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Firefly - Beqa and Kaduga



Its Sunday 13th July and Firefly is anchored off Yanuca Island within the Beqa Lagoon - its beautiful, but this was not our intended destination.

A few days back Rosy had her 7th consecutive day of surfing near Tavarua Island. Having spent a rolly night anchored there we were up early and as we motored towards Cloudbreak we spotted a whale, swimming in the direction of the break - it was blowing and visible but we did not get close enough to identify it - however, the day before Humpbacks had been seen by other boats. There was no wind and Cloudbreak looked stunning, busy with surfers and a flotilla of small boats, milling just outside the waves that had bought the surfers out to the reef.

After a couple of hours we picked Rosy up in the dinghy and started our planned passage to the Lau Group - this was then abandoned relatively soon after setting off due to a horrible head on swell we encountered on the south of Viti Levu. We slowed down and sailed under jib alone until we could enter Cuvu Bay. After a dinghy and swim trip to a small river and a very pleasant night we resumed our trip east the following day. By this time we had already decided to change our plans and to cruise Beqa and Kaduga instead - for several reasons: the much shorter distance involved, the higher likelyhood we would find good surfing spots, the fact that Beqa and Kaduga were also reported as being stunning destinations and that Firefly will be coming back to Fiji next year and will enter at Lau.

Beqa was about 40nm east of Cuvu and we reached Vaga bay mid afternoon. There was another British yacht anchored in the well protected bay and following a quick discussion with the crew, to check out the local protocols, we took our offering of Kava roots and went ashore to perform our first Sevusevu. This is a traditional custom, the Kava root being given to the Neiseuseu Village Chief at a small ceremony performed in his house, while sat cross legged on the ground on woven mats. During the ceremony we request permission to stay in the bay, anchor, swim snorkel and land at the village - The Chief recites a traditional monologue and by accepting our offering of the Kava root the Chief agrees to our request and we are effectively adopted by the village.

In our case the Sevusevu ceremony was quite relaxed and we were soon ushered out of the house - in some places in can be much longer and complex and in this case would involve preparing the Kava and drinking the 'muddy' liquid. On departure from the Chief's house we were taken on a tour of the village by numerous young children all desperate to hold hands with Rosy and Susie and we did get to drink some Kava at Sero's house, Sero being the villager who from then on looked after us. Rosy, who will be training to be an English teacher from September was keen to visit the local school, located in the adjacent village (a boat ride away) and over a coconut shell of Kava it was all arranged that she would go the next day - the kids were ecstatic.

After an early start and a 20 minute open boat ride with about 30 children from Neiseuseu, Rosy reached the very tidy village of Naceva and was taken to the school to meet the headmaster. Clearly there was some mis communication as Rosy was then delivered to the classroom for years 7/8 (kids about 12 or 13 years old) where she waited, along with the class for the teacher (in this case the headmaster) to arrive. After a while it was clear he had decided it was an impromptu day off and the class encouraged Rosy to teach them. This was obviously quite taxing as she was thoroughly unprepared, but due to their excellent English speaker ability it was both successful and rewarding for Rosy and the class - and the Headmaster did show up again at the end of the day to say thank you.

While the school visit was underway Paul and Susie also had some interesting experiences in the village and we will recount these in the next posting of this log. Since stopping at Vaga we have moved to Yanuca where we have anchored just off the tiny Yanuca Island Surf Resort. Rosy is currently on her 3rd days of surfing at Frigate Passage, another world class spot, along with the 4 other 'surf mad' clients in the resorts surf shuttle driven by the resort's land owner, Massy. Tomorrow, we plan to sail the 40 mile passage to Kaduga and Paul and Susie are poring over all of the information we have at hand to be prepared to enter this reef strewn area safely and to find anchorages near both surfing and diving spots.

Paul, Susie and Rosy

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