Bula! (Hello, how are you and bless you in Fijian)

I arrived in Fiji Airport, Nadi (pronounced Nandi) to the sound of three men playing guitars and singing polynesian songs. They also wore flowery shirts, as well as a flower in their hair. As soon as I had passed through the arrivals gate, I was introduced to Henry, who put a shell necklace around my neck and shook my hand. Henry would be the guide on the Feejee Experience Bus that I would be on tomorrow. To avoide confusion, Fiji is spelt as Fiji, although when Captain Cook first noted the island in his journals he called it Feejee, hence the name of the bus tour.

Having had a former opionion of the Oz experience, I was quite reluctant to join the Feejee Experience. I was however assured that they are quite dissimilar and to my findings they were. I met some really great people on the bus, around my age and slightly older, which was very refreshing. Plus the pace was much more in-line with "Fiji time" (i.e. one minute is 10, 10 minutes is an hour, etc...).

My journey around the mainland of Fiji, Viti Levu, took 6 days. I opted to jump off the bus and stay for 3 nights on the Coral Coast. Here is a summary of my Feejee Experience.

Day 1: Nadi to Coral Coast

Today, it poured and it poured and it poured. Yep, I was in Fiji at the end of the rainy season. Still that did not take away from the fun, as we still managed to shop in Nadi, swim in the ocean and play touch rugby at Natadola Beach and sand boarding down the 18m high Sigatoka sand dunes. Fiji is very green and lush and in some places the relief is surprisingly high. Sugar cane fields cover the land, if it is not used for shack-style homes or farm animals. The country and it's people reminded me very much of South Africa and I was not surprised to learn from Henry that the majority of Fijians are of Tanzanian descent; whilst the majority of the remainder are of Indian descent.

The water in Fiji is warm, and as Henry put in we took a swim in a rain bath at Natadola. It was so hard to get out of the water, that whenever I did, I just had to get back in again. The shore-break was pretty heavy too and we had great fun spotting the really big waves and attempting to body-surf. As for touch rugby; well now I am an avid fan. It is such a fun game to play.

Mango Bay resort on the Coral Coast describes itself as the first Flashpackers. You would think that it is a 5-star resort, with beautiful huts, beautiful dorms with mosquito veils, and a drinks and food menu to die for. After check in and a shower, I joined my fellow bus travellers (namely Kirsty, Debbie and Tiziano) for dinner and drinks. It was traditionally Fijian cooked fish for me. Later we were entertained by a crab race - we are still sussing out how fair the race was given that they were of various sizes. The Swedish crab won in the end.

Day 2: Coral Coast

It is by no means easy to be bored at Mango Bay, especially when it was sunny - horrah! I was up early so took a walk around the corner to find a deserted sand beach and palm trees and followed that with a swim in the beautiful clear waters. Just from walking in the shallows we could see bright coloured fish and corals. So, Tizi and I doned our very attractive snorkel gear and roamed the local reef. We saw Moorish Idols, Parrot Fish, bright blue starfish and many many more fish. It was wonderful.

We took a break for lunch and were soon back on the water, aboard a sea fishing boat! Yep, the aim of the day was to catch our dinner. Brett, our skipper and very exciteable/scary fisherman first took us on a Tuna hunt, but to no avail. So, we settled with casting our lines onto a reef and catching fish there. I hauled in a Coral Trout and found the experience one of the most stressful things I have ever done in my life.

Obviously, I had lost some of the fishing skills gained from fishing for Perch in Ireland with my Grandpa George as I was a bit slow in feeling whether the fish had taken a bite. Brett caught onto the fact that I had, started shouting at me, then proceeded to haul the line from my hands and pull in the fish himself. It seems the approach to sea fishing is not a mellow one. After I had literally fed the fish my bait (yep, I thought it was current pulling on the rod, well that is what Bret told me to look out for), we decided to chase tuna again. So, the moral of the story, practice makes perfect, and I learned that I had a lot of practicing to do!

For the next three hours we proceeded to chase seagulls (and subsequently tuna) and call back to the reef only to not catch a single thing. So, we decided to head in when Freddie (one of the support fishmen) caught the eye of a sea gull; yep about 1 mile away. These local Fijians are good! In the distance yellow fin tuna jumped across the water; the best way to describe them is a very small dolphins. They were a bit to witty for us and stayed clear of the bait. The big eye (I think they're called) did not. We trawled the lines and reeled in at least 2 tuna each. I did ok at this one and hauled in a couple of tuna all by myself. The second however was the one that got away, falling from the hook just as Brett pulled it into the boat.

The pierre-de-resistance of todayreally goes to what happened next. Just as we were fishing, a huge (and I mean huge) fin appeared from the water. None of us could see what it was, so Brett drove the boat to the fin. There was we stood on the boat, fin after fin surfaced the water. Pilot whales is what we were seeing! Oh my, they were just beautiful. As the sun went down, they soon became distant and before us appeared the silty waters brought down by the rivers to the sea. The product of todays storm; being on the water meant we missed it, but the land was affected by the typical afternoon/evening rains of the rainy season in Fiji.

That night, we ate our tuna in delight. Knowing that we had personally gone out and caught the tuna ourselves gave us great satisfaction. Reading the latest National Geographic does also; I find it quite scary how are seas are being trawlled for their fish stocks. If it wasn't for this trip today, I would not even know how to catch or kill a fish myself! No doubt, I will go on eating fish from the supermarket, captured by big nets trawlling across the ocean floor. It would be nice to change that.

Kirsty, Debbie, Tizione and I played cards and had a vaery funny time doing so.

Day 3: Coral Coast

Another lovely sunny day, so I sunbathed all afternoon. Kirsty, Debbie, Tizione and I celebrated a beautiful sunset with a cocktail and dined in style.

Day 4: Coral Coast to Suva

Sadly the rains prevented us from doing the programmed 3 hour trek through the Namosi Highlands, but that did not stop us from tubing down the Nuva River. We were first taken by long boat (a long boat with a motor) approximately 40 minutes upstream.The river valley was beautiful; from the boat we could see folk working on their bilibili rafts (made from bamboo) and we waved as we passed by. In Fiji everybody waves; you wave as you walk by; you wave as you are in the bus at every body and anybody. In Fiji, each person deserves acknowledgement and every one is important as another. If you spend too long waving, you end up in conversation, which is just lovely.

At our destination, we climbed into our inflateable ruber tubes and let the river currents take us downstream for 15 minutes. The water was cool and refreshing, and the small rapids provided entertainment. From the river beach, we were ferried across the river to a waterfall pool. We dived, jumped and played in the clean and cold water; it was great fun. The long boats brought us back to our starting position.

We then arrived in Suva (the capital of Viti Levu). As it was still early in the day, Cam and Te(our new tour guides) took us on a tour of Suva. I found the intensity of industry unexpected, along with the business of the city. We stopped at the Presidents House, only for hime to be coming through the gates as we were taken pictures of the guard. Even the president wound down the window and waved to us!!

After our tour, we had time for a shower and were back on the bus at 7.00pm to be taken to the restaurant for dinner.

Day 5: Suva to Rakiraki

The initial plan was to follow the road anti-clockwise from Suva in the south-east of the island to Rakiraki (loacted on the north coast) via the east of the island. Road closure due to a mudslide from recent rains meant that we had to take the road back from Suva all around the island in a clock-wise direction to Rakiraki. It was a very long day, travelling from 8am to 7pm.

The journey was broken up with two very memorable experiences; a vist to a local school and a village. It was important to wear a sarong and long-sleeves. Saraongs are the traditional dress for both men and women in Fiji. We visted three class-rooms, with children of around 7, 10 and 6 respectively. The greeting they gave us was overwhelming; the childrens eyes so bright and their voices to eager to chat. Bringing out the cameras just raised their smiles and they were posing all over the place. The classrooms are nothing like you would see in the UK, but the children still looked impeccably smart in their uniforms, putting my old school uniform to shame. We brought along pens, pencils and paper to say thank you and to help the school on their way - some children have to walk 4 miles to school.The teachers thanked us for coming along as by talking to the children we broaden their minds. That felt worth while.

At the village we were greeted by a representative of the womens group. She showed us the Chiefs house before takeing us into the meeting house. Here we experienced traditional sevu-sevu ceremony. This involves the chief of the host sitting opposite the chief and side-man representing the visitng group. Then kava (a drink derived from the root of the kava vegetable) is made, blessed, served to the chiefs and then to the visitors. Kava looks like dirty mud water, but has an interesting affect. It causes the mouth to tingle and go numb (rather like putting olbas oil on an ulcer), then a light-headiness kicks in and your head feels slightly detached from your body, such that you body feels limp. It's a little like being stoned. I had completed a Kava ceremony on my first night in Mango Bay, so I knew a little of what to expect, but the experience was still one of a kind.

The ladies then showed us their pottery making skills, they sang and danced for us. Then we danced too. Just marvellous!

Volivoli beach was our destination for the night and turned out to be a hoot. We played lots of silly games, drank and sat by the bonfire on the beach until it started to rain.

Day 6: Rakiraki to Nadi

We had until 12.00pm to enjoy the beach at Volivoli. I was awake at 6.30am, so relaxed and enjoyed the view across the bay, before taking off on a kyak for an hour with Pierre and Dave. It was so peaceful sitting in our kyaks and chatting as the day began. Back at shore, I swam and I swam until it was time to leave. Kisrty and I said goodbye to Debbie and Tizi - a rather sad affair, because we had all got along so well and I knew I would miss such lovely people.

We stopped in the Ba region to experience the indo-fijian culture of Fiji by eating lunch at a curry house (and chomping on Ruby Murray (Curry). I opted for a traditional vegetable curry - chicken in Fiji normally comes with bones. It was very nice.

After that, it was time to experience some natural mud pools and hot springs. The route there was offroad and due to the muddy conditions resulting from the recent rains, the bus got stuck. It took us 10 minutes to walk to the pools in the rain, wading through a torrent of water as we went. The location of the pools was really quite unexpected - they were literally holes in the ground, located in a field/wooded area. A small concrete shower block provided the only shelter to change.

We ploded in our bikinis through the forest (feeling rather odd) to the pools. Getting into the mud pool felt very strange as the bottom was literally mud and I sank in it up to my knees. We proceeded to smoother ourselves to get the most from the healing qualities of the pool. The adjacent hot pool provided a bath to cleanse it and my was it hot. It felt like a bath does when you run it and realise that there was just not enough cold water running with the hot. I went bright red and had to get our before I fainted.

We changed and met the owner of the land. A local driving back in their truck was able to give us a lift back to the coach. The truck consisted of a two-man cockpit and an area covered only by taupaulin at the back. The seats were tied onto the truck with string. We tipped the local for being such a hero.

So, that brought us to the end of the tour. Cam and Te played us the Fijian farewell song as the sunset beautifully around the mountain of the sleeping giant in the Sabeto Valley. Kirsty and I enjoyed the luxury of a four-bed dorm as opposed to an 18 and slept soundly. The following day, the sun was blaring, so we sunbathed on the lounchers at the skylodge backapckers, getting up only to cool ourselves in the pool, eat lunch and ice-cream. The perfect end to a perfect holiday in Fiji.

So, last stop of the world tour is San Francisco, then home! My how time flies!

Lots of Love, Em x