Time in Savusavu

Serenity of Swanwick
Phil and Sarah Tadd
Sat 15 Jun 2019 23:36

Nawi Island

 

Since arriving in Savusavu we have been on a mooring just off Nawi Island which is on the opposite side of the creek from the town and our marina jetty and buildings. The island is being developed as a resort and they have plans for a top class marina on the seaward side. I think we are lucky to visit before too much development has occurred.

 

Waitui Kelekele Marina, we believe the jetty was probably taken out by Cyclone Winston

 

We are happy to be at Waitui rather than the more upmarket Copra Shed Marina it has all we need even if the shower is a bit basic, at least it has hot water, there is water available on the quay and fuel just across the road.

Our stack of washing has been done and the cold weather gear can be put away for a few months, we have dried Serenity out from the trip up here and carried out some maintenance jobs.

 

This is very much a one street town with at least three supermarkets, loads of small shops which sell a mixture of goods as seems to be common in island communities. The pharmacy sells clothes, phones, fishing gear as well as being a pharmacy. There is a very good market for fresh food although it is a bit limited in what’s available, no imports here. Buses go twice a day to Labasa, the main town, a journey of about two hours on hard seats with sides totally open to dust and weather.

 

Savusavu on Sunday, every other day it is very busy.

 

On Friday we hired a car, actually a 4wd double cab pickup, with Jan and Richard from Morpheus of London and drove out to the Waisali Rain Forest reserve and the waterfall at Vuadomo village. Along with the tropical gardens these seem to be the only local attractions.

The rain forest involved a descent, steep and slippery at times although on a made up path with lots of steps, down into a gully and then a long climb back out, there were a few noticeboards along the path giving details of the different flora and fauna but no real explanation of the environment, a guide would have been useful. This walk took us a good hour with a short stop at the bottom. Although we didn’t see any of the tree or ground Frogs we did hear the Barking Pigeon.

 

Jan and Richard from Morpheus of London

 

A well made path

 

Rain forest vegetation

 

Bromeliads

 

Picnic table in the gully and a welcome rest

 

From Waisali we moved on to Vuadomo village where we donned our sula ’s, traditional skirts worn by men and women and handed over our Sevu sevu, a gift of Kava. We were welcomed to the village and allowed to look around and then to go to the waterfall for a swim, $10 each. Very much a tourist trip with a passing nod at tradition.

 

The Methodist church, in the shelter to the left is the ‘bell’ a hollow log. All the village

attend 3 times on Sundays

 

Well maintained houses and the washing laid out to dry as it was a dry day.

 

Fishing rafts, old and modern.

 

The waterfall, cool when you first went in but actually the water was quite warm enough to swim even for Phil

 

Driving out from the village the gears on the hire truck started to play up and eventually we had to call Budget and get a replacement. We had a very nice lunch in the local Korean restaurant and we finished the day driving out along the coast looking for a beach to have a swim, all the beaches seem to be in resorts with private access only so eventually we gave up.

 

Waiting for a replacement!

 

We were asked to move from our mooring to one on the town side of the creek as there was a large barge arriving with materials for the new resort. This came in yesterday and they manoeuvred it very skilfully.

 

Barge load of boulders.

 

We are getting ready to move out to remoter islands in the next couple of days we will buy Kava for Sevu sevu’s and other gifts of  staple  foodstuff. We make regular trips ashore to top up with water and yesterday filled with diesel, a trip to the garage, luckily just across the road with all our fuel containers, different sizes to fit in the available space low down in the boat.

 

14Lts of spare fuel, to be packed on board.

 

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