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Published: October 10th 2008
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I woke up early at 6am. It seems so alien to me going to bed early and getting up early like this but it’s a really nice change.
We made it down to breakfast just as it was opening up at 7.30am (this is a first for us!) The spread looked lovely; platters of pineapple, paw paw and watermelon, cereals, coconut bread, fruit loaf, bread ready for toasting, fruit juice, meats and cheeses. I enjoyed a continental breakfast and Matt decided to order an omlette from the hot breakfast menu which cost a bit extra. This time we sat by the pool rather than in the restaurant. I was glad we could sit on our own; we’ve been so used to each others company on this trip so far that it feels like an effort sometimes to talk to other people, and at that hour in the morning before having our caffine, neither of us felt like meeting new people.
We took our time and enjoyed a cup of coffee while looking out to sea. The weather was overcast but it was still warm even at this time in the morning so after we’d finished we grabbed our books
and sat on sunloungers on the beach under a thatched umbrella. We spent the morning either reading or looking out at the water. The tide was going out and you could see some of the coral poking out of the water. A few snorkellers braved the waves to go out which cheered us up - the previous day we’d seen a sign saying no swimming because of the currents, and we’d been worried we wouldn’t be able to go out. I went and chatted to one guy as he came out of the water and he told me that it was good snorkelling and there was a steep face of coral with lots of fish.
A horn sounded to alert us to lunch and we headed into the restaurant. We sat with a NZ couple who’d been married there the previous week and we enjoyed chatting to them about where we’d been on our travels, and where they’d visited around Fiji. Matt and I both couldn’t resist the fish and chips as we’d seen somebody have it the previous day. We were disappointed and got two big chunks of wahu (a chunky white fish) in batter.
After lunch
we headed back to the loungers. After sitting for a while I decided to go out for a snorkel. I was a bit apprehensive as I haven’t been out to snorkel in the deep water from the beach before and the waves were quite big. Matt decided not to go in as his leg was hurting so I was on my own. I joined a couple of other people who were going in - they had life jackets on and were struggling with their fins and masks so I felt a bit of confidence coming back. I got in easily as the water became deep very quickly and I started swimming face down to avoid being dumped by the waves. There was an initial patch of seaweed and then quickly I was over coral. Initially it was just a few heads, but a few meters in front was a gap in the reef and I swam over to it. At the other side was a great big drop; to one side it was a clean sandy floor and to the left of me was a sheer bank of coral that was full of fish of all shapes, sizes and colours.
It was amazing - a completely different experience to the shallows of Moorea and Aitutaki.
I saw so many fish and tried to memorise which ones so that I could look on the fish card later but it’s really difficult as I kept seeing more and more. The little sgt majors were really friendly and kept coming right up to my face so I could almost touch them. I paddled around deeper and enjoyed just floating and watching. The water was choppy making it an effort to swim against the waves to go further along the reef but with fins on it wasn’t too bad. I saw parrotfish, various butterfly fish and trigger fish, trumpet fish and even a shoal of paddle tails. After a while I went in and sat next to Matt on the loungers again, but as soon as I did I realised I was missing seeing the fish, so went straight back in again for another go. This time I was a bit braver and went further out away from the other people in the water. It was all a very different experience from the lagoon snorkelling - this was harder work but there were more fish to look at than I‘d ever seen before.
By this time it was late afternoon and the cloud cover was becoming darker so we decided to head back to our bure for a while. Not long after it started to pour down and stayed that way for the whole night.
I started feeling poorly, and Matt wasn’t hungry after our big lunch so we decided to stay in. Had it been dry we’d have ventured out to see what was showing on the ‘movie night’ big screen by the pool, but with the rain it had been cancelled. It felt a shame to miss dinner but I really couldn’t face sitting at a large table eating when I felt bad - that’s a big down side of being at a resort like this. I hope I feel better tomorrow.
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