Fixing Things in Paradise - Really

The morning of our little anchor drama that night, we had a problem with our outboard. We have a Tohatsu four-stroke 9.8HP motor, which we bought new before we left the US. It has been great - starts easy, uses little gas, does not smoke like a two-stroke and has been very reliable. It is heavier than the same power two-stroke but I don't have to mix oil with the gas either.

It started acting up in Lautoka after I had put in gas from one of the other tanks we carry. It was miss and be hard to start, then it would run but only at high RPM's. We went out with WS on a dinghy exploration at Navadra to an outlying island and it quit and refused to run even though it would sorta start. They towed us back (oh the shame).

Rather than go in with the group to do sevusevu with the local village representative I stayed back to try to fix it. I suspected a fuel problem so started checking out the fuel lines and changed the one from the tank to the motor. Still no joy. I checked the filter in the motor - OK. Worked on it for several hours - still no joy. Bagged it for dinner and then we had to reanchor. It was no fun to try and work on a dinghy in the water with high winds and swells. The dinghy would buck like a wild horse, with me hanging on and trying not to drop tools and parts in to the deep water. No fun.

The next morning we decided to get out of Dodge and go to someplace more protected. We pulled the non-working motor up on to the rail and then the dink. Not easy in high winds but we are used to that. We had a terrible trip from our wild anchorage to a wilder sea to the next island which had a protected bay. Getting there in the face of high winds directly on the nose with big seas took some doing but finally we made it, although some times we were down to less than 1 knot with max revs on the engine. It was a short trip though and well worth it as the large magnificent bay we entered was as pretty and dramatic as any we had seen in the Marquesas last year. The 1000ft lava peaks jutted up to the sky in several directions surrounded by ripples and folds of grass covered mounds. Truly the work of the god of volcanos in eons past.

There is more to the story in Yolabi Bay in the next installment, but in the mean time we had to rely on White Swan to take us in for our second sevusevu ceremony since arriving in Fiji. This was a very relaxed affair with one village elder and some older women who were working and lounging under a tin roof area with a concrete floor covered by hand-woven mats. The village chief had died last week of illness and old age and a new chief had not been selected yet. The village was tidy in a way but not as tidy as the one we visited on Gau Island. This was more traditional though with many thatched roof bures (huts/houses) but as in any place in Fiji you are roundly greeted by bula and bula bula (hello) and sincere warm smiles and direct eye contact. The Fijians are simply the friendliest and warmest group of people that we have ever encountered, including the dear ol' USA.

When we got back to the boats for lunch I had to start working on the stubborn outboard motor. We put the dink in the water with the motor hoping it would work but no..... I took the carburetor off three times in one day and finally found a blockage in the really tiny low speed jet that was hard to get out. I had to use a jeweler's loupe to see the block and then use a rusty safety pin to unplug it. Not your best tool for the job but it worked. Lo and Behold! it started right away and ran as good as ever. I have rarely been that happy about a successful repair. The dink is your car, your taxi, your ride. Without the dink you can't get off the boat and go anywhere. You can't bum rides from your friends all the time. I immediately drove over to White Swan in the rapidly fading light to show off and they whooped and hollered as loud as I did.

Staying behind in the afternoon to fix the motor, I did what I had to do. WS and Cindy went back to the village and to the local school to visit and play a Sudoku game made with extra large numbers and paper so it could be played on the ground with a group of kids. They came back elated and laughing from the experience with these warm-hearted, laughing kids of all ages. The school is actually a boarding school and takes kids from neighboring villages and islands. They go home on weekends and sleep in dorms and eat in the cafeteria at the school during the week. They wear uniforms like all kids here do. The girls have such short hair it is often hard to tell them apart from the boys. They have Grades 1 and up here but not the older kids of high school age. I think they all go up to age 15 but not totally sure about that. More in the next installment. Meanwhile we have a functioning dink again and both slept really well that night.

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