Life is not measured ....

Fiji

Arriving in Fiji after a four hour flight from New Zealand to sunshine, local music and a gift of shell necklaces you can’t help but slip into what’s locally known as Fiji time, where life takes on a gentle pace of its own.

From the airport we took a short drive to Denerau marina to pick up the boat across to Treasure Island where we spent the next seven days.

Our bure (villa) was right next to the beach and with a hammock outside and sandy path down to the beach and beautiful clear blue water completing the picture, it was just like the ads you see for idyllic islands.

We spent daytimes making the most of the water facilities – snorkelling, canoeing, seeing the coral reef on a glass bottomed boat, sailing hobie cats and even having a go at parasailing.

Somehow I also got persuaded into taking part in the 1km race from Treasure to Beachcomber island – the main race, 2.5km from the sandbank to Beachcomber was won by Daynon Loader, a Kiwi Olympic champion. I did the 1km in a fairly respectable 25 minutes.

Evenings generally started with cocktails whilst watching the sunset, followed by dinner and local entertainment which was excellent. We tried a Lovo dinner where the food is cooked in underground oven and took part in a traditional Kava ceremony.

Louise and Daniel both made friends very quickly and there were far too many exciting things going on for them to want to spend much time with us “oldies” (I have to say it was a bit weird – I know as parents you expect the time to come when your kids announce that they have better things to do – but at 5 and 6! Oh well, if you bring them up to be independent what else do you expect?). As well as many hours in the pool and by the beach, they also fed iguanas, played dodge ball, found coconuts, made dens, found hermit crabs (and spent our money betting on them in a race – Louise chose the Scottish one – partly for grandma and partly because Ben persuaded her that the England crab labelled Wayne Rooney had to high a tag on his head – Scottie came in third so we made our money back and a bit more). Daniel and his friend Benji also starred on stage one evening dressed as warriors and taking part in a meke (narrative dance).

After an amazing week, we had three days back on the mainland at a hotel called the Warwick Fiji, on the coral coast. This smart pristine hotel was a complete change to the completely laid back haphazard atmosphere of the island.

Ben’s dad, David had spent some time in Fiji a few years ago and had also stayed at the Warwick. He had become friends with Ratu (chef) Boro from a neighbouring village, Namatacula and whilst Boro had passed away a few years ago, we looked up his widow, Vacemaca and she took us back to the village and her house. We shared in a Kava ceremony and Daniel played rugby with some of the children from the village.
Back at the hotel, Louise enjoyed the swim up bar at the pool and we watched fire walking performed by a local tribe.

Fiji photos

On the way back to NZ, we had an interesting time at the airport. MAF (Ministry of Agriculture and Fisheries) were out in force that evening and we knew from shipping our stuff over that they are extremely fussy about what comes in to the country. We duly declared the sword like piece that we had bought plus the wooden mask Daniel had chosen and the shells that Louise had collected. We’d had a long chat with the kids so that they knew that there may be a possibility that there purchases may not get past customs. As it happened, it was a small wooden plate that Ben had been given as a trophy for winning a table tennis competition that had suspect bore holes in it – we were given the option of paying $70 to have it fumigated, $20 to send it back or the airport authorities would dispose of it free of charge. Given that it probably cost less than $10, we thought about it for all of two seconds, got out the camera to take a momento photo and handed it over!

posted by Sharon, Ben, Louise and Daniel @ 3:39 am