We have finally set off to Fiji. We had heard there was a weather system that might be overly challenging so we decided to stay put a few days in Tonga. Now we have set off West to Fiji leaving our new friends on the islands, Windswept , and the World ARC boats behind us. Some of them will be coming West by next week. We will be carefully making our way past the reefs that are between us and Fiji. There are more between Fiji and Australia that we will be keeping our eyes on too.
We have enjoyed our visit to Tonga and the surrounding islands. All these islands are similar but each has its own character. Some are more modern and others are like taking a step back in time. We have not seen so many caves til these islands. The snorkeling was good yesterday in the "Japanese garden". Within the healthy reef there were many fish and different kinds of starfish. Bill claims to have spotted a barracuda but he is the only one who saw it. I saw many varieties of clownfish. The colors of all the fish were spectacular.
We bid adue to Marlene and Jack of Windswept. They gave us some perspective on Australia and gave us some lessons in the correct pronunciation of many words we thought we knew how to say. It is a whole new language. Our son Eric is keeping track of some of our new international language. He's making sure we don't forget where we came from.
As we set off on our next leg we send our best wishes to those of you at home and around the world.
Rosemary, Bill and Matt on Crazy Horse