Fawn Harbor, Vanua Levu Island, Fiji
Harmonie
Don and Anne Myers
Sun 12 Jul 2009 01:26
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16:43.643S 179:43.616E
On July 2nd, we left Savusavu Bay behind and had a
brisk sail east through choppy seas and mostly into the wind to Fawn Harbor
on the south coast of Vanua Levu Island. Not our favorite way to sail, but
we survived the six hours of wave bouncing and dodging drops of saltwater
as waves came over the bow. We had a brief encounter with pilot whales
along the way. At first we thought they were dolphins when we saw them
cross directly in front of us - but their slow, deliberate, movement through the
water soon clued us in that these were no spunky dolphins come to play in our
bow wave. Pilot whales are small as far as whales go, very black (from
what we could see of their backs, anyway), and when they crossed in front
of us, we only got a glimpse of their backs and one relatively small
fin. It all happened so fast there was no time to get the camera, and with
the rough seas, it was difficult to see them once they moved away
from our immediate vicinity. So sorry, no pictures - but it was still
a thrill to see them if only for a brief moment.
Not too long after the whale sighting, we arrived
at the entrance to Fawn Harbor. The Fawn Harbor reef doesn't look like
much in this picture, but in real life, with 20 knots of wind blowing and some
fair sized waves pushing you around, it's a little daunting. We knew it
was possible to get through the mile long, crooked and narrow pass through the
reef because Storyteller had already done it and radioed back that all was
fine. We were happy to find that our electronic charts were mostly
accurate as we motored slowly into the pass and out the other end without
encountering any uncharted surprises.
Lady Kay followed a short while later after reeling
in a nice 10ish pound mahi-mahi that they kindly shared with all eight of us on
Storyteller that night (Don and I, Sue and John, Sue and John's guests Sue and
Grant and Jackie and Michael). Not too bad.
Anne
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