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Will they confiscate our boat?
Fiji will forever be the place that shaped our future. It’s here, in the middle of the South Pacific Ocean, that our story began. Here amongst the rugged landscapes, palm trees and turquoise clear water, we hauled out our ex vendee globe open 60 to embark upon what was to become the biggest project of our lives. Our dream was to convert her into a fast family cruiser to take us half way around the world back to the Mediterranean and our homes. It was here in Fiji that during that time our son was born and where we adopted our furry son... And yet with no prior warning, our tropical paradise was abruptly turned into a thunderous nightmare as our boat and all that we had worked for was suddenly at risk of being taken from us...
Fiji is made up of more than 300 islands and home to close to 1 million people. Whilst the majority of people live on Fiji’s two main islands, as cruisers, we’re lucky enough to be able to visit the outer islands and before embarking on our final passage preparations, we took the time to pay one last visit to the village of yalobi, in the south of Waya in the Yasawa island group on the western side.
It’s customary in Fiji, when arriving at one of the outer islands, to present kava to the village chief. Kava is a root which is ground to powder, and mixed with water to make a midly narcotic drink, which is popular amongst south pacific islanders.
Island life is peaceful and most villages are pretty much self sufficient, growing and fishing almost everything they eat - only buying a few extras from the mainland such as sugar, soap and occasionally flour. Their diet is mostly from root vegetables, cassava and yams, coconuts, fruits and veggies plus the fish they catch and wild boars they hunt.
Most villages in the outer lying islands are strong christians with the church being a prominent part of their lives.
But the ocean was calling, so it was time for the final preparations to get ready to clear out of the country.
Preparing for ocean passages is always a big operation - but after our 2 year refit, we still had some last minute finishing touches to do to ensure a smooth ride ahead. These last few weeks leading up to the departure were pretty action packed - we replaced batteries and added a generator to the boat inventory to prevent further power issues, repainted our cockpit (the thin layer of nonskid we’d crammed into the end of the refit was already wearing thin). With a toddler and dog onboard, we divided the cockpit up into 2 sections to do this, cordoning off the freshly painted section with netting each time to try to reduce the likelihood of little feet or paws finding their way onto the fresh paint.
Plus safety check, rig check, filling the boat up with food fuel and water...
And finally we were ready, just one more sleep, and it would be time to clear out in the morning and get out of the marina with the high tide around 9am
… or so we thought...
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Caio! We are Timo and Jo, an Italian and English couple with countless ocean miles under our belts. We're refitting an ex Vendée Globe Open 60 race boat originally designed & built & raced by famous Hungarian sailor Nándor Fa. He competed in her in the 1992 Vendée Globe (round the world single handed race known as “the Everest of the seas”), finishing 5th, becoming the first non-frenchman to finish.
We are currently in Fiji giving this old gladiator a new lease on life, transforming her from an ex race boat to a performance family cruiser, which we'll need to make both dog and baby proof! We’re planning to set sail again in Oct 2022, so with limited time&money we have plenty of challenges ahead to turn our dreams into reality&get back on the water!
Subscribe to our channel&track our progress as we release videos about our journey as well as "how to" videos about anything boat related.
Never stop to dream, never stop to sail!
You can find out more about the boat, us and our refit plans on our website www.sailingnv.com or follow us on
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#sailingnv #boatrefit #sailing #boatlife #Open60 #raceboat #cruising #sailingvlog #boatwork #lifeinfiji #sailingfamily #boatrepair
14 июл 2023
