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Bula from Fiji!!!
We had an 8 and a half hour flight from Hawaii which made a stop off in Samoa, which looks amazing. The flight wasn't the best, I was sat next to a fat Samoan who smelt twice as worse as Graham Morgan and every time he exhaled we could feel our body dying from the inside, it was that unbearable that we spent most of the flight with our blanket pulled up over our nose and mouth! Anyway once we arrived in Nadi we got off the plane to be greeted by 3 Fijians playing the local instruments and singing to us welcoming us to their country. The place where we are staying is quite a distance away so we jumo on one of the local buses after being told that it is quite an experience. The bus was so much fun, it pulled up and we noticed that it looked about 30 years old and had no windows! We were the only white people on board so was a little bit sceptical at first but everyone on board was friendly as hell, they all made an effort to speak to us and we even had a sweet old woman in front of us (with the best moustache I have ever seen) pointing out every Church we went past! The bus was meant to take about 2 hours but ended up taken just over 3 hours as true to Fijian time every time we stopped the driver seemed to go on walk about and must have done his shopping or something at every stop. There are only a couple of major roads that have been finished so most of our journey was spent flying along dirt and gravel tracks, it was great fun! When we did arrive at the Beachouse (by this time it was pitch black out!!) All the locals on board lent out of the windowless windows and waved goodbye to us, most friendly people ever.
We didn't really do much on our first night as we had spent most of the day travelling but we went to the bar for some food and a pint and was quite happily surprised at how cheap things were. We are staying in a hut which is built Fijian style by using Bamboo, its ace. It doesn't really keep out the wildlife though and on the first morning I had a Gecko jump in my hair when Jodie scared him! Next morning we got up to have an explore and have a look around. The beach looks quite nice, although it is really overcast so the sea doesn't look very torquise. We have a few hammocks scattered around, a couple of hammock seat type of things and 2 rope swings. The pool looks ok but is a lot smaller than it looked in the pictures but the whole place is huge and is properly like paradise, every building is built like local huts hidden between palm trees with a big rain forrest in the back ground, we have fallen in love with the place. We headed down to the beach to have a look around and all along the sand there and little crabs hermit crabs running around. The place we are staying is in an area called the Coral Coast so all the way up the coast for miles is coral, we expected it to be quite far out but its right by the shore so that stops the tide coming in very much so you can walk out for ages and the water will only go up to your waist and that is at high tide. Its a bit of a shame because theres not loads of fish there and because it is so shallow then you can't really swim anywhere. We are not going to do very much here apart from just relax so for the rest of the day all we done was chilled in the hammocks with a book, swam in the pool and played pool. That night we went to the bar and had our meals and then got speaking to a few other guest and Blicks the barman (who is a legend, he has the funniest laugh I heard in a long time!) over drinks, the place has such a good atmosphere, everyone is just relaxed and chilled out.
On the Monday we checked out the activites board after breakfast. There is a couple of things on there that we are interested in and we plan on doing the coconut weaving today. This wasn't until 1 so we had most of the morning to do what we wanted which was to just lie back in the hammocks and do absolutely nothing! We went to the coconut place at about quarter to 1 but an hour after the guy was meant to be there he still wasn't, proper Fijian time! We gave up waiting in the end but spoke to other people and apparently he never showed! We didn't really do anything all day apart from relax and swim a bit and then at night we sat with a few people and had a couple of drinks with them.
The weather hasn't been too good here so we haven't been able to do everything here. It has been raining quite a bit so the snorkeling has not been very good as the visibility aint the best. Today is another not so good day so we sat in the hammocks and went to the pool in the morning. We wanted to the coconut jewellery but the guy never showed again, I've heard about Fijian time but 2 days late is pushing it a bit! Later on in the afternoon the Heavens opened and from about late afternoon till we went to bed the rain just never stopped, it was chucking it down. Because of the rain most of the widlife headed for shelter so we had a few pets that night, we had a giant (and I mean giant!!) spider on the spare bed, he was that big that you could make out all his details and see his fangs from a good way away from him. We also had a couple of Gecko's in with us who as soon as we turned the light off started 'talking' to each other and kept us up for ages. They were like a couple of kids because as soon as we made some noise or they thought we were coming towards them then they went all quiet until they knew we were back in bed! We had gone for a couple of drinks after tea so needed to use the toilet a bit more than usual. The toilets are all shared so it is about a 3 minute walk there and because of the weather there were loads of frogs out, every step you took 2 or 3 frogs were jumping out from under you feet!
We spent the morning just relaxing on the hammock and swimming hoping that today we would be able to do the coconut weaving. We just totally chilled out till about 1 o'clock and then went over to see if the coconut guy had turned up, and this time he had! We were the first one's to sit with him but were joined by a few English couples. I didn't really expect much from the coconut weaving but the guy was ace! If he went to Britain he would make a fortune at parties (although I guess there aren't too many coconut trees around to weave from!). He started off showing us how to make small things, like a whistle, but I still didn't pick it up and my whistle never made any noise :-( The guy showed Jodie how to do a bracelet so she picked that up really quick and got on with that, in the meantime he showed me how to make a grasshopper but I still couldn't get it! I did learn how to weave a fan/fly swatter and made most of it on my own (well the easy bit). In the end the guy showed us how to weave a hat, handbag, bowl, grasshopper, bird, fish, whistle, a ribbon that goes on top of pressies, Christmas decorations and a fan so he was a pretty talented guy! After we were all weaved out we spent the afternoon chatting to a few guys we met and read our books, Jodie got through an entire book in one day!. After dinner all the lads had a big game of killer pool which didn't finish until midnight and a few of us were quite worse for wear (me included!) while all the girls sat outside on the tables and gossiped about us!!
After breakfast we signed up for a jungle trek with all the people we met yesterday. Were not really too sure what to expect with the jungle trek but know that there is a waterfall at the end of it. We met our guide at 10 who is part of the village just up the road (all the money from this trek goes into the village, which was good) We walked up a steep slippery muddy hill right by the entrance of our resort, the guy told us that this was a shortcut which seemed a little strange as it took a lot more effort than just walking up the road but we later realised that he was just putting us through our paces to see if we would be able to manage the jungle. We walked along the main highway for a little while and saw some great views of the coast (this was the first real sunshine we had so we could actually see the beaches etc without the grey cloud above!) and then turned off at the local village. Our guide sat us down on the outskirts of the village and told us how it was built up thanks to a load of Korean's that came to the country and donated loads of money to build a school. The people here are so religeous and they thank God for sending them money in the form of Korean men, they think the only reason they got the money was all down to God which I thought was a little strange. After our talk we walked through the village and said hello to all the kids then made our way to the jungle. The trek we had to follow was so slippery, it had rained for the past 4 days so no one had any grip what so ever, surprisingly though we didn't actually fully deck it but other people did! The jungle is full of all different kinds of things, there are mango trees, pineapples being grown, a heap load of bamboo shoots and some of the villagers were in the middle of building homes in the middle of it all. The trek was a lot more difficult then we imagined, it took us about an hour and a half to get to the waterfall and it involved us wading through rivers and climbing some steep terrain. Once we all got to the waterfall though we were a little bit disappointed, the waterfall didn't really look like it did in the photo back at the beachouse but this was apparently because it had rained loads when that photo was taken. The waterfall was still pretty impressive and it was good, it was deep enough to swim in and some people thought it was deep enough to jump in but they all hit the bottom. We chilled and swam around the waterfall for abouth an hour before making our way down the same trail back. On the way back we saw our guides horse and the baby foal that had just been born. The hike back wasn't half as long as we didn't stop every two minutes to check things out but it was still a long way. All in all it took us about 4 hours to get there and back, it was a great day out. When we did get back we were all shattered, the first thing everyone done was head straight for the bar to get a nice cold refreshing drink and a big slap up meal. For the rest of the day we just kicked back in the hammocks and chatted to the group of English people we had met. That night Jodie had an early night as she was shattered from today but I went back out and stayed up till 1ish playing killer pool, im usually not too fussed about tournaments but when there is a jug of beer for the winner in it then I am fully involved!
Next morning our bodies were aching from the hike yesterday. All we wanted to do was just to stay in bed and do absolutely nothing. We did eventually drag ourselves up out of bed and headed out to swap our bed for a hammock! We chilled out all day till about 3 in the afternoon then went and joined Catherine and Adam and spent the rest of the day with them. Towards late afternoon a group of 35 and a group of 25 people checked in so the whole Beachouse was absolutely heaving, you couldn't get near a hammock or anything. Me and Jodie had spent all day with Adam and Catherine and had stayed in the same seats for 7 hours! Me and Adam played in the, now daily, killer pool tournament. We headed to bed at about 1 but the group of 25 Americans were still up in the bar partying and kept everyone up, I went back to the bar at about quarter to 2 to ask if they could turn the music down a bit and I have never seen Blicks, the barmen, look so happy at someone complaining. They had to stay up till the Americans had finished but had o be back up for work at about 7 so I think he was glad of the excuse to try and wind it down abit!
We are leaving the Beachouse today and heading to Nadi for a few days before going on to one of the Islands. We got up earlier then usual for breakfast so we could be checked out on time. The barmen did not look happy when we arrived and were trying to scrub the whole place. We found out that the Yanks didn't finish till after half 3 and had completely wrecked the bar area and the pool. Thank God we are leaving today otherwise I would have probably drowned the b******s! After we checked out we spent the morning with Catherine and Adam and then got a shuttle straight to our next place with the chef! We have fully loved the Beachouse, if the Yanks weren't here then we would never have wanted to leave, the place is absolutely amazing and if anyone is heading to Fiji then I definately recommend staying here for a while.
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