Ah ha! Top prizes to all those who noticed the notes we had written to jog our memory when writing the Cooks and Fiji entry were - due to a little finger trouble, published for all to see! Bugger. Ah well, below is the finished article, as finished as it will ever be anyways.
Right, this one should be nice and short as we didn't do a whole bunch on Raratonga in the Cook Islands and achieved even less in Fiji. A proper holiday. After arriving at Raratonga international airport which is unsurprisingly tiny, we collected our baggage then went out to meet our pickup. Whilst waiting in the queue for immigration we were entertained by a little local guy playing calypso and singing which was cute - methinks he was a little worse for the local moonshine! Most of the other passengers were met by their accommodation reps who gave them tropical island flower necklaces which was a nice touch. Our driver however was a grumpy large local woman, who didn't come bearing flowers, wasn't into the island welcome thing and blatantly wished she was somewhere else! Never mind, this is backpacker hospitality. After a short drive we arrived at our accommodation which is just about on the beach and beside the beautiful lagoon about 3 feet deep that stretches all the way out to the reef about 1/2 a mile away. This lagoon encircles the entire island and as a result there is plenty of great snorkeling.
After spending the first day worrying if the rain would ever let up we were finally blessed with some decent weather (i.e. not rain!). To celebrate we booked ourselves on the Raro Safari tour which is a pretty good way to explore the island, it's not that big with only one road all the way around and you could drive the full circuit in less than an hour. Bundled in the back of a land rover we were driven to various highlights, the first major attraction being the sewage treatment plant (what?!) then onto a vantage point giving a birds eye view of the prison..... Hmmm, the guide seemed keen to show us these, finally we moved onto the more traditional sightseeing fodder of historical cultural sites and look out points with great views of the island. All the way round the driver kept stopping and telling us to reach up to pick the various fruit growing on the trees beside the road - scrumping is what we used to call it! It was amazing the variety of different fruit and veg we saw - and pinched! Finally we arrived at the tour depot (more like a lean to/hut) and were cooked a fantastic BBQ - the whole thing was a great day out and the guides were great even if there choice of highlights was a little leftfield!
The next two days we were virtually confined to barracks because of the rain. This gave us a chance to catch up on our reading, also to try to think of something to occupy us for the rest of our stay should the weather not change.... In the end we decided to do our PADI open water diving certificate, not because we wanted to do it that much but more because a) it was cheap, and b) it would give us something to do for 2 or three days and it really doesn’t make any difference if it's raining when you are 10 meters below the surface! Luckily on the first day of the course the weather improved significantly so there we were stuck in a classroom when the sun was shining! Nuts. After two days of hard graft in and out of the water both of us had pretty much had enough of it! This wasn't helped by the rolling seas that meant as soon as you got on the boat after a dive you got to feeling pretty seasick! That coupled with the 'I'm a dive master don’t you know' attitude of the dive centre staff was giving us the hump so we decided to take a day off - this is supposed to be fun isn't it? To cut a long and quite possibly boring story short - we are now qualified PADI open water divers but so sick of diving we probably won't actually use the qualification for a while! The whole thing did however solve the problem of what the hell to do for 8 days on a rainy tropical island!
During our stay Valentines Day came around and to treat ourselves we booked into reputedly the best restaurant on the island! Apparently just a short walk down the road, the restaurant forms part of a new resort. So off we set in good time just before dusk wearing our best 'going out to dinner' travelers gear. Now; on a cloudy night on a remote island that only has a casual attitude towards streetlighting it gets very dark, so dark in fact you can't see the road you are trying to walk along. Not deterred by the sudden and almost total absence of light coupled with the steady rain that, joy of joys, had now started to fall we walked on....and on....and on looking for a damn sign to the restaurant. Funny ha ha, apparently this new resort had neglected to advertise itself to passing traffic, and as a result we overshot by a mile. Realizing our mistake after walking around in the dark for 45 minutes and asking for directions we finally arrived soaked and muddy. On the plus side the meal was tasty, and the company good of course!
What with all the excitement of our crash diving course and impromptu glam night hiking, we opted to stay put for the last two days and relax by the beach. No great hardship and good practice for Fiji.
After another rotten flight on officially the worst airline of the trip 'Air New Zealand' - crap food, late again...ra ra ra, we arrived in Fiji, this time at 4am with no means of transportation to our accommodation until 8am. The cunning nightshift of tour sales people at the airport have caught onto this traveler’s dilemma and as a result we were sold a 3 night island stay on one of the Fijian island resorts that litter the area. Thing is, at 5am tired and hungry, the thought of an all inclusive no hassle stay with transfers included seems like a great idea! And it was. We even managed to get an upgrade - dorm price for a double room - bargain! No hassle, we were taken more or less straight there on a nice boat which cruises around several other islands first, so we had a little tour of the area too. We even passed the islands that were used for Castaway starring Tom Hanks and wait for it.... 'Celebrity Love Island' with a bunch of people we all wish we hadn't heard of.
On arrival we were greeted by the standard guitar playing locals and then at reception we were upgraded again - Reeesult! This time from our double room to a self contained beach bure, kind of like a little thatched cottage right on the beach. Very very nice – double bargain!
We really didn't do anything for 4 days, ate drank and layed on the beach. Perfect. What else is there to tell? Not much. There were mosquitos - big ones! Oh the weather was nice too.
So, that’s it for the beach then, between now and April its the American west coast winter with a little snowboarding and gambling thrown in for good measure!