Fiji

Fiji - fabulous, friendly and fun, and it's the first time we've taken 3 flights from one place to get to another. It's a 10 hour-plus night flight from LA to Nadi on West Coast of the main island Viti Levu, but we're headed for Ovalau in Middle Fiji, so must board two more planes. The first takes us to the capital Suva on East Coast where we clamber onto a tiny eight-seater for our six-night stay in Levuka, Fiji's former capital.
There are spectacular aerial views of countless coral reefs amid aquamarine ocean on our 12-minute journey. After landing on narrow tarmac strip in field, we are met by taxi driver Moon who drives us 45 minutes on dirt track road to the old whaling outpost of Levuka - a timber-fronted town with a wealth of sea-faring history and one of the few places left in the South Pacific to have kept its original colonial buildings. It's main street fronts the sea, looming behind it are towering tropical green mountains.
We are staying at the Levuka Homestay and are met by owners John & Marilyn, a wonderful Aussie couple who fell in love with Fiji and its people years ago and decided to follow their dream by making their home here. After six days with them we felt not so much guests at their 'home from home' but friends, such was their warmth and friendliness. Their depth of knowledge of Fiji and its people gave us a real insight into the land and its culture and we left feeling we had experienced The Real Fiji.
Their multi-level homestay has four large rooms with terrace, with John & Marilyn, their four cats and parrot occupying the highest section. Their lovely staff - but more family really - include local ladies La and Matilda and gardener and Levuka expert Nox.
To call breakfast 'breakfast' is to do John & Marilyn a disservice - rather it is an event. Fresh fruit, cereal, toast, cheese and tomato, plus homemade relish, followed by freshly baked cakes and banana pancakes, with passion-fruit butter - and that's before the bacon and eggs arrive. Brekkie and conversation can take two hours. If you are feeling hungry before 7pm then there is something seriously wrong with you!
Breakfast is taken around a large table and there we're joined on the first couple of days by meidcal friends Catherine (England), Francois (France) and Katie (Canada), who are all currently working for a short spell at the hospital in Suva, and had come to Levuka to enjoy a long weekend.
Latterly, Sam and Polly join us at the table - two 27-year-olds free spirits who have quit top jobs in London to go travelling for a year. What a brave & great pair they are - these two have done more in their short time on Planet Earth than many who live to be 90. They kept us enthralled with tales of their previous adventures (one very hairy one in Malaysia in particular) and in stitches with some others (promise not to tell anyone, Sam!).
Okay, if breakfast was the real deal so were the 'sundowners' every evening on John and Marilyn's huge deck balcony overlooking the ocean - a few glasses of wine and more engaging conversation as we watched night fall over the gorgeous islands sprinkled out before us.
Eating and drinking aside, we did manage to get out and about a bit and see Levuka and a stunning island off it called Caqali (Fijians pronounce it Thungali). A 40-minute boat trip takes you to paradise - it's a tiny palmed-fringed island with a golden beach right around its perimeter which takes 15 minutes to walk around. Wildlife includes some stunning birds, while snorkelling in the warm-as-a-bath ocean around it takes you into a fantastic world of pink, orange, red and deep blue coral and fish quite literally every colour of the rainbow.
We bid Caqali farewell with a heavy heart, such was its beauty and promised we'd go back before we left. Two days later we were back - and glad we did despite the rain setting in this time around.
Time to bid Sydney-bound Sam and Polly farewell and spend a cracking last night with them. John takes the four of us to The Ovalau Club - 'Fiji's first gentleman's club' (what's a Welshman doing there then?) where local residents get together for a drink and a chinwag. It's an atmospheric white timber building, its bar sporting flags from all over the world (yes there is a Welsh one there) and old photographs. What a place it must have been in its old colonial heyday. A few beers later it's off to The Whale's Tale, whose friendly owners serve great fish and chips from their bamboo-thatched kitchen, and it's lots more laughs with Sam and Polly (keep in touch you two).
Only a couple more days left and those scrumptious breakfasts (diets in order in New Zealand) keep coming, but so too does the rain - no wonder Fiji is so green. Wales has seeemingly adopted Delilah as its unofficial rugby anthem, perhaps Fiji should follow suit with Green Green Grass Of Home. In fairness, though, many parts had not seen rain for months and months and the reservoirs were crying out for it. We must have brought a little of it with us from Wales, so feel we have done our bit!
Sadly our time here has come to an end, but thanks to John and Marilyn, La, Matilda, Nox, other new friends we have made, and all the smiling Fijians we have met along the way we leave with great memories of a truly special place. Keep smiling, and staying on Fiji Time.