Day 29, Year 2: Internet Connect
Date: Wednesday, May 23, 2007
Weather Today: Another Beautiful Sunny Day
Location: Suva, Fiji
After yesterday’s excursion, we took it slow today. We got up early and I washed towels that I had left soaking all day yesterday while Mark made runs to the Yacht Club to get water. Slowly we are refilling the port tank that we have been using since we left New Zealand. We filled it using the watermaker while on passage and are now filling it with water from the dock. The water in the anchorage is totally unfit for watermaking as there is often a sheen of oil floating atop. Oil and watermakers don’t mix, so the watermaker was pickled when we arrived and will not be used again until we get to the out islands. Filling the tank using jerry cans takes a few trips, ten gallons a trip, but we should fill the port tank tomorrow. As soon as it is filled, we will switch to using the starboard tank. We don’t like to let water sit in a tank more than a month without being used, so the New Zealand water from the starboard tank is ready for consumption.
I continued doing laundry and working on naming photos for the website while Mark worked on our Fiji sail plan. We are struggling with this one, but hopefully by sometime tomorrow morning we will have a plan. We went into town around noon and spent the entire afternoon in the “Connect” Internet Cafe. It only costs $3 Fiji per hour, so we had a $15 afternoon. They are getting to know us well at the Connect Internet Cafe. We are their best customers these days, so much so that the young man that works there is going to talk to his boss tomorrow about getting a hot spot at the Yacht Club. Mark worked online getting new credit cards authorized using Skype, searching our Health Trust account to see if all of our medical bills for check-ups while we were home have finally been paid, and posting pictures to the website. This is what took the time. While he did this, I worked on naming more photo albums.
Once my computer battery ran down, I left Mark working and did a little shopping. Mark is able to plug in his computer using a New Zealand power adapter that Helaine and Alan left for us. Thanks to the Kanegsbergs! Now back to the shopping . . . I’m trying to find inexpensive but useful items to take to children on the islands we will be visiting, but I’m having a hard time finding things. I did find some $2 backpacks that actually looked very nice and some crayons for $ .90. These prices are Fiji money, so the cost US is about two-thirds of what I list here. Soccer balls are what we hear they would really like, but they cost $10. Still that might be the best gift as every child wouldn’t need his own soccer ball. I could just buy one for a group of children. Yoyo’s would make good individual gifts, but I haven’t seen any of those. I’ll continue my search tomorrow. While I was shopping, Mark continued uploading pictures. He worked until dark and is still not finished uploading all of the photo albums. This job should be done by tomorrow evening which means all of our pictures from New Zealand, from the passage, and from our time here in Fiji will be on the website. I’ll give the full report on that in tomorrow’s log. Right now it is back to trip planning. Last year, I did most of the trip planning and then gave Mark the itinerary and he filled in the routes and passages. Cruising Fiji is very different. There are so many islands and the reefs make passages sometimes very convuluted. We are struggling with a way of working together on this. I think we are almost there, so I’ll also give a full report on that tomorrow as well.
