We left Brisbane on a night flight to Fiji and having not slept much, we arrived feeling very groggy and tired at 5.30AM. The flight had been bumpier than we would have liked, but I suppose you have to expect that when flying across the South Seas. We had read that the airport arrivals area at Fiji can be a bit of a circus with numerous touts all pushing to sell hotel/resort space. They didn't seem too bad, and we took as much advice as we could without being pushed around before settling on a resort for the first night, opting to wait before booking our isolated island getaway for the rest of the week. As we came though the arrivals hall, we were greeted by island musicians, complete with harmonic singing and ukulele playing. It gave us a real holiday feeling!
We left the scruffy airport and got a taxi to the Sonaisali resort just outside the city of Nadi (pronounced Nandi) on the main island of Veti Levu. Suddenly we were thrown back into a developing country. It was quite a shock and not what I was expecting - the ancient taxis and the rough roads, shack houses, scruffy businesses and poor looking people. Being a popular holiday destination for Australians, I had expected it to be much more developed, but then again it is an unstable country with some recent military coups to boast of. Our resort was anything but scruffy and soon after being greeted with shell necklaces by staff wearing sulu's (sarongs) and flowers behind their ears, we were relaxing by a very nice pool, located right on a beach looking out at turquoise waters with distant islands on the horizon. Our accommodation was a luxury bure (pronounced Bur-ay) which is a large detached hut. It was total luxury and great value too. From here we booked our remaining 4 nights accommodation at Barefoot Lodge midway up the Yasawa Islands.
So the following morning, we took a taxi to the ferry port of Denarau and booked ourselves onto the Yasawa Flyer, a huge fast yellow catamaran that makes the daily trip to the Yasawas in the Bligh Waters (as in Captain Bligh - of Mutiny on the Bounty fame!). After about 3 hours of passing many beautiful islands and dropping people off onto smaller boats, we transferred onto a tiny boat which took us to our island. Soon we had been shown around our Bure - this time a tiny thatched hut with walls made of woven palm leaves and very, very basic with no electricity, lights or water. It did have two single beds with linen and a mosquito net and an off cut of old vinyl on the concrete floor! The windows were loosely shuttered (no glass) and these were propped open by sticks. Needless to say, creepy crawlies were going to be inevitable!
Tima, one of the few females working on the island showed us to the main Bure, where all the meals were to be served and introduced us to the other staff who all called out a happy 'Bula!' as we walked by. There are only 20 bures on the island, and as these were mostly empty we realised we were sharing the island with only 10 staff and 6 other guests! Despite its extremely basic nature, we really warmed to the place and the people. Our bure was literally 10ft from the sandy palm lined beach - this really was a desert island!
The beating of the drum summoned us for our lunch of fresh meaty white fish and were given our mandatory Kava ceremony. Kava is a traditional island drink made of tree roots and other plant things, but looks like dirty brown dishwater. It is prepared in a large bowl and served in halved coconut shells. Everyone sits cross legged on the floor, around the kava bowl and waits their turn to drink. When you receive the shell, you clap once, say 'Bula!' and down it! It tastes horrible, but the Fijians believe it has healing qualities and is good for the liver and kidneys. Most Fijians living in villages spend their evenings sitting around the kava bowl, chewing the fat and singing traditional songs.
We spent the afternoon on the beach in the sun and gathered for our first evening on the island in the main Bure. Another simple, but good meal, and more kava, we listened to Jay, the head of the island/resident manager play the guitar and sing traditional Fijian island songs with some of the staff. The guitar and ukulele music is fantastic to listen to - a real exotic sound of the islands! We turned in for bed at 9pm - there isn't a lot to do on a pitch dark island with no electricity!
Drawaqa Island is about a mile long and 1/2 mile wide, and has no electricity at all - so the main bure was lit by paraffin lamps. Water is brought in by passing cruise ships and then pumped up to water tanks on the hill. Food is refrigerated with ice (brought in daily) and cooking is all done on basic bottled gas burners. Most of the food we ate was fish, caught the same day by the staff. Back to nature was an understatement!
The following day, Jay took 4 of us out snorkeling and fished from the boat while he waited for us. The snorkeling was really impressive - every bit as good as the barrier reef in Australia. Within 10 minutes I had seen a small stingray, starfish, parrot fish and a whole host of other incredibly coloured fishies that I don't know the names of. We headed back, and sat on the empty beach for the afternoon. If you have ever seen the film Castaway with Tom Hanks, you would have a pretty good idea what our island looked like - the film was shot on one of the nearby Yasawa Islands, but movie trickery made it look like it was completely isolated. The Fijians, on the other hand, find it amusing that Tom Hanks didn't realise there was a major bustling city just 2 hours away!
The following day was spent kayaking around the empty bay, sitting on an empty beach and swimming and reading. You have no choice but to wind down in this place! One of the staff, a great guy named Nocks took us to the viewpoint at the top of the island - this gave amazing views of surrounding islands and the waves breaking miles out over the outer reefs. In the afternoon Nocks prepared a Lovu - a ground oven in which food is placed over hot coals and then covered by palm leaves, wet cloth sacking and then soil. This was in anticipation of a sailing safari group arriving at the island that evening. It turned out that the island developed as a nightly stopover for the sailing holiday and has only recently started to open up to guests like us who stay on the island. Needless to say, the food had excellent smoked flavour, but sadly, we were forced to take part in mandatory 'International Night' with the 20 odd other guests. Not really our cup of tea, but thankfully some really nice Brits, David and Melanie and another couple joined us in gargling the national anthem! It was a truly poor performance, but the Fijians absolutely loved it - really made them laugh, so we were happy with that! The Aussies imaginatively sang Waltzing Matilda and the Germans sang a football chant and spoke about Germany (we didn't mention the war!). All a bit embarrassing, but with a few cold Fiji Bitters, the evening passed quickly and was good fun. It was rounded off by the Fijian guys performing some impressive traditional grass skirted dancing, flaming torch twirling and even knife juggling!
It was whilst visiting the basic outside toilet after excessive Fiji Bitter, that I spotted the largest spider I have ever seen. It was the size of my hand and sat calmly on the toilet wall, so I bravely ushered it outside before Hannah saw it! It really made me wonder what hid in the corners of our bure!
The following couple of days were overcast, but still about 30 degrees. We snorkeled early to spot a pair of huge Manta rays that were in a nearby deep channel. We quickly found one of Manta rays, and snorkeled above the huge fish as the somersaulted in the deep blue below us - it seems they like the attention of snorkelers. Manta rays look flat and round like a Stingray, but with a shorter tail - these were about 1.5m diameter. Later, I was shown how to crack a coconut with my bare hands - it didn't even hurt(!), and we were shown how the islanders make medicines from local plants. We relaxed on the beach and drank more kava in the evening with the staff. That night, there were only 4 of us on the island, so the staff made a fuss of us, and waited on us rather than the usual buffet, which was a very kind sentiment.
After our 4 nights, we said fond farewells to the staff of Barefoot Lodge and headed straight back to the airport via the Yasawa Flyer for our onward flight to Hawai'i. It had been a fantastic experience, and a real way to relax. Like we need it! It was also a surprise to be able to really mix with the locals and spend quite a bit of time with them, drinking kava and chatting. The Fijians are huge rugby fans, so I gave Nocks my England shirt which put a huge smile on his face and I recieved a seriously hearty handshake!
Sad to be leaving, but looking forward to hot water, soap and some US food portions, we headed on to the land of surfing and Magnum P.I., Hawai'i !
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