow while we are underway, we tether ourselves to this line so we don’t fall over and get lost at sea (slightly important).

We take out our ditch bag and first aid kit.  These items have emergency items (flashlights, water, some food, batteries, water bottle, mirror, etc…)  We also set out our foul weather gear and PFDs (personal floatation devices).  Everything has to be easily accessible.

We stow any and all items that have the potential to fall or break. Secure all cabins, cabinets, and closets. Create a snack basket that is easy to access during night passages.  Check all EPIRBS, put in fresh batteries in them and the hand held GPS.  We double check our Iridium and sent out texts, emails and a phone call.

Check, Check, Check.  Now we just need a weather window!

Stay tuned for passage details coming up next..

Do you remember Marvin Gaye’s album cover “Sugar Shack?”  It sold for close to $15 million!

Marvin Gaye's Sugar Shack cover

Marvin Gaye’s Sugar Shack cover

Did you read our post on the Liward islands?  Be sure to check it out as we say goodbyes before we vamoose!  This blog occurred in late May. Our blog runs 10-12 weeks behind actual events.