Dear F&F, September 18th – 20th, 2011
We headed up the coast to Yasawa Island\’s Narara Beach. The anchorage was perfect. The water a calm cobalt blue to turquoise in color. We dove \”Paradise Point\” and the reef off Vawa Island. Paradise Point is also a surf spot, but was calm today and offered a great dive in both hard and soft corals.
New friend Gayle Van Leer even emailed me a Google Earth map shot of exactly where we were anchored and the dive spots. Thank you Gayle!
The beach here was gorgeous too and Joe said \”you ain\’t seen nothin\’ yet\”! The next day we traveled the 8 miles up to the most northerly of the main Yasawa group; Yasawairara Island. Yasawa in Fijian means, \”The Islands Over there\”. Yasawairara basically means, \”The end of the islands over there\”.
So we again had a beautiful anchorage and went ashore to do \”sevusevu\”. After which we got a lesson from Joe in all things coconut (photos not yet posted).
We had a lovely walk on \”8 month beach\” and saw a beautiful group of young kids coming from school. (photos soon!)
8 month beach is so called because of the sands. They are so fine (I kept some!), that the locals say if you get it in your hair (not my problem!…ha), it takes 8 months to get it all out. This was indeed the finest sand I\’ve ever felt. Silk comes to mind!
From here, we upped anchor and headed to Champaign Beach….. It was here the beach scenes from the movie \”Contact\” with Jody Foster were filmed. A stunning 1/2 mile of sand, one private home back in the trees and the anchorage all to ourselves. We did the view hike and walked the beach. It was quite melancholic for me as I\’m sure you can understand. This entire area was a \”Cindy experience\”. I needed some alone time, hiked up to the top of the hill and took some photos. (Posting soon!) The sands here were nearly as magical as those at 8 month beach. The experience of the water, the anchorage, the isolation and the beauty were priceless….
Tomorrow, we\’d be off back to Nanuya-Sewa for a last attempt at some dives and farewell to Joe before heading on to Vanuatu.
See Photo Gallery: 09-Western Fiji & Yasawa Group
Scott with Anja and Joe