Fiji tidbits

Here’s some unrelated stuff about Fiji I haven’t yet written about:

Fiji got their independance from Brittain in 1970. Betty, HRH Queen Elizabeth II is still on the back of all demoninations of Fijian dollars.

Greeting us outside of Suva as we arrived last week was a pod of pygmy killer whales. Bigger than dolphins, they romped in the surf a ways off the boat. We hoped that they would come over and bow ride, but they didn’t.

Where’s the beef? It’s very scarce in the grocery stores I’ve been in all across the South Pacific. I was able to buy some frozen steaks at one place, but most didn’t have beef.

Fiji’s grocery stores were much of what we’ve seen elsewhere. There were tons of tins of corned beef, corned mutton, and mackerel. Where the stores differed was the selection of Indian food and spices. The produce in Fiji was also several grades better than elsewhere. The farmer’s market was immense. It had just about anything you could want and it all looked fresh.

Our last night in Suva, we went out to eat at Tikos. It’s a floating restaurant and very nice. We started out with Fiji’s version of marinated fish. It was walu in coconut milk with some sliced veggies. Very good. It was the first time, this dish that has been everywhere we’ve been, that the fish wasn’t tuna. Our waitress said, “oh no, we use tuna for sushi.” I had surf and turf which was good. Susan had a filet mignon and Steve some fresh whole fish. We splurged and had dessert too. One each. We were trying to use up our Fijian dollars; we were successful.

Leaving Viti Levu (Suva’’s island) took us more than all day. We saw some real wrecks on the wary out. It’s something about sailing that I never knew until I started doing it. You leave a place and still you go by it all day and into the night if it’s of any size. Viti Levu seems bigger than Oahu and we spent all day and then some watching it go by.

We’re now having our coconut milk run winds and waves. The winds are perfect and the waves have died down. This is the ride we had expected, but so far have rarely seen. The weather reports some shifting winds over the next day and then back to trade winds. So, our run to New Caledonia should be quick one. Famous last words.