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We got up bright and early saturday (or i should say i got up, taz isn't quite a morning person) and there was no surprise when i was told that the bus wasn't going to be running that day so a day of reading and pool playing ensued. Not sure if i mentioned it in the last blog but a fergburger was had, these burgers are renowned throughout NZ for the quality and their size. They look at you like you are mad if you order a side order of fries!! The all blacks were due to play SA that night but as it was taking place in SA, i couldn't last the distance to stay up til 2 and watch them. When we trudged downstairs highly pessimistic on the Sunday we were greeted by the welcome sight of the Kiwi bus right outside the hostel. It felt like dunkirk as the masses of backpackers charged out to get aboard the buses and we gaped indisbelief as the driver told us that it wasn't yet certain we would get through the LOTR's style single track pass round a mountain. Thankyfully we were through and the bus cheered. We spent the sunday night in christchurch before our flight to Auckland the next day. Went for a bit of go-karting on the monday morning, Taz proved to be the sunday driver i expected him to be (ok well maybe a slight exaggeration) but a couple lappings took place, though he won a small victory in keeping me behind him for 2 laps and celebrated with a single fist in the air which was swiftly replaced so he could take on the next hairpin. The flight to Auckland was at 10 so we arrived there pretty late at night, shared a shuttlebus to the city with numerous other people only to find after a drop-off that the driver spoke no english, did not know his way around and could not reverse his minibus with the trailer it had on the back. We spent a good 15 minutes trying to guide him in reversing until he had the audacity to get exasperated with us and drove further into the road only to find there was an easy way out at the end!! We spent the next day getting to know Auckland which was a lot bigger than we expected, but again felt we had covered it in a day so the idea of a flight to fiji the next morning was a matter of significant excitement. We headed down to the hostel bar for a quiz on the night, resigned to winning the priuze for the best team name as opposed to winning the actual quiz, however much to our surprise (the bouncers didn't help us that much we promise) we won the whole thing and the 60 dollar bar tab went down very sweetly. We got to the airport for our flight to fiji and i would love to say it went without a hitch but it proved to be a bit of a spoiler. A kiwi girl sat on the end of our row next to the aisle, threw a strop in order for us to allow her to sit next to the window and proceeded to cough, sneeze and sniff her way through the flight. I thought that it didn't bode well and as predicted by thursday morning, i was feeling pretty damn rough. It was perhaps slightly influenced by the prior nights activities, but how often am i going to be in fiji is the question i asked myself. We met a few girls at our hotel, one of whom turned out to be the owners daughter, we ended up going out with them and some fellow kiwis along with some aussies and americans, and needless to say, we did our country proud. We were accompanied in a minibus to a club by a couple of burly fijian blokes who we were informed were security from the americans hotel, and we were wondering what we had gotten ourselves into. The club doors opened to reveal cheap lighting and disco balls, a shady corner full of fijians and a bar that had actual bars leaving only about a foot of space through which drinks and money could be exchanged! A couple of the local blokes came and spoke to us with their limited english and some drinks were had in the fijian way, they down their beer in double shot glasses. We weren't surprised to find out they were rugby players, one of them declared himself a number 2 and then much to his pleasure added on the word 'hooker' with a glint in his eye to suggest he knew the other usage of the word. We got back with no problems though. The next two days could only be described as chillaxing though, the various hammocks at the back of the hostel just before the beach proved to be vastly entertaining as they certainly aren't as easy as they look. We spent a lot of time with the kiwi girls we had met so when it came to saturday morning and our trip to Mana ('magic') island, it felt a bit wierd leaving. We had booked two days on Mana island and a local boat took us there and it was absolutely stunning. We were greeted by others who were staying at the hostel and a few of the men who worked there, we shared some traditional Kava (rumoured to have, shall we say, relaxing effects) and water, and the tone for the two days was set when the leader of the blokes introduced himself as Patrick, the man on his left as Robert, and the next man as Roberts boyfriend. It was like being welcomed into a family, the boss looked a lot like the actor martin lawrence with a massive white smile and the catchphrase 'have some more' which had clearly taken on cult status and was used by everyone at usually inappropriate times. Patrick and robert proved to be aabsolutely fantastic value for money, taz and i puzzled over their actual jobs but it seemed to be chiefly to keep us amused. This wasn't a fancy resort though, the dorm we were in was an extension on their own house, so the 20 or so guests were welcomed with open arms. We had some traditional fijian food for lunch which we couldn't identify (and probably wouldn't have eaten had we known what it was) before being taken in a small boat round to Sunset beach which funnily enough was the perfect place to catch the last rays and watch the sun go down. We headed back for some dinner before the main event of the night, a crab race. 20 or so had been collected on sunset beach and we were invited to choose our champion for the race, Taz and i were at the back of the queue and so ended up with some rather small ones who were miserable failures (although they did come 2nd and 3rd last in the final race where the idea was to be the last out of the circle). The cold that i'd inherited off the kiwi girl from the plane had turned close to fluey ( i couldn't make up my mind if it was the best place to have a cold or the worst place), so i had a pretty early night and taz went to meet some girls we'd met from NZ who were staying at a resort just down the beach. The next day was again sepnd re4lazing on the beach and another early night for me yesterday (sunday) saw our day to depart Mana arrive just as my sickness was departing. After waking up feeling refreshed, we decided to do something on our last morning which took the form of renting a jet ski, the first 20m's, getting out of the shallows were quite hairy as we tried to get some sort of balance but then we were off and out of there, me at the wheel and taz gripping on to me a bit too hard for my liking! The 10 minutes we had were exhilirating before the bloody thing suddenly lost the ability to turn and we were blowing on our the help whistle for a tow back to the beach. The bloke handed over a refund for the time we had missed with no issues and we hopped on the boat back to the mainland and here i am summing up the past few days now. With a night time flight to LA tomorrow i think i'm going to head back out to catch a few more rays!
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