Somsomo still

Trust
Richard Martin
Tue 8 Jul 2014 05:48
A passing front has delayed us here - we know this anchorage and the prospect of a northerly swinging round to the south encouraged us to stay in familiar surroundings. So we have been spending the time going ashore and walking the tracks to the surrounding villages. The Fijians are friendly as always, but they hardly live above subsistence level. Many of the adults greet us with big toothless smiles and the sad thing was that we saw many children from the next generation whose new adult front teeth had already rotted out. We saw one room homes that had sand floors, and where all the cooking was done on an open fire outside. Its obviously a very relaxed life, with lots of men lolling about during the day, but a world away from our lives.
We heard both local church services on the Sunday in complete detail, even though we were over a mile away in the middle of the bay! The local preacher's message was heavily over amplified, and delivered by way of a continuous harangue (the Sunday evening service started at 5pm and ended at 9pm!). If his tone was anything to go by, they worship a very fierce God in these parts! The only nice thing about it was the group singing - presumably to give the preacher the chance to recover his voice!
We have had a little bit of maintenance to do. The anchor winch clutch needed to be cleaned and regreased again, and the genset gave us a fright when it stopped suddenly. After replacing fuel filters and bleeding the system we found out lack of fuel wasn't a problem. Turns out that the coolant levels were low, and despite the temperature gauge appearing normal, the overheating sensor was activating and closing the motor down. All fixed now!
I have to go now - the sun is setting and we have this little ritual of watching it go down.

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