It was a nice calm morning for going into the marina and filling up with diesel. There were several boats booked in ahead of us, so it was 10am by the time we got to the fuel dock. There were guys at the fuel dock to help us tie off to the dock and pump fuel. Phillips seems to be the Manager and genuinely helped with a smile.
When we left the fuel dock we headed out of the bay and back through the pass we had come in. It was totally different to the conditions a week ago. Its gone from 10m waves to 1m. We headed North West along the edge of the reef. By late afternoon we reached a narrow pass through the Reef which lead us to what looked on the chart as a nice sheltered bay. It was sheltered but because of the reef we had to anchor faraway from the shore and we were quite exposedto the wind, anyway we were out of the swell and spent the night there.
The Saturday morning we continued north up the coast to the next sheltered bay. This one was surrounded by mangroves, which meant mosquitoes, so again we stayed away from the shore. As the next sheltered bay was another 40 nautical miles and it was already mid afternoon we anchored there and had a swim despite the choppy water. When we woke up at sunrise for our morning swim we were very disappointed by the dirty, cloudy water( the tide was going out and being surrounded by mangroves and reefs we assume that was all the seaweed and mud flowing out) so we hauled anchor thinking of going to the next bay up north of Vanua levu island.
After a second thought, checking the map and weather forecasts we decided to head to Yadua island which was our next stop plan before crossing to Yasawa group. It seems that going up north means more mangroves , dirty water and mosquitoes.
On the way we put out the fishing lure and caught a decent size Spanish Mackerel. B made a very nice Sunday fish lunch and dinner. We anchored in in the South Eastern bay and went ashore. Like a lot of beaches throughout the Pacific Islands this beach was covered in plastic bottles and other plastic rubbish that had been washed up in storms. By the time we got back to Imagine the wind was coming in the bay so we moved around the corner to Cokuvou Harbour. This bay is very sheltered.
