On the afternoon of Monday, December 22nd my bus arrived in Pacific Harbour. It was only four dollars for the hour and a half bus ride and there was a decent amount of room on the bus as far as Fijian public transport goes. The bus dropped me off in what looked like the middle of nowhere but after a half hour walk down the road with my pack I eventually found Uprising Resort where I would be staying for the next week or so. It was only $30 a night and was one of the nicest places I have stayed while traveling. It was located right on the beach and had a free breakfast every morning, $2.50 pints of Fiji Gold Draft at happy hour, extremely friendly staff, and cheap Hawaiian pizzas. I was in heaven.
My first night there was one of the best. I was hanging out at the bar with this African guy from Zambia when I noticed the abundance of females in the bar. I decided to go over to one of the tables and have a chat. I ended up meeting a great group of girls who informed me that it was actually ladies night, which would explain the abundance of females. I guess I missed the signs everywhere including the one at the door. I told these girls that I had no plans for Christmas and they were nice enough to invite me over to their place for Christmas dinner. I said I would be in for sure but didn’t really take it seriously at the time because of the state everybody was in. Sure enough though on Christmas morning I was hanging out with some Irish friends that I met at the resort when Alfie, the manager at Uprising, came up and informed me that the girls had called and I was to be at their place for three o’clock that afternoon. They ended up picking me up and brought me over to their parent’s place, which was a beautiful home right on the river. I met the whole gang and one of the girls showed me their dad’s giant collection of palms. They had a four-acre property with a botanical garden on it containing one of the largest collections of palms in the pacific. Apparently they had well over 400 species of palms on the property. It was awesome. The meal was amazing too. They had cooked three stuffed chickens, a big ham, mashed potatoes, and all kinds of other things were going around as well. It was a great time and I got to meet a lot of the locals that night too. There must have been about twenty people there at one point. It was one of the highlights of my Fiji experience.
I also got to know one of their friends, Talei, quite well. A few of us went over to her place for dinner one night and I helped her make us all some classic spaghetti. The next day the same crew all took a trip to one of the villages nearby where we got to go out in a boat with the chief of the village and go for a swim on a sandbar in the middle of the ocean. We stayed out there for hours playing around and talking. We even brought a lunch. Then after we went back to the village to drink some karva that we had brought from the store in town. We also brought some sweets for the children. We spent the rest of the afternoon hanging out on the porch with the chief and a bunch of the other villagers drinking karva. It was a beauty of a day and another one of my most memorable days in Fiji.
Pacific Harbour was by far my favorite place that I stayed in Fiji. Mainly because of the way the locals embraced me and brought me into their circle of friends right away. It was really nice to know and be able to hang out with the locals like that. It really made Pacific Harbour feel like home for me. I hope to go back there as soon as possible and maybe even buy a piece of land there someday if I can find the spare cash haha. I have to go back either way to do my shark dive and experience one of the great rafting trips through the forest. On Monday, December 29th I headed back to Nadi on the bus to stay one more night at Nadi Bay Backpackers before heading down to Sydney to bring in the New Year.
Wednesday, February 4, 2009
A Taste of Fijian Hospitality
Kam lived in a suburb of Suva called Sambula (actually pronounced Samambula) and on the morning of Saturday, December 20th I took a fifteen-minute taxi ride to meet him at the corner store near his place. When the taxi pulled up Kam was waiting there with his little nephew who was about 8 or 9 years old I would say. Kam’s home was a cozy one with 2 bedrooms, a bathroom, and a kitchen/living area. It was a pretty nice place and had it electricity and potable water as well, which was a real bonus. He lived there with his girlfriend, sister, and nephew. His girlfriend’s brother was also there for the weekend. I’m guessing he was roughly around 14 years old or so. They were all very good people.
I took a bus into town a little later on that day to go on the Internet and browse around a few of the shops. The bus only cost seventy cents so it was dirt-cheap and a good way to get a glimpse of the real Fijian lifestyle. The pace the Fijians moved at was priceless. It is just so hot and humid there that everybody seems to move at the speed of snails. When the bus pulled up nobody at the stop seemed to move so I assumed this must be the wrong bus and I waited as well. Then after about a minute and a half people started to filter onto the bus. I joined the group and found the bus driver sitting there reading the paper in no rush to go anywhere. After a few more minutes was began our journey into the city center making plenty of stops along the way.
Once in town I just walked around and got a few things done then I made sure to catch the last bus back into Sambula so I would be back in time for dinner. I bought us some chicken to use for the curry that night. It was a great meal. Just about every meal is some form of curry (even breakfast) so they are curry masters. Later we went over to his brother’s place and met the rest of the family. This was the house were Kam was born and where he had spent the majority of his life. His brother gave us all some freshly squeezed mango, passion fruit, pineapple, and mango juices that he had squeezed himself from the fruit found around his home. I can honestly say it was the best and most pure juice that I have ever had in my life. I wish I could wake up to a glass of that every morning. After that we just went back to Kam’s place and watched a movie then went to bed. They pulled out a mattress for me to sleep on in the living area and I had a decent sleep.
The next day was Sunday and all the shops were closed so there was no point in going into town. Kam asked me what I felt like doing and I just wanted to do whatever he would normally do. At around noon that day we went down the hill to his neighbor’s place where around ten Fijian-Indian men were sitting in a circle on their porch playing cards around a big bowl of karva. Karva is a Fijian classic. It is basically a tea that is made from crushed up karva root. It all starts by harvesting the karva root and then drying it out for a fairly long period of time. The potency and quality of the karva depends on its age, kind of like fine whiskey. Most karva has aged at least three years but very fine karva can be as old as ten years or more. You can buy the dried up root down at the market at a fairly inexpensive price. Kam’s neighbors had a large amount of this root and they gave me some to crush up for the next batch. I put it in a large steel bowl and basically just pounded the schnitzel out of it until it turned into a fine powder. I then took the powder large bowl of powder and divided it up into small tea bag sized paper bags, with each small bag being enough for one big bowl of karva. I then went into the kitchen with one of the men and he had a rag tied to his kitchen tap. We poured the karva powder into this rag then ran water through it until the bowl was full and we had strained all of the good stuff from the powder into to karva bowl. Then that was it, a few stirs with the half coconut karva cups and we were good to go. From then on anytime somebody says “taki” that means drink up, and the person closest to the bowl serves up one half coconut full of karva to each person around the circle one at a time. You are meant to down the whole thing at once, it is not a casual sipping drink. I don’t think you would really want to casually sip on a cup of karva anyways because it basically looks and tastes like muddy water with a bit of a kick at the end. The Fijians don’t even like the taste but they drink it because of its relaxing effect. The first time you drink karva you will probably just end up with a numb tongue but after a few nights of drinking it your tolerance seems to go down and it has a much greater effect. By this point I had already drank karva about 6 or 7 times so after a few cups with these guys my brain was at ease. We continued drinking karva and playing card games down on their porch until around 5 o’clock or so then Kam and I left to go try and get some dinner sorted.
Kam picked up a couple grapefruits on the way back up the hill to his place that we would boil for dinner. They weren’t the sour grapefruits that we are used to back home. They were big giant fruits about the size of small watermelons and the inside was kind of similar to a potato only sweeter. Kam also had some small fish that he had caught earlier in the week as well as some coconuts and this leafy vegetable that I forget the name of now. I was in charge of shaving the coconuts so I sat down on the shaving board which had a serrated edge at the front and began to carve out the inside of the coconuts until they were bare and I was left with a big pile of white coconut shavings. We then wrapped the coconut shavings in a cloth, put it in a bowl of water, and squeezed out all the white coconut milk until we had a big bowl of coconut milk ready to cook with. We put the coconut milk in a big pot along with the fish, onions, and herbs then brought it just to a boil and let it simmer for 15 minutes or so until the fish was cooked. We also boiled that leafy veggie that is apparently poisonous if no cooked properly. Luckily they had plenty of experience cooking this and I didn’t die at the dinner table.
After dinner we went back down to his neighbor’s place to drink some more karva for a bit then eventually called it a night. The next morning I decided it was probably time for me to move on because I wanted to be settled somewhere for Christmas Day which was only three days away. I said my goodbyes and thanked them for their hospitality then I went into town and caught the next bus the Pacific Harbour.
I took a bus into town a little later on that day to go on the Internet and browse around a few of the shops. The bus only cost seventy cents so it was dirt-cheap and a good way to get a glimpse of the real Fijian lifestyle. The pace the Fijians moved at was priceless. It is just so hot and humid there that everybody seems to move at the speed of snails. When the bus pulled up nobody at the stop seemed to move so I assumed this must be the wrong bus and I waited as well. Then after about a minute and a half people started to filter onto the bus. I joined the group and found the bus driver sitting there reading the paper in no rush to go anywhere. After a few more minutes was began our journey into the city center making plenty of stops along the way.
Once in town I just walked around and got a few things done then I made sure to catch the last bus back into Sambula so I would be back in time for dinner. I bought us some chicken to use for the curry that night. It was a great meal. Just about every meal is some form of curry (even breakfast) so they are curry masters. Later we went over to his brother’s place and met the rest of the family. This was the house were Kam was born and where he had spent the majority of his life. His brother gave us all some freshly squeezed mango, passion fruit, pineapple, and mango juices that he had squeezed himself from the fruit found around his home. I can honestly say it was the best and most pure juice that I have ever had in my life. I wish I could wake up to a glass of that every morning. After that we just went back to Kam’s place and watched a movie then went to bed. They pulled out a mattress for me to sleep on in the living area and I had a decent sleep.
The next day was Sunday and all the shops were closed so there was no point in going into town. Kam asked me what I felt like doing and I just wanted to do whatever he would normally do. At around noon that day we went down the hill to his neighbor’s place where around ten Fijian-Indian men were sitting in a circle on their porch playing cards around a big bowl of karva. Karva is a Fijian classic. It is basically a tea that is made from crushed up karva root. It all starts by harvesting the karva root and then drying it out for a fairly long period of time. The potency and quality of the karva depends on its age, kind of like fine whiskey. Most karva has aged at least three years but very fine karva can be as old as ten years or more. You can buy the dried up root down at the market at a fairly inexpensive price. Kam’s neighbors had a large amount of this root and they gave me some to crush up for the next batch. I put it in a large steel bowl and basically just pounded the schnitzel out of it until it turned into a fine powder. I then took the powder large bowl of powder and divided it up into small tea bag sized paper bags, with each small bag being enough for one big bowl of karva. I then went into the kitchen with one of the men and he had a rag tied to his kitchen tap. We poured the karva powder into this rag then ran water through it until the bowl was full and we had strained all of the good stuff from the powder into to karva bowl. Then that was it, a few stirs with the half coconut karva cups and we were good to go. From then on anytime somebody says “taki” that means drink up, and the person closest to the bowl serves up one half coconut full of karva to each person around the circle one at a time. You are meant to down the whole thing at once, it is not a casual sipping drink. I don’t think you would really want to casually sip on a cup of karva anyways because it basically looks and tastes like muddy water with a bit of a kick at the end. The Fijians don’t even like the taste but they drink it because of its relaxing effect. The first time you drink karva you will probably just end up with a numb tongue but after a few nights of drinking it your tolerance seems to go down and it has a much greater effect. By this point I had already drank karva about 6 or 7 times so after a few cups with these guys my brain was at ease. We continued drinking karva and playing card games down on their porch until around 5 o’clock or so then Kam and I left to go try and get some dinner sorted.
Kam picked up a couple grapefruits on the way back up the hill to his place that we would boil for dinner. They weren’t the sour grapefruits that we are used to back home. They were big giant fruits about the size of small watermelons and the inside was kind of similar to a potato only sweeter. Kam also had some small fish that he had caught earlier in the week as well as some coconuts and this leafy vegetable that I forget the name of now. I was in charge of shaving the coconuts so I sat down on the shaving board which had a serrated edge at the front and began to carve out the inside of the coconuts until they were bare and I was left with a big pile of white coconut shavings. We then wrapped the coconut shavings in a cloth, put it in a bowl of water, and squeezed out all the white coconut milk until we had a big bowl of coconut milk ready to cook with. We put the coconut milk in a big pot along with the fish, onions, and herbs then brought it just to a boil and let it simmer for 15 minutes or so until the fish was cooked. We also boiled that leafy veggie that is apparently poisonous if no cooked properly. Luckily they had plenty of experience cooking this and I didn’t die at the dinner table.
After dinner we went back down to his neighbor’s place to drink some more karva for a bit then eventually called it a night. The next morning I decided it was probably time for me to move on because I wanted to be settled somewhere for Christmas Day which was only three days away. I said my goodbyes and thanked them for their hospitality then I went into town and caught the next bus the Pacific Harbour.
First Night in Fiji's Capital
When we pulled into Suva I was amazed at the amount of people clustered around the bus station. It was a smoggy, noisy, mess of people like I had never seen before. I quickly got myself away from this area and the population seemed to disperse quite a bit and I became much more comfortable. Once I got quite a bit further up the street a man approached me and wanted to know my story. I gave him a vague idea of what I had up to and didn’t tell him too much about my plans for the future then he pulled a Fijian hustler classic. He said had a gift for me. He whipped out a wooden tribal mask asked me my name. I knew better then to answer this question. Luckily a man on the plane ride over had warned me about this kind of thing. People on the street will come up to you and pretend to be your friend, then they will ask you your name and when you tell them they immediately begin to carve your name into one of these masks. They then try to force you to buy the mask that now has your name engraved into it. These guys are harmless though, and they seem to bugger off fairly quickly once you shut them down. After checking out a few hostels in the area I realized that all the ones in my price range were pretty much garbage so I just accepted it and checked into the South Sea Hostel near the Museum. I through my stuff into the steamy room and got right back out of here as soon as possible. I walked around downtown Suva for a bit then I noticed one bar called the Big Dirty Dog or something like that had a Happy Hour on at the moment. I was parched and thought I might as well swing in for a beer. Inside it was a nice enough place with friendly customers and staff too. I sat up at the bar and began talking to this Fijian-Indian guy named Kam. He told me he knew the owner of this place and would be able to get us Happy Hour prices for the rest for the night. I had nothing else to do at this point and I was in no rush to get back to my crappy dorm room so I said, “Lets do it.” He was a jeweler and souvenir salesman all around Viti Levu. We eventually went over to the very popular bar O’Reiley’s and met a few randoms in there. After a great night in there Kam gave me his number and said I was welcome to come stay with him and his family if I wanted. Many Fijians had offered to let me stay with their families up to this point but I was always a little skeptical. I just got a good vibe off of this guy and so the next morning when I woke up I gave him a call and the first words out of his mouth were, “So, are you ready to come home.”
Journey to Suva
On the morning of Friday, December 19th I jumped on a local bus for $.70 which took me down to the bus station where I purchased a bus ticket to take me from Nadi over to Suva, which is the capitol city of Fiji. I thought this big city would be an interesting place to spend the weekend. Nadi was an interesting spot as well but I found it to be quite dirty and there wasn’t a whole lot going on that I wanted to be a part of to be honest. The bus ticket for the four and a half hour bus ride only cost me $8 Fijian, which is around $5 Canadian. It was ridiculously cheap but also incredibly cramped. They sat three people to a seat that looked like it would be a squeeze to fit two people on. It was a sweaty, uncomfortable mess for the first couple of hours but I got talking to one of the locals sitting beside me on the bus. He was a nurse on his way home to visit his family. I was the only white guy on the bus so naturally everybody wanted to talk to me and find out my story. Most tourists traveling around Fiji ride on another bus called the Coral Sun but it was more expensive and I wanted a more authentic Fijian experience. I am glad I made the decision to ride the local bus. Halfway through we stopped in a small town ride at the market so I went in and bought half a pineapple from one of the vendors for $2. It was very delicious and refreshing. I felt reenergized and ready to ride out the rest of the journey to Suva. When I got back on the bus I realized that this was the final stop for a lot of people so there was much more room on the bus and it was down to just two people per seat, which made the trip much more enjoyable. The Fijian countryside was something like I had never seen before. Little villages seemed to pop out of nowhere. A decent amount of the people living in and around Suva are squatters, which means they just toss a tin roof over their heads and they live off the land for the most part. They were everywhere. At some point in the late afternoon we finally rolled into Suva.
A Sad Return to the Mainland
On Wednesday, December 17th I attempted to catch the 11:00 am ferry from Beachcomber Island back to the mainland but once on the boat I was told that I still needed to pay my bar tab and that I would have to go back to do so. I had given them my credit card number and at most of the other islands that is all you need to do then everything would be taken off of that. I guess I misunderstood and ended up missing the morning ferry. When coming off the boat a Fijian guy was carrying my bag for my as they normally do, and I went to follow the man carrying my bag but he told me to follow some other women into reception instead. I thought that was fair enough and that he would take my bag back to the luggage shack for the afternoon boat where it would be safe. Wrong, wrong, wrong. I caught the afternoon boat later that day and eventually found my way to Nadi Bay Backpackers hostel where I would be staying the night. I hung out with a few people from my room that night and had a decent meal with a couple beers to wash it down. Then when I went to go to bed I thought I would fall asleep listening to my iPod. I looked in the top pocket of my bag where I had left it and whoops, no iPod. That was rough enough but after looking a little deeper I found that not only was the iPod missing but also there was no camera and I was about $60 short as well. I went to sleep in a mix of sadness and anger that night. The next day I went to the police station at the airport and got them to write up a report for me. Other than that there was not a whole lot I could do so I just had to let it go. I spent one more night at Nadi Bay Backpackers and decided to head east the next morning.
Beachcomber Island
On December 16th I arrived on Beachcomber Island to find a larger mass of people than any of the other islands I had visited. They showed me to my dorm room, which had about 150 beds in it at least. Luckily nobody spends too much time in their room anyways so it didn’t really matter. I went for a walk around the island to eat up some time before dinner but found that it only takes about 5 minutes to walk around the entire thing. Later I went down and had a decent buffet style meal and then headed over to the bar where I met up with a big group of people from Norway. I made friends with these two guys Maximus and Olav and shared a few jugs with them. There was a big round of limbo going on that night which was very entertaining to watch. I stayed clear because I didn’t want to crack my spine in half. We all had a great time that night but the next morning I was ready to move back to the mainland and get back to a somewhat normal lifestyle.
Sunset Waya Resort
On December 15th while traveling on the southbound boat I met up with three Irish girls who I had met before on Bounty Island so I decided to follow them to Sunset Waya Resort on Waya Island. Apparently this resort was also known as Twin Bays because of a sand bar that stretches from Waya Island to another Island (possibly Waya Lailai Island). At low tide this sand bar is exposed separating the ocean into two bays and allowing you to walk from one island to the other. You can also see both the sunrise and the sunset from this sandbar. It is really cool. This resort however had a total of about 10 people staying there. It was a really quiet place to stay and they had next to nothing for food. Breakfast was just dirty juice and bread, lunch was rice and something chewy, and I honestly have no idea what dinner was because it was dark and I really couldn’t tell. We all had a really good time here though actually. At night they put on a really good show for us with the craziest fire dancing I’ve seen and then we all sat around and drank karva before retiring out to a massive bonfire on the beach. I only had one night left on the Yasawas after this though so I thought I should go out in a blaze of glory and the best place to do that is Beachcomber Island.
Kuata Natural Resort
After Korovou Eco-Tour Resort, Hannah and I along with the rest of the crew decided to go to Kuata Island, home to Kuata Natural Resort. We stayed here for one night only from December 14th to 15th. I didn’t really do a whole lot here to be honest other then go for a little bush trek to the top of the island, try to keep cool by the pool, and eat, but it was a good time socializing with everyone nonetheless. With limited activities at this resort I decided to move on the next day so I jumped on the southbound boat and went from there.
Korovou Eco Tour Resort
When I pulled up onto the shores of Naviti Island on December 13th, I met up with two Dutch girls and two Canadian guys that I had met from one of the other islands further north. They were going on a deep-sea snorkeling trip to hopefully feed some reef sharks. A bunch of other people were doing it too so I thought I might as well join in the fun. We headed out in two tin boats with maybe eight or nine people per boat. It was a rough but enjoyable ride through the waves to get to our snorkeling location. Once there were all fell backwards into the water, flippers and all, in search of reef sharks. The coral out there was amazing and you could dive down a meter or two to get really close to it the odd time. It felt like I was in another world. At one point the guide pointed out a sea turtle to me but by the time I got my eyes there it had gone too far. We eventually stopped in one location and began to bring out the fish for the sharks. Many other brightly colored fish showed up for the feed but unfortunately no sharks. They said that the sharks almost always turn up and this was a rare occurrence so I was a little disappointed but still a great way to spend the afternoon nonetheless. When I got back to the hostel I met up with Hannah (a girl from London, England) and a few of her friends. We all watched the sunset before dinner and then had a decent meal together in the dining area. After diner a Fijian woman came up to us and asked us if we wanted to watch the moonrise. I thought this was another form of Fijian trickery or something but when we went out onto the patio, there it was. A full moon was just creeping over the horizon. It seemed to come up at nearly the same pace as the sunrise and it was a first for me. After that the Fijians made us all do a few awkward dances, then myself, Hannah, and another German girl whom I have since forgotten the name of headed down to the beach to wait for the sun to rise. I had heard that the Fijian sunrise is a must see and since we had already seen a sunset and a moonrise that night we thought we might as well complete the trilogy. We all decided we would relax in a hammock down by the ocean until the sun came up. It was a good time and the sunrise was well worth the wait. The scene was breathtaking and the clouds were lit up with an array of colors including purple, blue, red, orange, and pink. It was craziness. Later that day we just hung out on the beach until our boat came to pick us up and move us down to the next island.
Octopus Resort
On December 12th, after being boated out of Manta Ray Island Resort we decided to spoil ourselves a little by going to the luxurious Octopus Resort on Waya Island. This was the most expensive of all the reasonably priced resorts in the Yasawas but at $100 Fijian a night we though we might as well. We really lucked out because all of the rooms in the dorms were full so they gave us a little hut with four beds and two fans. In the room was Adam, a German girl we met on Manta Ray, some other random, and myself. Here we pretty much just spent our days in the water. The waves at this place were nuts though. Apparently the guy at reception said he had never seen the tides like this. We had to fight the waves the entire time but it was so fun we didn’t care. I tried snorkeling but I had to come in because I was worried the tides were going to scrape me along the coral only a couple feet below. Instead we played volleyball for a couple hours that afternoon and then showered up and had a nice cold beer before dinner. The dinner here wasn’t until 8 o’clock and they put on a show just before with traditional singing and dancing for the crowd. Then dinnertime came and I was in heaven. We all sat in small tables of about 8 people and they brought the food to us on large platters. We had fish lolo, which is where they cook the fish in coconut milk, chicken and lamb curry, pasta, salad, bread, the whole works. I was thoroughly satisfied and also very tired. I think I went to bed at around 9:30 or 10 that night haha. The breakfast the next morning was pretty standard with cereal, toast, and fruit, but the lunch was equally as impressive as the dinner. This was the first time I had gotten to choose off of a menu in ages. I know I talk about food a lot but you start to appreciate these things a great deal more once you have gone without them for a good amount of time. For lunch I chose some kind of marlin pasta dish, which ended up being a real beauty. After that I left Adam and the German girl to jump on the boat and head a little further up north because I had more time to play with than they did. I almost missed the boat and actually had to run into the ocean after it because I had been lounging out in a hammock for about an hour or so. Once on the boat I made a random decision to go to Korovou Eco Tour Resort on Naviti Island for a night and see what the deal was there.
Manta Ray Island Resort
Or next stop on the Yasawas was Manta Ray Island Resort located on Nanuya Balavu Island. This was one of my favorite resorts in the Yasawas. We got there on December 11th and that night there was an a la carte menu at the dining area for supper. That meal was the best one I had had in Fiji at that point. It started with a big salad or something like that and finished with this big plate of meaty goodness. I don’t make it sound that good but trust me it was. After that we all just stayed up and had a few drinks in the dining area, which was located high up near the treetops or the jungle. There was a great view from up there and the stars were easily visible. The next morning we set off on a jungle trek along the beach for part of it walking on volcanic rock and then right through the heart of the jungle and onto the other side of the island. Where we searched for coconuts and lizards. We found plenty of old coconuts, which we would use to make coconut jewelry, but unfortunately no lizards. After a good swim on the back of the island we headed back to the resort. The whole thing took about two and a half hours to do and it was free. Definitely worth it. Unfortunately once we got back to the resort Adam and I found out that there was no more room for us to stay another night. It seems they had overbooked and we would have to move on. I didn’t even have time to make some coconut jewelry. It was rough but sometimes that’s just the way the cookie crumbles. So we moved on.
Coral View Resort
The next place we decided to go was Coral View Resort on Tavewa Island, which is the second most northerly island in the Yasawas. We only stayed there for one night from December 10th to the 11th and for good reason. It was either overcast or raining the entire time we were there and so the mosquitoes were horrible. The rooms only provided partial shelter from the rain. That night the rain was continuously blowing in through the window, which had no screen, glass, or shutters, so I was completely soaked from the bellybutton down. The first meal we had there was nice but every meal after that was kind of sloppy and not many options at all. I suppose my stay would have been different if the weather had been a bit better but there just wasn’t much to do on the island. I went for a walk to the back of the island and to the top of the hill, which had a decent view but again, it was raining the entire time. I played volleyball that afternoon but there were rocks on the court so my knees got all scraped up haha. It was a rough go but they did have day trips to caves and stuff like that. I just didn’t want to cough up the extra cash in such poor conditions. So the next day Adam and I moved on.
Bounty Island
On Monday, December 8th, Nikki, Abby, Adam, and I left Mana Island and headed to Bounty Island where we would stay for the next two nights. Holly, the other girl who had been traveling with us through New Zealand, decided to go to Robinson Crusoe Island instead because of time and money restraints. When we got to Bounty we were greeted by the friendly staff and brought up to our dorm rooms, which held around 50 people per room. Luckily the place was not fully booked so we only had about half that or less in our room. It only takes about a half an hour to walk around the island so we did that a couple of times, one time stopping to do a little snorkeling on the back of the island. We were with an experienced diver from Spain so he told us a lot about the sport and was able to identify some of the aquatic life out there. While out for a swim one time, a few of the girls and I got attacked by some feisty crabs. They swarmed around us and were nipping at us wherever they could. We all scrambled back to shore where we had a good laugh for a while then moved on towards the resort for teatime. This was special because this was the only resort I saw that offered coffee or tea and cookies for their guests in the afternoon because dinner wasn’t until 8 in the evening. These cookies were amazing too. They were kind of like chewy shortbreads and were a rare commodity on the islands. We ate fairly well on Bounty Island. The meals were all done buffet style as most of the other islands do and they offered a wide range of options such as chicken, lamb, fish, sausage, salad, pasta, etc. Unfortunately Adam did not make it out to any of the meals really because he was feeling really ill. Both Abby and Nikki experienced this same kind of illness on Mana Island and many other people I encountered on my travels described the same kind of thing. I’m not sure if it had something to due with the water they cook the food in or if it was just sunstroke or something but I never had it so I really don’t know. Our last night on Bounty Island was Nikki’s birthday so we all went down to the pool bar to celebrate with the rest of the backpackers at the resort. The diving instructor even joined in with the drinking games. This would be the last time I saw Nikki and Abby until Australia as they had different plans than Adam and I.
Cast Away Island
On December 6th we left Mana Island on a half-day trip to Cast Away Island where the Tom Hanks movie was filmed. It was maybe a 20-minute boat ride to get there in the lodge’s tin boat. Once there our guide told us a little about the island. It cost us $50 Fijian dollars to go on this trip and apparently $10 from each person went to the chief of the island for letting us walk on his land. The chief did not live on this island though, nobody did. No spear fishing was allowed near this island either because Fiji relies heavily on their tourist industry to bring in the money for the country. It is very important to the Fijians that the island and its aquatic friends remain as beautiful and as diverse as they always have been in order to get as many tourists out to Fiji as possible. When we first arrived on Cast Away Island we all went out snorkeling for the first hour or so and saw some amazing fish and coral. The water is so clear and the coral and fish are so colorful that once I put those goggles on, the ocean turned into the best natural fish tank I’ve ever seen. There was such a bountiful and diverse amount of fish right beneath me it blew me away. On our way out of the water from snorkeling our guide and the boat driver randomly left us on the island smiling and waving as they drove off. I was somewhat worried until I caught word that they had left to try spear fishing for a bit. While they were gone we just kind of explored the island. We apparently saw the rock wall that Tom Hanks used as a gravestone when he buried the pilot but it didn’t look quite the same as it did in the movie. I climbed up close to the highest point that I could on the island and took a few pictures. It was an amazing view and it was cool to be the only ones there enjoying it. There was no sign of Wilson the volleyball. After a full morning of snorkeling and snapping photos the boat returned to pick us up. Unfortunately they had not been able to spear any fish. We ate pasta that night.
Mana Island
On Thursday, December 4th we boarded the boat to Mana. This was the same boat and crew we would be riding with to and from the islands for the next two weeks. It takes roughly five hours to go from Port Denaru on the mainland all the way up to the most northerly island in the Yasawa group so the boat just does a complete circuit of the Mamanucas and the Yasawas everyday. It stops in the ocean near each resort and each resort has its own little tin boat to bring people from the resort to the big boat. It took maybe an hour and a half to get from Port Denaru to Mana Island Lagoon where we spent our first four days on the islands. When our tin boat pulled up on shore we were greeted with a welcoming song, as they do on all the islands, and a warm “Bula” which is basically “Hello” in English. All Fijians are taught English in school at a young age so we had no problems communicating with everyone. Even the children are able to communicate in English quite well. I attempted to learn some Fijian while there but I don’t imagine I will retain much of it after leaving the country to be honest. Unfortunately I don’t have the memory of an elephant. Mana Island was a cool island and the resort we were staying at was especially cool because your dorm rooms and the resort itself are right in the village. I thought I got a much more authentic Fijian experience here then any of the other resorts on the Yasawas. Everyone was showing their classic Fijian hospitality and I got to know them all fairly quickly which gave it a homier kind of feel. It takes about 3 hours to walk around the entire island which I did one morning for something to do. There were 3 other resorts on this island which were much more posh than ours. We weren’t even allowed to set foot on the one resort. Even to use the Internet. We all got escorted out the one day when we tried. Brutal. I thought our backpackers lodge was great. It had all kinds of entertainment. They had crab races, fire dances, karva nights (which I will explain later), and great beaches to swim at both the front and back of the island. The beach at the back of the island was only maybe a 5 minute walk and there was barely ever anybody back there. It was a sheltered beach and this is where some country’s version of the TV reality show called “Survivor” was filmed a few years ago. The set from the show was simply abandoned after the show ended and is still in place today. You could see where they had “Tribal Council” to see who would be voted off the island that week. It was really cool to see something like that but I thought it was odd that a show would just move out leaving their set behind to rot. I suppose the Fijians may have asked them to leave it as a tourist attraction but I don’t know. Another bonus of Mana Island was its proximity to the small island where they filmed the Tom Hanks movie “Cast Away.”
Enter Fiji
On December 3rd around lunchtime we arrived at the Nadi (actually pronounced Nandi because all ‘d’s are pronounced ‘nd’) International Airport in Fiji with absolutely no idea where we would crash out that night. Shortly after getting our luggage a woman was already rushing up to us offering to help book our travel accommodation for the next few weeks. With no plans at that time whatsoever we decided to go with this woman and hope for the best. After a painful hour of talking over the various options the five of us managed to get ourselves booked into a decent hostel on the mainland for that night and then we would stay at her sister’s husband’s uncle’s cousin’s place (or something like that) on Mana island for the following four nights. When we arrived at Skylodge that day I was happy to see that it was a luxurious spot with a beauty of a swimming pool. We all decided we would go for a swim and try to decide what to do for the next few weeks, which was not an easy task because there were so many options. Nothing much was accomplished during this talk. After dinner and a beer Adam and I just decided to sort ourselves out and buy a 14 day Bula Pass which is a hop on / hop off ferry service from the mainland to and from the various islands in the Mamanuca (actually pronounced Mamanutha) and Yasawa groups. It was the easiest option really because it didn’t required any forward planning. We could just buy these passes then our transportation costs are covered for the entire trip and you don’t need to miss out on any sweet islands because of the cost to travel to them. The accommodation for each night can be booked during the day on the boat so again no need for forward planning. I would only have to decide whether I wanted to go north or south that day, jump on the appropriate boat, then ask around on the boat to see what island everybody else is going to and join in. The girls decided to pay the $60 for a one-way boat ride to Mana Island the next day then they would figure the rest out during their four days on Mana. Once they had that sorted we just kind of hung around in the room and all went to bed relatively early because we had to be at Port Denaru around 7:00 or something the next morning. Other then the few cockroaches outside our door and the annoying task of attempting to plan our vacation I had a good stay at Skylodge. The next day the island hopping was about to begin.
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