Live from Vanuatu By MichaelPORT VILA, VANUATU

Windy today in overcast Port Vila, Vanuatu.

We’ve been busy and non-communicative.

To catch folks up:

I left Arizona for Fiji the beginning of June, alone. The plan (and all went according to plan) was for me to fly solo and move the boat to the yard in Vuda Point, have the old girl hauled, and do all the needed grunt work before Windy and the girls (having wrapped up Arizona life for the season and having visited old and new relatives in California) flew in 3 weeks later to board a boat that was more or less (less) ready to sail west.

Then we sailed west.

We just arrived in Vanuatu.

I’ll let the pictures tell the whole story.

Jumping back to last December, here are the girls in Musket Cove, Fiji,
getting a lesson from the local volunteer beekeeper.

Days later, via Fiji Airways, we were back in lovely Ajo, Arizona,
and reunited with our white truck.

We let the javalinas know we were back and that they needed to
find another place to hang.

Then we noticed they were tearing down the problem house two
doors down...

And that we had more to do on the white house we were camping in
than we thought.

And that the sweet little raspberry house between the white house and
the problem house was for sale and move-in ready, so we bought it.

So while Windy worked on the raspberry house...

And I dove deep on the white house...

And Eleanor completed middle school...

And Frances fostered dogs....

We enjoyed our lives in Ajo. Here we are one of our last nights before
returning to Fiji, watching Coco at the outdoor community pool.

Before I knew it, I was back in Fiji, working on Del Viento and
missing my family. That's when Lin Pardey stopped by
to lend a hand.

Then my jet-lagged ladies joined me in Fiji.

And helped me get the boat finished. Here Frances
is up the mast running the lazy jack lines through the
cheek blocks.

I should have written a whole post about this photo. This is Miriam from Enough
and Aimee and Phil from Terrapin, all dear cruising friends. Not pictured is Jeff
from Enough and all the crew aboard the other boats who made our last bit of time in
Fiji so memorable: Me Too (plastic-free Saweni Beach!), Cape D (Fatty Boom-Boom!), and
Bear (Frances is back in top form, thank you Mamma Bear). Just appreciate this
setting, with that evening sky, a view of our boats, a place to cook,
no clean up, and a bar at the ready. Many great evenings spent here over two
seasons with a gaggle of great kids and parents.

Last water top-off after checking out of Fiji.

And our last anchorage in Momi Bay, the morning we set out for Vanuatu.
Couldn't this be California?