Wednesday, September 16, 2009

DAY 1 -Wide Blue Ocean

Day One
12 noon
Position: Musket Cove, heading towards Wilkes Passage and open ocean Distance to New Caledonia 620 miles Distance to Brisbane 1450 miles Course 230 degrees
Well here we go. Just the Shimmi family and lots of wide blue ocean. Despite their being almost no wind, I hoisted the main and we are motor sailing out of Fijian waters. We have 1450 miles ahead of us to Brisbane. Fwwwwaaaaack, its a lot further than we thought. We will definitely stop in New Caledonia, despite the fact that I don't have a French visa. I will send Chantal in to deal with that one. Anyway, we are all well, fairly well rested and mentally prepared for the days and nights ahead.
Whilst at the Vuda Point Marina, we took Josh and Indie to the Lautoka Traveling Fair. I have never in my life seen such a motley collection of fairground rides. It was like something out of a Mad Max movie. The one merry go round featured a pod of fighter jets which could only have been fabricated by a deranged welder on acid. Pieces of jaggered metal stuck out at all angles, a rope with a 6 inch nail functions as a safety belt, Josh's jet had "OSAMA BIN LADEN" on the one side "THE TERRORIST" on the other, and when he reached the top of his trajectory I read on the bottom: "I KILL YOU". And ladies and gentleman, you may ask, what was the date of our little excursion? September 11, you got to laugh. There were no less than four very homemade ferris wheels, the highest of which comes within centimeters of tipping out its human contents every time it rotates through top dead center. All of these "appliances" were ingeniously powered by individual single cylinder Chinese diesel engines, linked by elaborate fanbelts to motorcar differentials and the like. I totally related to this lot, one of the rides in fact looked exactly like my old Indies Explorer anchor winch. Josh had an absolute blast, right down to the final "Just one more ride" tantrum. Indie stayed in the safety of his pram, making a light work of an orange sucker, whilst Chantal, with a huge smile on her face, got hold of a candy floss vendor. Remember the old Goodwood Show? Those were days.
Anyway, the wind is coming up, the sea is getting lumpy and I have a big Mahi-Mahi surfing on one of my handlines.
Till tomorrow
G