We spent the next three days up in the village of Nakavika with RiversFiji. It is high up in the interior of Fiji, surround my mountains and hills and in the middle of very dense rainforest. About 30 years ago the loggers came and built some roads through the forests, but before that it used to take 3 days, by raft down the river, to get to the nearest town on the coast, Pacific Harbour.
Up early on Tuesday and packed a couple of days' clothes and toiletries into dry bags. Then headed off in our off-road bus to Navunikabi where we did a sevusevu, a welcoming ceremony involving kaval. we also had a walk around the village and talked to some of the children at the school. Then we went down to the river, packed our kayaks and set off down the rapids. After a couple of stops to jump off some high rocks into the river, we arrived in Nakavika. In the evening i trained with the rugby team in the biggest piece of flat, unforested open space for miles around: the rugby pitch. the posts were made of 2 vertical bamboo poles! in the evening we put up our tents for the first night.
On Wednesday we went on a hike around the hills. The villagers showed us all kinds of plants which they use for things. There was:
-very sour orange which could be used to remove rust
-a special root to cure stomach upsets
-some leaves which, when rubbed together, make soap
We also went down to the river and made our own bilibili raft from Bamboo and vines which we cut down with a machete.
On Thursday we went down to the next section of the river. there was a place where you could jump into a deep bit of river off a cliff. it was a 35 foot drop which was pretty cool! We then kayaked down the river until the late afternoon when we got a small motor boat back to Pacific Harbour.
On the way there was a bit of a tropical storm. It rained so hard that it hurt and so thick that you couldnt see far ahead. there was lots of lightning too and i got totally soaked!
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