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Ok, so we are actually back in cold cold England now, but we thought we would write a bit about the last couple of stops on our trip- just so we can look back in 10 years and remember!
We left New Zealand on 8th February, and arrived in Nadi late at night. We were picked up by Fi- our tour operator (who asked us to buy gin and chocolate from the duty free- hmm!) and taken to a hotel for the night. We were pretty tired and got up at 6.30am to catch a bus the next morning, so I couldn;t even tell you the name of the hotel or the area where we stayed. We caught the 'Yellow Boat' (it leaves once a day from the mainland to the islands) the next morning and sat on the sun deck for the entire 4 hours. I had taken some of my mystery yellow tablets from Thailand (supposedly for sea sickness) which knocked me out for the majority of the journey. 4 hours later we arrived at our island 'Nacula' and I was a little sunburned to say the least.
Our accommodation was pretty basic. We had our own little 'Bure' (or hut to you and me) with an en-suite (a toilet and a pipe type cold shower) and plenty of ants and lizards. Fiji was probably the hottest place we had been and I was sweating within minutes of arriving. We were fed 3 times a day as there were no shops or restaurants. Being the constant grazer that I am, I was wasting away by 4pm! We spent the majority of the week sunbathing in hammocks (there is not a lot else to do!) but we did manage to fit in a trip to church and sunday school, which was fantastic even though it was all in Fijian. We also went on a cave trip, which involved swimming in dark deep caves and then swimming through an underwater tunnel to another cave (I wimped out at this point!) We also took a trip to the nearby 'Blue Lagoon' where the film 'Castaway' was filmed. The beach here was gorgeous and the snorkling was fantastic. Millions of fish all over the place, coloured corals and blue star fish which were my personal favourite.
The Fijians who ran our resort were fantastic fun throughout the week. Every night after dinner we did the 'Bula Dance' and the 'Snake Dance' which got slightly boring by the 3rd night we were there. I took matters into my own hands and taught them the 'Macarena' (I still remember from the days of youth club disco's). So from then onwards, we did the Bula Dance, the Snake Dance AND the Macarena. Every. Night.
We experienced a couple of Kava ceremonies. Kava is a traditional Fijian herbal drink made from pepper root and it's mixed with water. There is lots of clapping and shouts of 'Bula' before you drink the mixture and it supposedly makes you feel calm and relaxed. To be honest, it just made my tongue feel fuzzy and it tasted HORRENDOUS. It can only be described as muddly water. Yuck. But you have to try these things!!
At the end of the week we were quite sad to leave our beautiful island, although I was very much looking forward to some comforts such as a sand and bug free bed.
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