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 Keeping Up with  I am back in scenic Boston and THE HAWKE OF TUONELA is in the slightly more scenic Savusavu, Fiji. America seems odder and more solipsistic than ever. Last night the evening television network news could find nothing in the world more important to report than an item about Elvis Presley's Army record. Savusavu is the eastern and northern most of Fiji's four ports of entry. It is on the south coast of the second biggest island, Vanua Levu, and is an extremely nice little place. Well protected from almost all wind with moorings on what is called a creek, but is really a 200 yard wide stretch of water between the mainland and a small island. Not yet too touristy and with what seem to be genuinely friendly people. I reached Savusavu from Tonga in an easy four day passage, spent mostly under cruising spinnaker, from Neiafu, Tonga. This was my first all trade wind passage in tens of thousands of miles and 15 years. Rather pleasant. I didn't ever close the deck hatch over the main cabin. I had not been to Neiafu in the northern, Vavau Group of the Tongan Islands for a long time. Not since 1985. Of course there have been changes, but it is still a nice place and there is still not much to buy there. I expected this and was well provisioned from New Zealand. There are more bareboats now in the charter fleets, and there are moorings to rent. This last is desirable because most of the anchorage is 90‚ deep. Because I was there early in the sailing season, Neiafu was not crowded. Only a handful of other cruising boats were around, all of which had come up from New Zealand as I had. I have been told that later in the year when the wave of boats migrating from North America to New Zealand and Australia between cyclone seasons arrives, there will be more than 100 boats in the harbor. I think the place might be a tad less enjoyable then. Backtracking still further, I had a good nine day passage from New Zealand to Tonga. I left my mooring at Opua in the Bay of Islands on the last day of a gale. I had intended to leave a day earlier, but the wind then was too strong for me to row ashore to clear with the officials. Both days and for several more to come, the wind was from the south, so was fair for me heading north to the tropics. Being only around 35 knots, it just gave me good sailing and a fast, if bumpy offing from land. I had gale force wind again for 36 hours about half way to Tonga, but again it was from astern and just gave us good sailing once I reduced sail to a minimum. One mid-morning about 300 miles north of New Zealand I saw a half dozen or so humpback whales browsing quietly on the surface of the then relatively smooth ocean. They, too, were probably making their way to Tonga, whose waters they frequent in July and August. And the last day at sea I sailed over the spot where the mutiny took place on HMS BOUNTY, within sight of the Tongan islands of Kao and Tofua. I'll return to the boat in early September, cruise in Fiji for a month or so, and then sail back down to New Zealand.
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