Musket Cove

We left Vuda Point around lunchtime after much faffing around waiting for the fuel dock, waiting for the bill and waiting for the escort boat to help us out the berth. We decided to head for a small group of islands in the Mamanucas, Treasure Island and Beachcomber there is a couple of dives around here we were interested in having a look at, one of which is an old B26 Bomber plane. The passages through the reef looked a little dodgy and while we had the google maps on to show the aerial imagery the sun in our eyes made it very hard to spot anything. as we looked over into the area between the islands it looked rolly and not like a particularly fabulous anchorage. With only another hour to Musket Cove and the idea of a calm anchorage unlike the Yasawas we put the sails up and headed on. There was a light breeze so we had a very leisurely sail to Musket Cove.

We were greeted by a vast anchorage and moorings area filled with boats, we picked a spot a little further out from the Musket Cove Yacht Club moorings next to a massive super yacht (144ft yacht called Encore) we looked mini next to them. We joked that we should pop over in our little dinghy and invite them for a sundowner in the hopes they would invite us over to their boat!

The following day we headed out for the reef for a snorkel, unfortunately there wasn’t too much to see. We headed out a little further in the hopes that there maybe more colour and life, the outer area was marginally better. We spent a bit of time practicing our free diving, Matt and I are definitely getting better, I think we both managed to make it to about 7 or 8 metres this time! Owen and I dropped Matt & Marjo back at the boat and went for one last try and finding a nice snorkel spot, after it was apparent the snorkelling around here wasn’t going to improve we dinghied over to say hello to Ilya and Stefan on Sabir. We organised to head out to Cloud 9, a floating restaurant about an hour away from the anchorage, tomorrow with them.

Around lunchtime the following day Sabir came alongside us we dinghied over tied up and joined them to sail out to Cloud 9. Ilya and Stefan had met some people in the bar the night before and asked them to join us at the restaurant. We made introductions to Brian, a farmer from Canterbury, Rod a landscape architect and his wife from Sydney. We hoisted the sails up and had a very enjoyable sail out through the reefs to Cloud 9. Paul & Andy with their son Ben and wife Zoe followed us on Talulah Ruby who arrived that morning, the first time we have seen them since Savusavu. As we approached Cloud 9 the water turned an amazing shade of aqua and there was this little floating building filled with people. We dropped the anchor and another boat came over to let us know that Cloud 9 was closed for the day for a private function! How disappointing!! I suppose we probably should have called ahead. We decided since we had anchored we would have a beer and hang out for a bit. Owen, Matt, Ilya and I jumped in for a quick swim. After our swim and beer we pulled the anchor and sailed downwind back to the anchorage.

Stefan pulled Sabir in beside Dulcinea, we jumped into he dinghy and the outboard wouldn’t start. Joy! This outboard has been an ongoing issue this entire trip. There was such a lot wind that rowing against the wind and waves from Sabir would have been difficult. Stefan shouted down to us that he would tow us so the wind and waves would take us to Dulcinea. He drove forward and around our bow, Ilya then dropped the line holding us to Sabir and Marjo and Matt paddled to get us back. The group on Sabir all stood there laughing at us and taking photos of us in our plight. I think on the hour sail out to Cloud 9 the motor must have got a bit wet and decided that we weren’t treating it with the dignity it deserved so it quit on us.

We decided that we should move the boat closer into the other boats and stop pretending to be a super yacht so we picked up the anchor and dropped a little outside the field of moorings. after dropping anchor again Owen managed to get the outboard started again and just to make sure it wasn’t faking it Owen and I took it for a little ride around the boats and teed up sundowners on shore with Sabir and Talulah Ruby.

That evening we headed ashore to the bar at Musket Cove resort and met up with everyone for a wine and a beer. Next thing a familiar face came over to me and said “oh hey, we partied together in Tonga on the 4th of July!” We made re-introductions to Ian from Tevake and met Blanca and Drew. We ended up have dinner at the restaurant at Musket Cove with them, then being invited back to Tevake for a coffee. When we got onboard the boat, Blanca quickly made our coffees, which turned out an awful lot like gin and tonic. We had a fun evening on board chatting about all sorts of topics with the 3 of them. We knew it was time to try and make a getaway though when Marjo decided to get into the liquor cabinet and together with Blanca try and make shots! Hmmm this can’t end well! After downing our shots, which admittedly were delicious we all said our goodbyes and thanks and carefully climbed in our dinghy to head back to Dulcinea. We soon realised that between the 4 of us, not a single one of us had remembered to put the anchor light on! Luckily even though the anchorage was very busy we managed to navigate the boats and find Dulcinea fairly easily.

The following morning was a little slow, Matt and Marjo was feeling the effects of their “coffees”. I think Owen and I made the right choice to nurse our second drink and not have the 3rd round! Yay. After proper coffees and breakfast we headed over to shore and had a walk and explored the area. Its quite cool to have a good look around the resorts and see how everyone else holidays. We checked out Musket Cove Resort and then walked around to Plantation Island which is more of a kid friendly resort. Both seemed like pretty cool resorts for holidays, although we all decided we were happy over on Dulcinea instead of in the craziness of the resorts. Back over at Musket Cove we decided to join the Musket Cove Yacht Club which gave you use of the pool and showers etc (well Owen gets use of it all, but we decided he was allowed guests!)

We had decided to use the BBQs onshore at the bar for dinner that night so we headed back to the boat to prepare some food and get out togs and shower things. The pool at Musket Cove was calling us so we grabbed our stuff and went for a swim, and much to all of our surprise the pool was a salt water pool, I’m not sure why but it disappointed all of us, we cooled off and had a quick swim then hit the showers for a proper shower. We fired up the BBQ at the bar and cooked up our fish and eggplant (I think it going to be a long time until I want to eat these again, its the only vegetable that seems to last out here!) After our delicious dinner we had a quick chat with Stefan, Ilya, Paul and Andy and they told us where to find the good snorkelling around here.

We decided it was time to find ourselves a good snorkelling spot, so armed with the directions from last night we piled into our dinghy and headed over the reef at high tide. We saw multiple boats of tourists all heading that way too so we excitably thought we were onto something. As we got through the reef we realised all the tourist filled longboat were heading way round the tip of the island, somewhere we would not be attempting in our ever so reliable dinghy that the motor stops at random, has slow leaks in the bottom allowing the water to slowly come in and slow leaks in the pontoon (maybe time to look at a new one). We decided to check out the edge of the reef, maybe there would be a good wall. Owen jumped in to check it out before we all piled in behind him, about 10 seconds later he was back in the boat claiming it wasn’t very good, lots of rock and no fish. We headed around the edge and checked out a couple more spots, still not finding anything much we jumped into the water and went for a swim regardless. Owen, Matt and I decided to practice our free diving instead. Matt has been religiously trying to complete breath training to teach himself to hold his breath for longer to help with free diving. I have been getting better at being able to dive, when I started I just flopped around on the surface like a broken duck, but I can now get to around 7-8m without too much difficulty. Unfortunately Matt has had issues with his ears being able to equalise and pushed it a little too much and popped his eardrums! So with a dizzy Matt we piled back into the dinghy and headed back for Dulcinea. Matt re-assured us he was ok and we set off, unfortunately the wind had picked up and we got absolutely swamped on the way back to the boat. I was trying to bail us out as we motored but it was coming in faster than I could bail. I ended up giving up and we spent the rest of the trip in hysterics getting swamped by wave after wave!

Our plan was always to head to Musket Cove for the regatta then wait for a weather window home to NZ. But chatting one evening we decided actually we had all had enough of Fiji and maybe we should look for a weather window to New Caledonia! We decided to forgo the Regatta and start looking for weather to New Cal. I decided to email Al and Shirl on Bravado to see when they were planning to head over and see if I could get a little weather advice. Much to my surprise the email I got in response was “shush, look behind you” I ran outside and anchored behind us was Bravado. Turns out they checked out to head to New Cal, but decided the weather wasn’t fab so pulled into the anchorage to wait it out. We organised to have a wee pot luck BBQ on shore with them that night. They advised us to wait a couple days for the weather system to pass through before we headed out, they planned to wait a little longer until it was totally calm to go. But as Bravado needs the tiniest breath of wind to move and Dulcinea needs 15-20kn to move her butt we were happy with our plans to head off earlier than them.

With our plans decided and all 4 of us excited about croissants, cheese and New Caledonia we headed for Lautoka to stock up for passage and check out.