Viti Levu times

Bula everyone! Once again the time has snuck by us and it's almost been a month since last updating this thing. We left Savusavu shortly after our last entry
and made an overnight passage down to Fiji's largest island of Viti Levu. It is a HUGE city in respect to anything we've seen since leaving Hawaii so walking
along the crowded and conjested streets after not sleeping at all the night before was a little intense for us upon arrival for check in. Despite dodging crazy buses and wheel barrel men flying down the
side walks, it was fun to be in such a booming place again. Our friends off of Madeline also treated us to an Indian cuisuine in town so we were happy travelers.
Once we loaded up the boat with fresh veggies and fruits from the incredible produce market there in town(five pineapples for $2.50 American), we moved Mai Miti
about a mile out of the diesel slicked Suva harbor to a clean water anchorage called Bay of Islands before continuing our way west around Viti Levu to Pacific
harbor.

We had our eyes set on Pacific Harbor to hunt for Rob, the owner of the Nai'a charter boat whose crew we had met in Tonga. We had been in
contact via email for the last couple of months so we were eager to meet the man behind the screen.
Before actually reaching Pacific Harbor we made an overnight stay outside a little town where our highlight was some kid kayakers. Fascinated with seeing a boat,
they circled around us singing and laughing for what seemed like hours. Then with some courage they'd come to the boat and ask James a bunch of questions
before laughing and paddling away again. They wanted us to visit their homes the next day but with Mai Miti bucking like a bronco in the unprotected anchorage
we left the next morning.
With a name like Pacific Harbor you'd
imagine it had just that, a harbor. What we found was quite different. The harbor was nothing more than a very narrow and shallow mouth of a river that the
dive and paanga boats went in and out of. Luckily we did see a couple of run down sail boats side tied to the mangrooves up the river, so we went in to do
the same. However we ended up side tieing to a dive/delivery boat that the Fijian divers on the shore directed us to. After walking around the very
fancy and nice resort right at the end of the river mouth, we were then invited to hang out with the same Fijian divers that night on the boat we were next
to. They all came aboard Mai Miti as well to check out "the little boat" and once inside they must have decided that she needed more color, so they
decorated the entire boat with flower and butterfly stickers! After that night, we were all officially brothers and sisters according to them! Seems like
everybody is related in Fiji!
We did finally meet up with Rob who gave us some good local information. He was a very busy man so we didn't get much time, but it was still nice to
meet him in person and thank him for the wonderful time his crew showed us in Tonga. with that mission accomplished, we stocked the boat with some goods and
left the following day for the outer islands of Fiji, Mbennga and Kandavu. I should mention that before leaving we almost ended up with a furry, slobering,
third member aboard Mai Miti. A third member who only had three legs who we named tripod II(tripod I is my dog Sandy at home in Colorado). This dog took
a real liking to James and I and wouldn't stop following us everywhere we went. She even followed us into grocery stores and the fancy resorts. The workers would
give us the stink eye thinking it was our dog (which was hard to convince them otherwise with the way the dog followed right by our side:-). We felt horrible
leaving her at the dock sitting there staring at us, but we had no choice and we sailed on. We wish you the best Tripod II.