Island hopping in Fiji

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Mainland Nadi
We arrived to terrible Cairns-esque weather and we all thought oh no, not again! BUt this was just typical Nadi at this time of the year. We stayed at the Smugglers Cove, we met with Ryan early the following morning and had a swim and played some volleyball and american footy with the ball Guy had somehow acquired, we visited Nadi city centre and stocked up on booze and noodles (the backpackers diet). The next day we began our island trip.

Tawewa Island, Coral View Resort
We chose to travel to the most northern part of our island trip first and work our way back towards the mainland, hopping from island to island en route. This island was where I opened my first coconut with natural resources and we all got involved in international crab racing. Guy chose the crab representing Argentina and came second, winning a load of beer. We sunbathed the next day and listened to my ipod with the new travel speakers I had bought. Ryan and myself went snorkelling and then before we knew it, it was time to head off to island number two.

Nanuya Balavu Island, Manta Ray resort
Wow! This island was beautiful, better than anything I could have expected, we sat and had dinner ehilst watching the sunset from the restaurant set among the hill. Dinner was an amazing 3 course meal. The snorkelling was the best I had ever experienced and we spent all morning in the sea, we spotted two white tip reef sharks and followed them around. The next day Hev and I utilised the free kayaks to head out to an uninhabited island beach, we sunbathed and snorkelled some more then left this paradise in search of more...

Waya Island, Octopus Resort
...and how we found it! This was the resort that all the passengers on the boats get their cameras out for, as we were about to board the boat to the resort we spotted Pandora from the TV program Skins heading onto the main boat. I took some stalker style photos and we headed to the beach to a wonderful singing welcome from the resort's staff. This resort
stood proudly amongst the luscious sandy beach thatched huts; sun umbrellas; hamocks and beautiful erray of towering palm trees. This was the most beautiful sight of my travelling experience. We were supposed to spend one night here but the combination of the amazing 3 course steak dinners, the pure relaction we felt here and the lovely group of people we had met (Joe, Gemma, Kelly and Emma) staying an extra night was soon a certainty. We mainly spent our time relaxing by the pool, chatting, laughing at Emma and catching some strong Fijian raysn during the day. NIght one was spent drinking my crate of beer to drinking games and having a laugh. The next day I was in an almost comatosed state of relaxation... this was the life! A spot of snorkelling, sunbathing and scenic photos later it was dinner time. We ate in the beachside restaurant as the sun began to set. THat night was a bit messy with Joe buying a bottle of Fijian bounty rum for shots, we drank it under the star decorated sky and before we knew it we were skinny dipping in the pool. The following morning I awoke bright and early, brushed off my hangover and jumped in a small fisherman's boat for my twelth scuba dive of my trip. It was just Cookie (the instructor) and myself. He had an underwater slate and a pencil, which allowed him to write down and track everything we saw a blue spotted stingray, clown fish, a giant barracuda and as our dive was coming to an end I spotted a green turtle, which we followed during our safety stop for five mins. Guy, Ryan, Hev and myself took a scenic walk across the island to the local's village. This was a good insight into how the Fijian's live. I spent the rest of the day relaxing and laughing about the previous night with Joe and the girls by the pool. Then it was time to say goodbye and head to the next island.

Beachcomber island/resort
This island was tiny! Walking around the island was the first thing we did, this took less than ten minutes. The next day Ryan and I attempted to swim it, Ryan made it three quaters of the way and I just made it in about 25 mins. Beachcomber was known as the party island. It seemed a bit quiet at first but GUy and I began chatting to two Swedish girls and the drinking games commenced, we soon gathered a crowd of people round our table, with Lotty, Rosie and Katie warming to us the most, lots of giggling and some crazy dance moves later (especially from Guy) we ended up in the scuba diving teaching pool that wasn't allowed to be swam in recreationally... oops! Towards the end of the night we headed back to our 80 bed dorm and began monkeying around between the wooden roof slacks (almost 10m from the floor). The next day was spent sun bathing (for a change!) and then the boat arrived and we were off to the next and final island.

Mana Island, Ratu Kini resort
As we arrived, all dorm rooms were full so we got a free upgrade into two big rooms with a single and a double bed in each. Woop woop! The resort's restaurant was right on the beach which gave us beautiful views as we ate lunch and dinner. That night we met up with the three girls from beachcomber the previous night and got involved in some of the resort's bar games (limbo and sexual musical statues). I woke early the next morning for a scuba dive. The dive sight was called 'The Supermarket' and was infamous for encounters with sharks. Once again it was just myself and the instructor (Natalie this time) for a one on one scuba dive. The dive was by far the best of the trip! Almost immediately after we descended to 30m we were surrounded by grey reef sharks, giant territorial trigger fish and yellow fin barracudas. We continued swimming reaching a maximum depth of 32m around two pinnacles and spotted shoals of beautiful shiny fish, a humphead wrasse, nemos and a total of six grey reef sharks. The baby and another that was 2.5m long with its mouth open to be cleaned stuck out as dive highlights. We passed through an colourful large vertical swim through and headed back towards the boat. On the return boat journey we passed the island where the Tom Hanks film 'The Castaway' was filmed. What a great start to the day this had been! The rest of the day i spent socialising with people around the resort and learning about their backgrounds/cultures. I really enjoy learning new things about other countries and often found myself chatting away to other backpackers as Guy, Hev and Ryan sunbathed elsewhere. We caught the boat back to the mainland after winding up the neighbouring resort's security guard by sun bathing on their beach. Anal muppet! Fiji had been pure paradise, I left so relaxed I could barely walk. Next stop New Zealand's south island for some adrenalin fun!

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