Commodore
October 15, 2024

Wednesday 16 October – finally we visit Sawa-i-lau caves

Another cloudy day, we are heading south to get closer to Nadi, where we will depart from for NZ. The wind behaved for a change and we had a lovely sail down to the bottom of the Yasawa island to where the Sawa-i-lau caves are. We had tried to visit on our way up but the wind was from the wrong direction. There was one other boat in the stunning bay, next to a massive limestone mountain that contains the caves.

We arrived around lunchtime, Rowan had read that late afternoon was the best time to visit when the tourists from the resorts have departed. We hadn’t been anchored long when the Fiji Cruise liner came in and parked pretty close to us. While we waited for all those tourists to leave too, we headed into the village where we needed to do sevusevu. A very friendly young lad called Sam greeted us and took us to the chief, where we did a very relaxed sevusevu while standing! Rowan is almost sevusevu’d out! Sam was very engaging, he is studying in the capital to be a hydraulics engineer, but has had to temporarily quit as he has run out of money, and he can live for free back here at his family’s home on the island. Sam volunteered to be our guide to the cave, so we arranged to pick him up later when the tourists had gone. The cruise liner was incredibly quick at the caves and soon moved on, to have supper in the next village along.

We picked up Sam and had a wonderful visit to the caves. The setting is wonderful just off a small white beach surrounded by incredibly weathered limestone. There is a well made staircase up to the entrance to the cave and more steps down the other side to enter the water. The entrance fee is 50 Fijian dollars each, about £17 which is quite expensive but worth it to have good and easy access. It is an amazing cave, cathedral like, incredible water colour with just a shaft of light coming in from the side. Apparently the caves were carved out under water by the waves, and it is the shift of tectonic plates hundreds of years ago that have pushed the caves up to sea level. The three of us swam in and happily had the place to ourselves, where Sam told us many long stories. The cathedral like structure is just like the cave we saw in the Lau group, in fact this cave has Lau in its name, because they are the only two limestone islands in Fiji. There was a big rock I could sit on while Sam armed with his underwater torch took Rowan into the next door cave. As in the one in the Lau group it required going under water in a dark tunnel for 4 seconds. I certainly didn’t want to risk it with my ears, plus I ‘m not really brave enough! Rowan said it was very impressive, Sam told us there are a number of tunnels leading off that cave and people have died getting lost down the tunnels as there is no light and there is a bit of suction from the sea coming in and out!. I had my own little nightmare, sitting on the rock on my own, as I suddenly spotted this eel coming straight for me! It was way too snake like for comfort, I managed to get my feet right out the water and splashed water until it changed course away from me! I watched it like a hawk as it circled the cave. Sam had a good laugh about it when they came back, the eel is a resident of the cave and doesn’t bite! Ugh I’m not too keen on a friendly inquisitive eel!

The beach had tables where the locals sell their wares, I’m sure it is mainly Chinese tat so we were very pleased there was nobody about. It is definitely getting to the end of the season, this anchorage is usually quite busy, but only one other boat when we arrived and another one arrived after us.

With the cruise liner gone we had a wonderful quiet night, we saw the liner leave the bay later at night, all lit up like a Christmas tree.