Wow wow wow.......what can I say!!

Fiji is amazing, the last 2 weeks have been totally perfect. We have loads to tell so will explain each island at a time.

WAYA LAILAI

We transferred to our new island in the morning after our night at Bounty. It was a lovely place with a small beach covered in palm trees and hammocks, the accommodation was set back on various grass levels up the mountain. We did a little sunbathing and swimming in the sea to get settled in. Afterwards, Adds and I took part in a weaving lesson on the beach and made some jewellery from banana leaves with the local ladies. After that it started to rain so we grabbed the first people we saw, a couple called Simon and Lucy and headed to the bar. We sat there for 8 hours drinking Fijian beer very slowly and playing games. After dinner we were treated to some Fijian dancing by the local community, it was hilarious, the fire dance involved the local men accidently spraying the small crowd with kerosene and setting their grass skirts on fire. Mental.

MATACAWALEVU

The following day began with a bumpy, wet boat ride to the next island where the accommodation was aptly named, Long Beach, for obvious reasons. We had an 8 bed dorm to ourselves which was nice. The afternoon was spent walking down the aforementioned Long Beach. Typically, as we reached the end it started to rain, this was not any old rain, this was a monsoon! Funnily enough, a 2 week holiday with this kind of weather would normally leave us devastated, but when you're travelling it's par for the course and it was just rather funny and pretty refreshing. After running the 20 minute stretch back to our dorm, not easy when laughing your head off the whole time, we read (well, Adds slept) for three hours until dinner. The awkward dinner that night with the 5 other guests on the island was pretty painful so we made our excuses soon after we finished.

TAVEWA

We were up at 8 for breakfast and made a dash, in the rain, for the dining hall where we ate our freshly baked pink bread! One of the guys set up a basket weaving session for us, which Adds found very manly........! They tansferred us to the big yellow boat (Yasawa Flyer which we board every time we move somewhere else). At the next place, Coral View Resort, the rain stopped for a while but carried on soon after, soooooo......to the bar once again. This time with Hannah, Mike and Sally. We played drinking games and generally got to know eachother.

NACULA

Friday saw us transfer to the next stop, Safe Landing Resort. The sun actually came out!!!!! The food in this place was crap but we had booked to stay for 2 days so we had to deal with it. First meal was scrambled egg and plain rice......mmmmmmm tasty! The reason we were staying is because there was an annual Islands rugby sevens tournament (14 teams) the following day. Our team were the favourites as the manager had scouted 5 players from the Fijian national rugby sevens team from the mainland. These guys were staying at our small resort and sung to us at night, FYI, massive rugby players with guitars, singing at the top of their lungs and harmonizing is funny. Fact.

The following day we were up at 7am and got on a small boat to another island, it was cold and wet and we lost the first game. The place was electric, filled with hundreds of Fijians. It was particularly enjoyable as it felt pretty authentic as opposed to some of the evening entertainment that was purely for tourists. After lunch the sun came out and we started to win. By 5pm we'd won the tournament and everyone was celebrating. The 5 of us (Lucy, Simon, Cedric, Adds and I) had loads of pictures taken with the team before heading back to the resort for more celebrations. When we got back we watched a beautiful sunset and had dinner (more egg) then watched the locals perform a brill set of dances with the cutest kids. A few drinks were consumed and we decided to stay another night.....! We promptly changed our minds when the manager decided to be a pig. More on that when we see you in person.

NANUYA LAILAI

Next stop was Gold Coast Resort, we were now travelling as a group of 6. The place was really cute, very basic 5 bed dorms with mosquito nets and no electricity or bathroom doors.....! We were served lunch and the other people were given tuna and noodles, we were so excited until our scrambled egg and rice came out.....I cried out in a warbled yell, "I'm not a vegetarian", and Hannah shouted "Aagh, I eat fish!". The guy explained he wasn't expecting us so that's all they had, then for sone unknown reason me and Hannah burst into tears, it was ridiculous so we laughed over the tears for about an hour. After lunch we walked down the beach and found a tea shop where a lively Fijian lady cooked us a fesh chocolate cake.....! We sat on the beach chatting until sunset, it was perfect. After dinner that night (chicken curry yay) we had an early night and decided to set our alarms for 5.15am and all get up and watch the sunrise together. We all made it and it was so lovely and peaceful, we were proud of ourselves for making ourselves get up. Then the girls went back to bed until breakfast and the boys had a beach nap ha ha, hardcore! Afterwards we walked 45 mins to a STUNNING location called Blue Lagoon and it was just that, white sand, crystal clear water and lush greenery topped off with royal blue sky and a few token white fluffy clouds, just for the photos! The yellow boat was 4 hours late this day, as you can imagine we were devastated :) yeah right! The luxury resort that we were using was brilliant and they allowed us to eat lunch there which was really yummy. We got Thai flavoured chicken burgers and salad.

NAVITI

We all decided on Korovou Eco Resort for the next island stop which was a great decision. The food was fab and they had a fresh water swimming pool which was much appreciated as the sea in Fiji is so warm and doesn't cool you down at all.....hard life I know. We had a 32 bed dorm which was surprisingly good and showers filled with worms and bugs, not so nice. We sat up until midnight playing cards and talking rubbish.

WAYA LAILAI

Even though we'd already spent a night here Hannah hadn't and she really wanted to go, we decided it'd be nice to see the place in the sunshine so off we went. We spent the day chilling out in the sun then played some more games before the evening BBQ. The next morning I, unfortunately spent most of the time on the loo.....nice! It was time to say bye bye to Hannah too which was sad but we sent her off to NZ with a list of people to help her set up home for the year.

WAYA

The 5 of us that remained from our group were really excited as it was now time to make our visit to Octopus Resort which we'd heard on the grapevine was the best we would find. We weren't dissapointed. On our arrival, the sun beat down on our shoulders and the locals welcomed us with their guitars and happy faces on the beach. We were handed an ice cold fruit cocktail, shown to our amazing dorm (air conditioned with single beds instead of bunk beds). We made a quick exit to reception and booked a second night. Lunch was amazing, so much choice. Most of us had fish and chips (best I've ever had). Then we lay by the pool on a huge sun lounger built for about 20 people with a big squishy matress on top. The peace was quickly ruined when a spider the size of the palm of your hand appeared as I unrolled my beach towel. Cedric attempted to come to the rescue by snatching a pink plastic spade from the kids' play box and swinging for the spider. Had he been on target the spider would not have stood a chance...however he missed and the force of his swing instead snapped the spade clean in two, whilst the spider calmly crawled away and disappeared under the sun lounger. Needless to say nobody felt 100% relaxed lying there for the rest of the afternoon. That evening, following our first hot shower in a week, we got dressed up and went to the dining room for dinner, a 3 course Indian banquet nontheless. The manager ended up sitting with us and suggested we help him try out some wine he's thinking of putting on the drinks menu. Well we could hardly say no could we? So 3 free bottles of wine wasn't a bad start. Then our luck continued with the beach party games. Adds came joint 1st in the limbo and snagged us a bottle of bubbly, me and him won this ridiculous balloon game which meant we'd won 2 Fijian massages. After this was a boys v girls race in which the boys won a jug of cocktails for the 5 of us. Next up was some silly game where you get into pairs and make animal shapes that they shout out and Simon and lucy won a champagne lobster beach dinner for the following night....... we'd agreed to share out all our prizes between the 5 of us and this made a nice little addition to the pot. All in all it was an amazing night. We played killer pool then went to bed.

The following day was spent similarly, sunbathing by the pool. Some friends we'd met a few days ago also turned up. Lucy and I went for the amazing massages which involved a massage of the normal body bits plus head, tummy button, nose, ears and lips, very odd! So relaxing though and we came out feeling very relaxed, smelling of coconut and about 97% waterproof from all the oil. Good job really as it was raining, meanwhile Adds had taken part in a Fiji vs Rest of the World volleyball match. They didn't win but I have it on good grounds that Adds was particularly spectacular (if coated from head to toe in hand). In the evening we'd asked the manager if we could all sit together (just us 5) and share 3 normal dinners (worked out well as it was a delicious fish pie) and the lobster dinner for 2. He agreed and set us up a big candle lit table for 5 with waiter service......IT WAS AMAZING!!!!!!! We then got really drunk and the boys made a beach bonfire before proceeding to have another beach nap. We got to bed after 4am so it must have been a good night :)

NANUYA BALAVU

Our final destination was Mantaray Resort, we'd saved it until last as me and Adds could get a 2 person treehouse for only 2 pounds extra. The treehouse was great and it was nice not sharing a room with loads of people, although the term treehouse was being applied in the loosest possible fashion. The food was fairly average here but the beach was stunning. We spent a lot of time being sad that we were leaving our friends the following day.

NADI

Our final day was spent, yes, you guessed it, sunbathing. We were transferred at 2.30pm to the big yellow boat after saying our goodbyes to Cedric, the Swiss German we've been travelling with. Lucy and Simon came aboard with us and got dropped off at Bounty for their last 2 nights. A few tears were shed as we arranged to go to theirs for a dinner evening next year. We arrived in Nadi at 6pm and after they lost Adds daypack then managed to find it again, we were on our way back to Nomads where we spent our first night two weeks ago.

The following morning (this morning) we caught a local bus into town for lunch then wandered, very slowly in the heat, back to the hostel just in time to avoid the tropical downpour. We are now sat in Nadi airport waiting for our flight to Melbourne where Uncle Peter is collecting us. We've been talking about the next week and are VERY excited about spending it with familiar faces and in a real life house! Hope we can get some pictures uploaded for you too, fingers crossed.

Big hug and lots of love to everyone.

The two tremendously tanned travellers

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