Normally, after several days at Musket Cove we would head out to a little island called "Namotu" only an hour away. Here, the water is crystal clear, the beach has beautiful white sand, and a short dinghy ride away are some of the world’s best surf breaks! Fortunately these include 2 where you don’t have to be one of the world’s best surfers.

I am usually one that goes for it but found out the hard way that a break called "restaurants" was beyond my physical condition and ability.

It was a big day and the waves were barreling well over head high.

About 35 expert surfers were lined up at the takeoff, well inside of me so every wave had somebody on it by the time I was ready to paddle in.

I tried a few times going in a bit to catch some of the smaller waves but inevitably a big set would come through and totally wipe me out every time!
I experienced very long hold downs and the waves break on a shallow reef that also banged me up a bit. And paddling back out through these waves was no easy task especially when you’re exhausted already.

My spirits were further beaten down when one guy yelled at me for being in his way (my duck dive under was not good enough) as he came ripping down inside the barrel. After a bit of a heated discussion he suggested that perhaps I should not be there. I said, possibly, but after coming so far I had to try!

Well, fortunately there were other breaks that were not so crowded and more my speed. Most times Iris could join me on her boogie board and we both got many waves and had a great time. If I limited my sessions to an hour or so my back was usually ok.

The wind came up one day and we wanted to go kite boarding. Namotu is a private island (with a small resort catering mostly to surfers). I asked the owner, a guy from Australia, if it was okay to rig our kites up on the beach. He said OK but for that day only. I think it would have been better if Iris went over in her bikini and asked?

When the surf was good a few other boats would come out to Namotu for the day but normally returned at night. Depending on the tide and wind the anchorage could become very uncomfortable. Catamarans are more  stable though at times, it could be a bit bumpy, but tolerable on Andromeda.

Musket Cove also had a good place for kite surfing.
A big sandbar was exposed at medium to low tide a short ride away.

Iris had many wonderful sessions and was able to improve her skills. Depending on my back my sessions tended to be very short. I anchored Andromeda close by so I could relax in the hammock reading and also keep an eye on Iris. We usually had a few other kiters for company but it was never too crowded.

We fell into a comfortable routine spending time between Musket Cove and Namotu: socializing, surfing, swimming, kiting, hiking, and playing volleyball etc.

Fiji has many lovely island groups and destinations we wanted to explore but after all the work on the boat and the long trip from NZ, (my back being the worse from ware), we both had no motivation to go anywhere soon.

Sailing across the Pacific we didn’t meet many other couples we had a lot in common, or felt a bond for.

Here we met some people we really enjoyed spending time with and hopefully will see again.

In fact, we will see one of them very soon, Blanka, a lovely czech girl. After kiting one day Iris gave a fellow kite boarder a ride back to

SV Tevake, the boat he was staying at
He invited us to come back for drinks later that evening and we met all the friendly crew members including Blanka. We all got along well and became friends.

Small world, Blanka works in Barcelona managing a hotel and some apartments. We are booked to Barcelona end of October and she recently arranged a nice apartment for us to stay in.

We had been smelling diesel for a few weeks and discovered a small leak in or around our 600 liter stainless steel fuel tank. After exhausting searches and tests too numerous to detail we narrowed it down to a small crack in one of the bottom corners that you cannot see (or reach) because the tank is fiber glassed in at the bottom.

It probably happened in the very rough seas coming from New Zealand.

Through the inspection hatch we could access 2 of the three compartments in the tank.

We cleaned the bottom, thoroughly ground the edges down and then filled the corners with epoxy putty and then covered this with liquid epoxy.

After this repair I used a kite pump to run a pressure test and found that the leak was coming from the third inaccessible apartment!

Shit…..!

After so much work Iris and I were pretty distraught as the repair now became extremely difficult if not impossible. The boat is basically built around the tank so there’s no way to get it out, or access parts of it, without cutting huge holes in the bulkheads or deck.

I finally came up with the idea of reaching in through the access port to cut a hole in the wall that separated the second and third chamber. Even with my long arms I could just reach that wall with the cutting blade on my angle grinder.

Unless you’ve tried something like that, it it’s impossible to describe how hard it is to cut a nice whole through 2mm stainless steel at arm’s length, and not go through the side of the tank by mistake! I built a support to rest my wrist upon which helped greatly. I just managed the job after much time and seven broken blades.

Now the hard part - if we can just reach the hole in the wall of the third compartment how do we repair it?

Thank goodness Iris could just get her shoulder and head through the inspection port so she was able to reach in and very patiently put the epoxy putty on the end of a stick and mold it into place.

She worked like this for many hours and her body suffered from the contortions. Great Iris has such determination!

We both held our breaths as I ran another pressure test.

And thank God it worked!

Very close to our location at Malolo Island is the Mamanuca Group so we headed there. These islands are located within the barrier reef so the sailing was very tranquil.

We spent a very enjoyable week hopping around to various locations each with its own personality. One was where they filmed the movie Castaway with Tom Hanks. It was also very memorable because while we were out kite boarding Andromeda dragged anchor and started drifting away pretty quickly in the 25nots! Fortunately, there was nothing close

by for her to hit so we hopped in the dingy and retrieved her without too much worry.

With so many islands so close together, very friendly people, no worries about crime, ideal climate, crystal clear water and great waves, Fiji truly is a cruiser's paradise!

The only thing lacking was fish to catch or spear for dinner. All the reefs we snorkeled on had been almost completely fished and spear-finished out, and even the smaller, but still edible fish, took off in a hurry the moment we were in sight!