MYSTIC MOUNTAIN MAMA I don’t know what that falling galaxy on the horizon was. It stayed with me all night and disappeared at dawn. Perhaps it was never there, perhaps it is always there deep inside my lunar channel. I arrive to Matuku at sunup. The island is a green Mystic Mountain Mama, and she …
OGEA & THE SAIL TO MATUKU
OGEA Everyday is an adventure when you float in a desolate place. Ogea feels like a slow Saturday on a summer’s day. Sleepy, spacious, stunning. My mind is totally lost in the azure, wandering and wondering. It’s like I’ve come out of the blue and into the great wide open. How can I describe it …
THE PIED PIPER
We are leaving Fulaga for it’s sister island, Ogea. It’s six nautical miles to the southeast, beyond that you fall off the waters edge and into Tonga. We haven’t seen my friends in two days. The ferry from Suva came with dozens of distant relatives and everybody is fishing frantically to feed the extra mouths. …
THE CHIEF, THE PSYCHIC TV & THE PICNIC
The CHIEF Fulaga is full of mystical enchantment. The people, the holy blue of the lagoon, the waves smashing onto the outer reef, the secrets, the low tide beaches, the myriad of uninhabitable palm tree-topped islands, the purity of the air, the siren songs, the blue-feathered birds, the hibiscus blooms, the fish, the butterflies… On …
THE PASSAGE TO FULAGA
DAY 1 I wake up like a live wire. I’ve been waiting all week for the wind to turn north of east and today it is turning. I’m going to ride it back out to Fulaga in the south eastern most part of the Lau group- where the women are wild and the limestone rocks …
PIECE BY PIECE, LAYER BY LAYER
It was two weeks ago that I ripped my mainsail and so much has happened in my life since that I must cut it into small slices and feed it to you in vignettes, piece by piece, layer by layer. TWIN PISTON I hop a twin piston from Savusavu to Nadi. Me and Diarm and …
SEA CHANGE
With the mainsail busted and the air sucked dry of wind, the rest of our journey across the Bligh is a limp on an iron leg. We putter up to the uninhabited island of Yadua long after sunset. We don’t have any tracks for the pass, or cell service, and my calls on the VHF …
BLEW OUT MY MAINSAIL IN A BLOW
Oh honey, have I got a story for you, it starts like this….. It’s 4 P.M. and I’m on an aluminum dinghy in the Blue Lagoon. I’m thinking about how Fiji is a real easy place to never leave, all the islands, all the wind, all the magic. I spent the morning staring at baby …
SAILING TO THE BLUE LAGOON
I’m in a green and purple hammock that’s strung up in the cockpit between the stern pulpit and the boom gallows. The sea is rocking me like a swing, back and forth, high and low, and it’s way more alive and effortless than anything that hangs from a tree. I’m on my way to the …
SPLIT INTO SKY
The Navandra anchorage is so rock and roll that it’ll make you throw up your Fruit Loops. Everybody’s leaving. The pirates and their Jolly Rogers are long gone on the horizon and I’m getting towed back to civilization by Zephyr. That catamaran is always doing something real nice for me. They gave me the power …