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March 21
At 5:30 am we landed on the beautiful island of Fiji. Having absolutely no plans made, and having done limited research, we went straight to the travel agency to get some information about our options on how to spend the next 11 days. It was hard for us to miss, too, as the lady from the travel agency, who we would soon know as “Lucy” called us over right after we left the customs desk. We knew there was a large backpacking community in Fiji, we just had no idea where it was, and how it was possible to experience on the cheap. Lucy informed us that our best option was, of course, to book a 10 day/3 island cruise with her company. As it was now 6:30 in the morning, and we were still groggy from our 3 day airline adventure, we decided to bite the bullet, and pay a little extra for her services.
We missed the free shuttle to the ferry port, so we had to take a cab ride there. It was our first experience with “left-side-of-the-road driving”, and it was a bit weird at first. The ride itself was 25 Fiji dollars, and we had no change, so the cab driver was kind enough to go get change for us. He came back and gave us $20 change (from a $50 bill) and said “I took $5 for myself”. Again, we were pretty tired, and he seemed to be a nice guy, so we didn't argue. The boat left almost immediately as we got there, and we finally had some time to relax and enjoy what was a beautiful sunny day in Fiji, for the 4 hour trip to our first island. As we cruised through the many Yasawa islands on our way to our first “resort”, we were treated to some Ukulele and singing from an American guy who we had met on the boat.
Long Beach Resort, Nacuna Lai Lai Island.
This was our first stop, and we had booked 4 nights here. The island was quite large with a long beautiful beach that stretched along the resort. It was tucked away behind another island that was right across from us (which rumor had it cost $1000 a night for accommodation). The first day was gorgeous and sunny, and we were greeted to the “Bula welcome song” and a nice lunch upon arrival. After that we started doing what we would spend the next 5 days doing; Lying on the beach. We retired to our private bungalow after that and had a nap before dinner.
The resort, along with many of the others, offered an array of activities from snorkeling, fishing at sunset, swimming with the sharks, basket weaving, coconut tastings and trips to the village. In the interest of efficiency, we can tell you that everyday went a little like this; Wake up to the sound of the drums (signalling meal time) at 7:30. Eat breakfast. Go back to our bungalow, change into bathing suits, and suntan/swim until the drums sounded for lunch. Eat. Suntan for another few hours. Swim. Go back to the bungalow. Read and nap. Wake up to the dinner drum. Eat. Spend about 15 minutes socializing with the other backpackers. Movie for about 10 minutes in bed until we quickly fell asleep. Sleep. Repeat. This was perfect for us, though, as we had spent the last 3 months running around like crazy, and welcomed the relaxation.
We did, however, deviate from the norm a few times; One day we took a nice long walk down the beach with a girl we became friendly with from England. Another day we walked through the water from our island to the island just across the narrow inlet. The tide here went in and out quite dramatically, and as such, we were able to walk the whole kilometer or so. However, the tide had come in by the time we were ready to go back and we had to swim almost the whole way. This wouldn't have been a problem if our “waterproof dry-sac'” that we had been keeping our camera in didn't have a leak in it. The camera was completely soaked, and despite our best efforts, (putting it in a bag of rice overnight) we were unable to save the camera. Do not fret, though, as this was our “emergency back up camera”, so we were willing to part with it. One night, we tried “cava” which is a local social drink made of some kind of root, and on the same night, Fiji happened to be playing Canada in the ‘Hong Kong 7’ rugby (national sport of Fiji) test. So, we stayed up late and watched the fuzzy little black and white tube with the locals. Fiji won pretty convincingly. We also played volleyball, once, where an unfortunate consequence was the breaking of one of our fellow travellers’ sunglasses.
All in all we really enjoyed our first island. The weather was hot and sunny (for the most part), the people (staff and fellow travellers) were great, the beach was sandy, and the water was possibly the most crystal blue that we’d ever seen. The food, on the other hand, was pretty poor, and the portions were small, but we were enjoying our time too much to worry about that.
White Sandy Beach Resort: Naviti Island
Our second island hop led us to “White Sandy Beach” on our 5th afternoon in Fiji. It was the first day that the sun was struggling to come out, besides a few crazy overnight rain storms we had had previously. We were once again greeted to a welcoming Bula song and dance and then invited to tea time after we settled in. We were assigned another super cute bungalow on the beach, close enough that we could see and hear the crashing of the waves right outside our window. This island was smaller than the first, but it was true to it’s name, as it had beautiful white sand stretched across the beach. The resort was small, with one main house which held the bar and dining, a few small bungalows like ours stretched across the beachfront and a volleyball court that separated the tourist area from the staff lodging.
One the first day, we were all gathered by the staff to the volleyball court for an intense game, where we got eaten by mosquitos and attacked by flies. That night, we were treated to a shockingly exquisite meal followed by some nightly entertainment by the Bula girls and Bula boys. They later made us all stand up to participate, while they taught us the famous Bula dance.
In the middle of the night, Dave woke up in a sweat with a bad fever and feeling extremely nauseous. Coincidentally, earlier that day we were sharing stories with some people that we met about their previous experiences with Dengue fever and Malaria. We didn’t want to say it, but we were both thinking the same thing, ’Oh goodness, we’re stuck on an island in the middle of the Pacific Ocean with NO hospital, NO doctor, and no way of getting to the mainland until 4 o’clock the next day!’ Alice quickly got out of bed and took out a Tylenol Cold & Flu from our travel pharmacy and the bottle of rain water we had filled up at the last island, and got Dave to chug as much water as he possibly could. Still hoping it wasn’t anything too serious, we waited up until Dave’s fever broke and he was able to fall back asleep.
The next morning, we were woken up by the sound of the drums indicating breakfast was ready, and Dave’s fever was back to full steam. He was sweating and shivering all at the same time, barely able to lift his head up off the pillow. Alice spent the day reading on the front porch, taking breaks switching cold compresses, getting tea, cold fruit and Tylenols for Dave while he slept off whatever it was he was suffering from. Thankfully, his fever broke with every Tylenol and by late that night, it broke for the last time. Unfortunately, his upset stomach didn’t, and only got worse as the hours went by. Back into the pharmacy we went, switching Tylenols for the ‘just-in-case’ stomach antibiotics that were pre-emptively given to us by our travel doctor before we left.
For obvious reasons we enjoyed our second resort about 50% of the time. The volleyball game was great, and the food was gourmet (when we were feeling well enough to eat it). The weather great the day that Dave was sick, and pretty sick the day Dave wasn't.. Go figure..
Kuata Resort: Kuata Island
It took 3 days for Dave’s stomach to get better and by this point we had taken the short boat ride over to the Island of Kuata. This one was the smallest one we had stayed on yet, but was the most beautiful. The beach stretched out enough that you could get a 20 minute return walk ending at a tall rock mountain. The other side of the beach had low standing rocks that you could walk out to, looking out to an extravagant view of the ocean and some of the other islands near by. On the complete other side of the island was another separate beach (one that we took a courageous walk to one day, disturbed a nest of mosquitos, and got eaten alive AGAIN) with a great view of the rock mountain where scenes of the movie “Castaway” were filmed.
The grounds on Kuata were about the same as the previous island, with a main house for dining, a small bar hut with a gazebo overlooking the beach and ocean and a few lodging huts for us tourists. There were only 6 of us tourists staying on the island for most of our stay and we spent most of our (rainy) days getting to know them. One couple was from Italy and the other from England both previously coming from Australia on working visas.
One rainy night on the island in the attempt to avoid another Bula dance, we hooked up our lap top to the main speakers, and invited all the locals for a big movie night. Despite the fact that it is just a small screen, everyone was very excited, as if it were one of the only movies they’d ever seen, and all applauded as the movie “The Avengers” finished.
Mainland: Nadi Island
By five in the afternoon on Saturday, March 30th our island hop was over and we were headed back to the main island. A great big coach bus was waiting for us and took us to ‘Bamboo Hostel’s’ sister property on the backpackers side of town. We were finally back to civilization and the internet and as such, spent most of our night checking emails and looking for flights out of New Zealand (our next destination).
In the middle of the night, we woke up yet again with another scare as Dave broke out into a million hives all over his body! Our personal pharmacy was lacking Benadryl, and at 1am, the only shop in town was closed for the night. We went around asking everyone we saw if they had any form of an antihistamine, but were unsuccessful. So, Dave took a cold shower hoping whatever it was that he was allergic too would be washed away.
By morning, that scare was gone. We figured it may have been a late reaction to the 30 mosquito bites he had gotten earlier that day on our courageous walk to the hidden beach on Naviti, but we’ll probably never know what the true culprit was.
The sun was finally blazing on our last day in Fiji (go figure, again) and we enjoyed it by having breakfast, lunch, and coffee out on various patios with our new friend Peter from England. And, at 8 that evening, as we flew towards Auckland, New Zealand we said BULA! and goodbye to the beautiful islands of Fiji.
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