ARRIVING IN SAMOA, DAY ONE

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And now the tropical bit begins. Thirty-one degrees of tropicality to be precise. Now I’ll be honest, but I hate the tropics. That probably sounds odd given that pretty much everywhere I go is in the tropics, but I can’t stand the heat and especially the humidity, I just put up with it because that’s where all the best wildlife is. All things considered I’d rather be in Iceland. But the tropics are what call me and there’s nothing I can do about it.



Samoa’s international airport is 35km from the capital Apia, and most people take a shuttle for 25 Tala or a taxi for 60 or so. The other option, the one I and exactly no-one else on the plane took, is to walk fifty metres out of the airport building onto the road outside and catch a local bus for 3 Tala. (There are roughly 1.9 Tala to one New Zealand dollar, according to XE.com). The bus takes about an hour to get to Apia – cheaper usually does mean slower – so I had plenty of time to scenery-watch. The only birds I could note down firmly were common and jungle mynahs, red-vented bulbuls and Polynesian triller. I did see a Samoan fantail and what was almost certainly a Samoan starling, but because they are both endemics I pretended I didn’t so that I could see them for the “first time” in better viewing conditions than from a bus window.



From the bus Samoa reminded me of the Lesser Sundas; same sort of villages and in-between bits. But as soon as we hit Apia it reminded me immediately of Aranui where I grew up in Christchurch. I swear you could take a street from Apia, plonk it down in eastern Christchurch (pre-quakes) and nobody would notice. I was staying at the Hotel Elisa, in the hidden-out-the-back budget rooms of course, which were 50 Tala per night. They were very budget but a penny saved etc. Samoa is actually a relatively expensive place, especially in comparison to southeast Asia. When I went looking for something to eat I found a major difference to Asia: no food stalls! It was so bizarre, the whole place looked like there should be little stalls on every corner but instead there were just tourist restaurants. Eventually I found a cheap Philippines place which became my regular eatery. In the evening that place was closed so I ended up at Samoa’s only McDonalds where I discovered that you apparently can’t order burgers by themselves, only as a part of meals. The girl at the counter got very confused, and then I got very confused when she started trying to explain the system and how she could replace drinks with extra burgers, and somehow I ended up walking out with two single cheeseburgers, two double cheeseburgers and two lots of fries, all of which cost me 30 Tala which I could have used to buy real food at one of the restaurants. So that was (supposed to be) my only foray into Samoa McDonalds.



Before that though I had tried my hand at sea-watching from the foreshore walkway. It might have helped to have had a scope because the few birds I did see out there were too far away for binoculars. I did see a wandering tattler very close up on the rocks though, and also lots of snake-eyed skinks.

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Photos

Red-vented bulbul (Pycnonotus cafer)
these two photos were actually taken later in the trip but I needed something for this entry. Bulbuls are called manu palagi in Samoan: the white man's bird, because they are introduced.