PAR.  It’s a type of bad weather radar assisted approach used by the military to get their aircraft on the runway in zero/zero conditions.  Basically (and highly simplified explanation) a radar controller using precision radar tracks the aircraft and “talks” the pilot down to the ground.

What does this have to do with Charisma?  Well, we were approaching the Yasawas (from the north) last night at 2200 in deteriorating weather AND we had two retired military radar controllers sitting on Orcinius waiting for us.  They brought us in.

Normally I would never come through the reefs in poor visibility let alone at night, but Orcinius had a track through the reef (as depicted on their chart plotter/radar) that they made when they came in here mid-afternoon with good visibility so were able to give us some waypoints.  But even better, they tracked us on their radar and compared the radar return with the track they made earlier in the day (a “red line” shown on their radar screen).  This gave us a backup and more precision than just following waypoints (in which you can easily be a hundred yards off).  Wow – Precision Approach Radar.  Add to that my experience as an instrument (IFR) rated private pilot and a normally questionable approach looked pretty doable.  I’ve flow down the glideslope to within a couple hundred feet or so of the ground without being able to see the runway (or the ground for that matter) in rain and fog just using the “gauges” so why not in my boat?

So, in we went.  And we were relieved to head in.  A night spent hove to in increasingly windy, building waves and rain with lightning visible in the distance is not my idea of fun.

Before starting in I made a “route” on the chart plotter using the waypoints that John gave me earlier in the day via shortwave radio.  That way the general route plan was automated and I had a feed into the helm for steering.  The GPS would show us a path.  Normally just the GPS is not enough for me to feel comfortable around reefs in the dark – but with our radar controllers we had backup.  As we approached we called them on the VHF.  They responded that they had us on radar and would give us further direction as needed.  Great.  We’re on the glideslope.  Time to start the approach.

As we rounded the north end of the island we were taking some breaking waves into the cockpit, so not a lot of fun.  It’s now blowing 20+ gusting to 30.  I had to concentrate on the helm to keep us on the track, so Ann took care of the radio.  “Orcinius, Orcinius, this is Charisma, do you copy?”  “Roger, Charisma.  Have you loud and clear.  Good signal on radar; we have you coming right on the line”.  Nice.  They even sound like radar controllers.

As we got closer in where the reef narrows and Ann needed to be doing some other boat prep to get the anchor ready and such (I was too busy steering in the blustery conditions to do the talking) , Orcinius called, “OK, no response needed, we’ll just give directions.  Charisma, make a 10 degree left turn.  OK, back on the line.  Now turn right straight to our light.  Good come straight in, you’re right on the line”.

And so it went.  It took about an hour from our initial approach point until we pulled up to within a boat length behind Orcinius where we dropped the anchor and immediately got blown back on the anchor by the gusting wind.  Fortunately the holding here is exceptional in good sand and the anchor grabbed right off and dug in.  We were set.

After cleaning up the boat a little to make sure nothing blew overboard during the night, we talked about our approach over a glass (OK, a couple glasses!) of wine.  We decided that was kind of fun, but the third kind of fun that is better after you wake up the next morning.  For now we agreed, “Let’s not do that again soon!”

Many thanks to Controllers John and Lisa from Orcinius.  You guys are awesome!

It is 0815 and we have been motor-sailing for two hours already, on our way to Ngalelevu, the most northeastern island in Fiji. Our visit last year was a huge treat. Living on the small island in a 12-mile lagoon we found
Matei, a 35-year old man and Moe, his 69-year old uncle. These guys were the only two people living on an island full of coconut crabs. They were working or reclaiming the island so their wives and families would join them. Their goal was to have a house ready for their wives by Christmas.

So today we will push through the 10 hour sail and see if the boys are still there. Sure hope so because we are bringing Orcinius along to meet them. And we have some goodies for them.

If not, another great anchorage to share with Orcinius!

Yes, I finally got them done.  Starting on 7/4/14 with “Exhausted But Excited” and through 9/20 “Cocounuts, Mangoes and Wild Boars” the pictures are now included.  Most of the posts have at least one – you may have to scroll to find it.  Some have a lot and a few posts don’t have any.

So…please remember for many of your computers that have already loaded the pages without the pictures, they will “think” the pages still don’t have any pictures UNLESS you do two things to trick your computer into looking at these pages as fresh:

On your menu bar at the top of the page:

1.  Go to “View” and scroll down to “History” and click on “Clear History”

2. On some browsers it’s called “Reset” and on others it’s “Clear Cache”

Basically you have to clear out all the data that makes your computer think it’s already seen these pages, otherwise it will show them as you ORIGINALLY saw them and will not show the new pictures.

Hope this makes sense.

We do not intend to stay long in Savusavu. Our season is running short and we have places to go and people to see! But the lure of real Internet has Bob feverishly trying to get pictures uploaded to the blog. Of course the internets has other ideas. He has spent two days now working on sharing the “visual blog” with all of you. And today the Flash player decided it needed to be upgraded. So he did. And then proceeded to fight with it for four hours today. What a pain! But lucky for you, our loyal readers, Bob is a patient man, so stay tuned!

Meanwhile I am in re-provision mode. I have spent the last two days shopping to fill in the blanks on my spreadsheets. The alcohol blanks need both of our strong backs, the other blanks I try to handle myself. But as Bob picked me up at the dock yesterday with a full backpack and two bags I was not very graceful getting into the dinghy. In fact the women at the marina laundry let out quite a chuckle when I fell backwards, from the weight in my backpack, as I sat to get a better angle on my approach to the dinghy. But it has been a fruitful few days and looks like we are 90% re provisioned and ready to head back out for another month or so starting early next week.

Say a prayer that tomorrow’s photo upload goes well!

So, I’m laying in the cockpit around 2200 watching the stars, well – sleeping actually and I was startled awake by voices in the distance.  “mBomb, can you use some lobster?”  What the heck!!?  In a daze I stagger awake (Ann’s asleep in bed) and try to make sense of this.  Angels again??  In this case it’s some of the young guys from Nairai who have been out spearfishing on the outer reef.  Since it’s Saturday night and there’s no work allowed on Sunday they are pushing to the last minute to bring in fish for the Sunday feast.  And they had speared two lobsters and figured Charisma would like them.  I had given one of them, the Chief’s son, two lures and apparently this was repayment. 

 I like this economy.  You give a little, you get a little.  Nice.

So, I got a bucket to put the lobsters in, still in a bit of a sleepy haze and they dropped two nice lobsters in the bucket.  Then they shined the flashlight on all the fish in the boat and asked if I needed some fish too.  No thanks – (we have so much food at this point including almost a quarter of the pig Epele slaughtered yesterday).  I had a brief inspiration.  There were four young men in the boat.  They had been spear fishing for hours on the outer reef, an exhausting exercise.  I knew I had four cold beers in the fridge.  We don’t offer alcohol as a matter of policy, but in this case it seemed appropriate.  “Let me get you guys a cold beer,” I said in the darkness to the outline of the little open boat just a few feet off Charisma.  In the dark, I could hear the response that any young man anywhere in the world would make, “Yesssssss!!!”

They motored off very happy having paid back for the fishing lure and scoring a cold beer.  Now that I’m waking up I’m starting to wonder what the hell am I going to do with two lobsters at 2200 at night?  The only answer:  Cook them.  So, out comes my cookbook to again remind me, “Plunge an ice pick between the eyes to kill them instantly”.  (Cruising can be so cruel).  Then I cooked the lobsters, put them in the fridge and tonight threw them on the grill to finish them off and had a great dinner with mung beans, cabbage and apples with Asian peanut dressing. 

Today we went to church.  Very similar to Fulunga but smaller.  This village only has about 50 or so people including children.  But as with everywhere in the South Pacific the service was heartfelt and the singing was inspiring.  It was of course followed by a feast prepared by Esther.  I had to take a nap under the mango tree afterward to digest the wonderful food.  Ann pulled out yet another game to teach the children and leave them to play after we’re gone.  

Back to Charisma and time to prepare for early departure tomorrow.  Put away the outboard, store the dinghy and paddleboards… same routine.  As the sun began its descent Ann spots whales breaching just outside the reef.  And suddenly the sounds of a squealing pig floats across the water from the shore and we can see a large black pig being towed by its hind legs back to the village.  There was a parade of children happily following the big pig.  There is a fiber headed to Suva tomorrow for a funeral and my guess is that this pig will be a passenger.  And when we think the wild life excitement has settled down another fiber comes over to Charisma from around the point.  In this fiber is Epele driving with three of the young guys, each holding tightly to one hind leg of a small pig.  There is going to be quite the feast in Suva.

 It was a very enjoyable end to our stay at yet another lovely and special place here in Fiji.  We will never forget the friendships we have made here.

In other words, just another average Saturday in Nairai.

We went into the village this morning and Tuba (pronounced Tumba) the Chief’s son met us and helped pull the dinghy up above the high water mark. We were going to look for him anyway as we brought him a couple of fishing lures. He was very thankful for the lures and right there knocked a couple coconuts down so we would have some to drink. Next, down the beach came Epeli (who with his wife Esther are our friends here on the island) with his dog Tiger and a wild boar over his shoulders. Yes, it was dead. Tiger tracked and held it and Epeli caught it. I asked him how he dispatched it – he drowned it in the ocean. “Much cleaner. No blood”. After that he cut its throat and bled it before carrying it back. By the time we had changed from our beach/coral shoes to flip flops and went into the village, Epele had the boar hanging on a tree behind his cooking shed, had lit a fire under it and was burning the skin with a dry coconut palm frond that he caught on fire.

Burning the hair off the wild boar.

This was to burn the hair off and tighten the skin. After that he scraped the skin with a knife, then cut a chunk of dry coconut husk and used that under some running water to scrape the boar from head to tail. It was now deemed clean enough to gut and butcher. And the first cuts; the hoofs and lower legs, for Tiger to reward a job well done. (He not only caught this boar but trapped a pregnant female that Epeli hobbled to be retrieved by the minister on Monday! The minister had previously told Epele that he really wanted to raise some pigs.) Then he sent Ann and I into the cooking shed with Esther to have tea. I watched him start the process and can report it’s the same as gutting a deer.

Tiger keeps a watchful eye as Esther cooks the pig.

All this in just the first half hour of the day.

After tea we went outside to sit under their huge mango tree and rest.

Esther and Epeli's huge mango tree.

You need a lot of rest here to digest all the lovely food Esther makes. We’re having a small battle right now to see which of us can send more food back to the other. Last night she sent us back to Charisma with two fresh fish for our dinner and some home baked bread. We retaliated today with fresh sourdough muffins and jam and thought we were doing pretty good until she loaded us up with a stalk of bananas and a box of the biggest mangoes you have ever seen. AND she cooked one of the entire hams of the pork and a side of ribs and sent that as well. We’re losing big time here. Oh well…

In between all this we needed to get out of her way as she was preparing for Sunday feast, so we went out for a walk down the beach. We didn’t get a hundred yards before Ann “The Magnet” had a dozen kids following us, finding sea shells and finally singing songs while Ann recorded them with her camera and played them back to the shrieking delight of the children.

Surprise! We found kids on the beach (um, well, they found us actually).

All in all a very fun day. PS – dinner tonight is BBQ wild boar ribs with a side of mung bean salad with Asian peanut sauce. Oh how our diet adjusts to what we have!

As JHamm mentioned in response to last night’s blog, it is really something special to have friends on a small island half a world away that we met via a bottle with a note that we tossed overboard. Very small world. And today it got smaller. Our friend Epile led us to the next village, through the jungle, down to the beach, through the water to the school. We love visiting the schools on these islands but today’s had a special draw. And a Fulunga connection. The Head Master at the Nairai school is the brother of Koro, the women who taught me to weave in Fulunga! I knew it was Simi before the smiling man coming our way introduced himself. He looks, and laughs, just like his sister. And Simi was just as delightful. (Simi has not seen Koro in 14 years! But they stay in contact by phone. In fact Koro had called Simi to tell him that Charisma was in their way to Nairai — small work connections.)

The "path" to school.

Headmaster Simi and family.

And of course my day is complete when I can teach children to play Farkle. So surrounded by about thirty kids I explained the game and we played. Kids catch on fast and it is a great way to share our languages. And I always learn something new. And of course I taught them how to say nothing in Spanish…nada! They loved it.

Ann teaching the kids how to play Farkle.

As we hiked the thirty minutes back to Lawaki we were accompanied by Epile’s dog Tiger. Tiger is not a big dog. About the size of a Springer Spaniel. But he has a special talent. Tiger hunts and catches wild pig! Go Tiger! Epile said they may go pig hunting tomorrow morning but it is far too early for us to attend. But we promise to find out if Tiger was successful.

I spent the rest of the afternoon chatting with the chief’s daughter-in-law as she wove a beautiful mat. Laiti happily discussed the different weaving styles with me. She can identify the island origin of a woven mat in a craft mart just from the construction. Nice.

Chief's wife is also an impressive weaver.

And really nice was Bob taking a nap at Esther’s only to be awakened by Epile who decided it was time for a bowl of kava. So a gentle voice worked through Bob’s dream inviting him to kava. Island life…issa (which is like awww…in English.)

We’re anchored just a half mile inside the reef from the Koro Sea.

We left Savusavu around 1600 and anchored just in time for Sunset and a Charisma.

Dinner of eggplant and bok choy on rice (with a little Hoisin sauce and a dash of Siricha) and we’re set.

It’s now about 2020. It’s absolutely still, flat calm, with a lovely little sliver of a moon behind us peaking through the clouds.

Ann’s grabbing a nap as we’re going to leave this idyllic spot around 2200 and head 185 or so miles south to the island of Fulunga. She’s first up on watch. We’re planning an arrival for about 1000 Friday which coincides with high tide/slack water for going through the reef pass. The hitch right now is a forecast for clouds and some rain at that time. We’ll hope its not too bad. If we hadn’t been there before we would make other plans, but we have pretty solid GPS waypoints from last year, so as long as the conditions are not too crazy, we’ll go in. Otherwise – plan B. Don’t know what that is yet, but stay tuned.

OK, I see that as I’m writing this the clouds have parted, so I’m going to the foredeck for a little stargazing while we’re waiting to leave.

OK, Julie Ross says we need to get our act together and get back to posting, so that’s the way it’s gonna be.

Actually, we’ve been back three days already.  We’re almost caught up on sleep, but there’s a weather window right now, so completely caught up or not, we leave tonight.

We’ve been stocking up the last two days on veggies, fruit, some meat (very little freezer space, so either we catch fish or become vegetarian) and wine.  We’re going to leave Savusavu this afternoon and motor six miles to Cousteau Resort, drop the hook, have dinner and then actually head out around 10PM tonight.  The trip to Fulunga in the Southern Lau is 186 miles.  There’s no wind right now (that’s the weather window since usually the wind and waves are 20 knots, and 5-6 feet on the nose) so we’ll motor.  At 5 knots or so, we’re looking at about 36 hours.  We want to get to Fulunga around 10AM so we have good visibility over the reef although I haven’t checked the tides yet which also determine when you can enter the lagoon (because of the current, not the depth).

So, now we’re caught up.  Here’s a few pics to tide you all over.  We’ll be out for at least three weeks with only the shortwave radio to send in text posts – no pictures, so these are the last until we’re back in the land of broadband internet.   We will post text notes daily though as long as there’s something to say 😉

The White Stork noted a couple posts ago. It looks MUCH better in the daytime!

Our island hopper...

Flight planning easy here. You climb barely above the clouds, then GPS direct your destination.

A good example of the places we'll visit as seen from the air. Mostly reef (all the light blue and yellowish brown) with a tiny island (the green on lower left) and if we're lucky a little bay which is the slightly darker blue to the right of the island.

Here's what we want to avoid. This is just a random reef with no island. Depending on conditions and the direction you approach from you may or may not be able to see it from the deck of a boat.

Here's Savusavu from the air. Usually we go on a mooring in the river, but since we were gone for two weeks I opted for one of the slips on the middle right of the picture right opposite the building.

If you look closely at this picture you'll see the makings of a wild landing. Look at the direction of the plane, then out the front windshield at the runway heading about 40 degrees to our left and just below us. Yipes! Actually you come in over a tall ridge, so they have to do what's called a "slip" to lose altitude fast enough to make the runway. In a slip, you actually fly sideways while dropping kinda like a rock. Fun if you know what they are doing, but not so much if you don't.

One last one; here's Ann with a bunch of bok choy. How much? 0.50 cents. Bok choy and eggplant are the main ingredients of our diet here. Available everywhere in quantity. 😉