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This morning we were picked up by the big green bus once more for another action packed day of activities with our guide T, before reaching Suva just after sundown.
Our first stop was to get some lunch to take with us on our trek as we were told we would be on the move all day and as we'd missed breakfast we made the executive decision to get a toasted sandwich as we thought it wouldn't take too long to cook or eat. Darren however had different ideas and twenty minutes later as our stop was coming to an end his full English fry arrived on the table! The lady in the restaurant managed to find him a paper plate so he ate a full breakfast on the bus with his fingers while everyone around him had sandwiches!
From the supermarket we had the option to either trek through the rain forest or take the long boat up to the rain forest. We all decided to trek so we got off our coach and into the back of a pickup truck to get to the start of the trek as normal cars and coaches couldn't go up the road. Let's just say it was a tad bumpy!
When we got to the start of the trek we were told it would take about three hours and was divided into three fairly distinct sections. The first section was basically a clay trek with logs over creeks that were covered in moss and slime! There might have been plenty to see, but we were all concentrating so hard on not sliding over that we only managed to see a couple of parrots. And as if things weren't difficult enough, half way along the first section, one of Jen's contact lenses fell out which made the next two and a half hours very interesting for her!!
After the clay bit came the rainforest where 'Anacondas' was filmed (we still find it hard to believe that they could justify making a sequel) and the colours were amazing - even for one-eyed captain Jen. It was pretty special to know that we were in our first proper rainforest tramping through mud, tripping over trees and ducking under vines etc! Half way through the forest we came across a creek that we waded in to assuming that it would just be a quick inconvenience and we would soon be on dry land again but this turned out to be little more than wishful thinking and we spent the next half an hour walking along the creek bed. Most of the time the water only came up to our ankles but every now and then we could hear a squeal from the front of the group as somebody 'discovered' a deep pool and lost a leg up to their waist!
The final section of the trek headed down to the river along the edge of the forest. The view was amazing as it looked down onto the river but we had very little opportunity to enjoy it as the track was so steep and slippery that everyone had to concentrate on staying upright. Along the most difficult sections there was a rope that been hooked into the rock and through poles that were cemented into the ground but even this didn't prevent people from sliding all over the place because there was so much slack and give in it. Eventually we all got down to the river bed despite David's best efforts to knock us all down like dominos and Melanie's efforts to swing Darren over the edge when she forgot to let go off the rope!
Once we were safely on level ground we had our lunch and then went for a swim to cool ourselves down. The water was like ice and even after a few minutes to acclimatise it still didn't get any better and we were all freezing! It was very odd though to be able to swim in one direction and not actually get anywhere due to the current. It was like being on a swimming treadmill! When we had all finished our lunch and had a chance to recover from the trek, we got in our huge rubber rings and floated down the river and over some rapids for half an hour or so until we reached a waterfall and had to disembark.
We swam across the river to the waterfall which was pretty tuff because of the current and then some of us spent the next hour throwing ourselves off a ledge above the first smaller waterfall into the freezing cold water! A few attempted jumping into the pool that the massive waterfall flowed into but it was even colder so that didn't last too long! After messing about in the water for a while we all got into long boats and floated down the river to where our bus was waiting. It wasn't until this part of the day did we actually realised how far we had gone through the forest!
On the drive into Suva we told T about our plans to go over to some of the less visited places just off the mainland, to which she got very excited and gave us the number of her aunt who lived on one of them and told us that she would put us up for a few nights! Once we got to Suva we were shown a few of the sights, such as the US Embassy (we all call it McDonalds) and then it was onto our chosen hostel where we are planning to stay for a couple of nights before heading off to the eastern islands.
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