Our final passage of our amazing year

Once we cleared Savaii we had fairly big seas and good winds, so we made good time until we hit Fiji’s waters.  Then we had glassy seas a wide open passage, beautiful sunrises and breathtaking sunsets with Fiji’s gorgeous green hills welcoming us to it's  island.  After another 700 miles and 6 days at sea  and no fish, even though we sailed through a fish boil for an hour without even a nibble, we picked up a mooring ball outside our marina and opened a bottle of champagne to celebrate our passage.  We settled in for the nigh, we would check in with biosecurity, immigration, health and customs the next morning. 

Our first greeting was a huge Bula (means Hello) from the officials and after doing our paperwork and laying out about $200 we are now allowed to step off the boat.

Now that the year is really over we planned a menu to go with the bottle of Cliquet Veuve that Jennifer had given us to celebrate the year.  Champagne requires smoked salmon and fois grasse!  A lovely way to celebrate a year of travel!

We then spent a week getting quotes for work we needed to have done.  This meant staying in the water in an area with 2 meter tides and fixed docks.  At low tide we could get off Interlude easily, but at high tide we couldn’t climb up!  We had great neighbours, we used whoever’s boat was easiest to get off and on our boats. (Just imagine having your legs over your ears, BEFORE coffee.  Or walking a tightrope after a glass of wine.)   So we were happy when we went on the hard and into the cyclone hole!

Now the work begins to put Interlude to bed. Fiji is right in the middle of cyclone area.  So what does it mean putting the boat to bed,  well  first thing is they haul you and place you in a hole completely surrounded by tires,  then you start to take everything off the deck.  It is amazing how much stuff we have on the deck.  We dropped the rudder as we had a continuous leak in the stuffing box, (found that coral had made its way up the rudder post and had scored the post and making a rough edge which tears up our packing). Since we have our steering apart we decided to check our steering system and have now replaced the steering cable as we found a couple of burrs it. We fixed Trouble again and found a tiny pin hole it looked like a staple hole, okay leak found yeah.  Then as we put her back together we find she is still leaking.  So we patch the new spot and continue putting her back together.  Painted and put 5 coats of varnish on the V-berth cabin and bathroom.  Aft bathroom was painted and varnished.  5 coats of varnished was done on the engine mounts, cockpit table, flowerbox.  Karen  sewed, not exciting things, but strapping, re-stitching the sunscreens as after 4 years the sun had eaten the thread, new cover for the horseshoe ring, cover for the door…Cheryl scrapped and put 2 layers of primer and 3 layers of top paint on the fridge, now it has 3 months to dry.

With Interlude put to bed we got ready to head to New Zealand for our 3 month vacation.

Off to New Zealand!