Wednesday, April 25th, 2012: Suva, Fiji
Bob: We were on deck as the Sea Princess slowly sailed into Suva, the port and largest city of Fiji, and the rugged, forest-covered mountains reminded us of the island of Bali Hai from the musical "South Pacific". It was really that pretty. The port itself, however, featured a large, industrial-looking corrugated iron shed right on the dock, which was decidedly unaesthetic! |
Monika: Suva, Fiji, our first tropical island. Steaming into the harbor, it did look like Bali Hai. We had booked an excursion: a hike in a tropical rainforest to a waterfall with a pool where you could swim. We got up early to watch the ship steam into the harbor. From afar the island looked like there were nothing but mountains. And the closer we came the better we could see those looming cliffs. |
Bob: We were exposed to the concept of "island time" when our tour for a walk in the rain forest left an hour late. Fiji is a poor island nation with 24% of the population living under the poverty line, so we weren't too surprised to have a tour bus with open windows serving for "air conditioning". Our guide, "Freddie", was friendly and capable, however, and he pointed our various sites on our way out of the port of Suva and up the mountainside into the mountainous interior of the island. We stopped at the edge of Colo-I-Suva Forest Park to pick up several forest rangers, who were to serve as our guides and helpers on the trail. Their help turned out to be critical in several places along the trail. Then our bus driver slowly and carefully edged our bus along a dirt road into the interior of the park. We stopped at a trail head and queued up for our walk into the rain forest. The first busload of 50 or so people was directly ahead of us, so we halted on the trail as they slowly marched ahead, single file. I heard the lady behind me loudly and repeatedly demand that we all move aside so that she could push to the front of the group. We ignored her, but I cringed when I recalled Judy and Ian's comment that Americans are perceived by some Australians as being loud, pushy, and rude. It is distinctly uncomfortable to have negative stereotypes of Americans confirmed by the behavior of my compatriots. Ouch! Fortunately, we soon started walking and her complaints ceased. The rain forest was a soothing, multi-layered canopy of dark green leaves that effectively shut out 97% of the sunlight impinging on the top of the trees. We could, however, catch glimpses of the sky through the tangled mat of leaves overhead, so we did not feel crowded or claustrophobic in the slightest. |
Monika: After breakfast we assembled in the Princess Theater, but then had to wait for quite some time because the pier was so small that only one bus at a time could be loaded. But finally we were under way to the Coli-I-Suva National Park. The houses were small, but the people were friendly. At the entrance to the park we started to drive along a dirt road for a while until we came to the parking lot for the upper falls. There were three falls along the little stream and we would hike downhill for a couple of kilometers past the upper and the middle falls to the lower fall, where there was a pool to swim in. We started along a narrow path through the rainforest. We had been told, that the rainforest filtered out a lot of light, and although I thought there was plenty of light, quite a few of my pictures where unfortunately out of focus, because I did not hold still enough. But Bob did manage some nice pictures. |
Bob: Perforce we had to walk very slowly as many points in the trail had extremely treacherous footing due to either mud, which we both stepped in, or very slippery wet rocks. As a result of the consistently high rainfall, the rocks had moss and some kind of slime mold growing on them, so we were often hanging on for dear life, either to each other or the occasional very flimsy side rail. That's where the rangers came in. They positioned themselves at critical points and steadied us across the worst parts. The rangers also obliged us by using our camera to take our pictures at the prettiest points of the trail. The trail followed a creek that descended a valley through a series of picturesque waterfalls, and the largest of the waterfalls in the dark, dense green foliage provided beautiful backdrops for our pictures. Of course, almost everyone had brought their camera, so taking those pictures also noticeably slowed up the progress of our group. |
Monika: The going was slow. There was another busload of 50 people ahead of us, and on every steep or difficult section and, of course, at “Kodak spots” the line would come to a stop. Two women behind us were getting antsy and thought they should just start passing people, a difficult endeavor on this very narrow path. It reminded me of some maniacs, who would pass us on a two lane road, even though there were 20 cars ahead of us going the same speed. I could just laugh at such impatience. Here we are in a strange tropical rainforest, with interesting trees, and a gurgling, cascading stream and every now and then a waterfall, and all these two women could do was complain that they could not pass. Ah, everyone vacations their own way. I did enjoy it all. The path at times was somewhat treacherous and slippery, so you had to observe the hiking adage: "walk or look, but not both at the same time". We even had to cross a couple of hanging bridges. But they seemed to be quite stable. Altogether it was a great, albeit slow, hike. |
Bob: In total we walked just a mile or two at most, but that took us about an hour. The humidity was near 100%, so although it was just in the 80s, we were both overheated and sweating when we arrived at a final waterfall and deep pool at the bottom of the trail. I was so glad to strip down to my swimsuit and get in the cool, refreshing water. The younger folks took that opportunity to swing from a rope over the deepest part of the pool and then let go and plunge in. We had a lot of fun watching their antics and taking pictures of it all. |
Monika: We finally reached the pool at the bottom of the third fall, where the first group of people had already gotten into the water. We quickly took off our clothes--we were wearing bathing suits beneath--and jumped into the water. Although we had walked in the shade, we had been starting to get hot, and the cool water was wonderfully refreshing. We found a place where we could sit in the water and enjoyed watching the youngsters swing on a rope over the water and jump or fall into the pool. Some tried fancy somersaults, others just kind of plunged in. It was great fun. I was almost tempted to join, but decided it was more fun to watch. |
Bob: After cooling off for half an hour or so, we took a shortcut walk back up the road to where our bus was waiting and drove back out of the park. Our next stop was at Rain Tree Lodge where we had a snack of fruit and muffins while watching women do the Fijian version of the hula dance and the men do a kind of war-preparation dance as far as I could make out. Both were impressive, but in completely different ways, of course. Monika found a nice carved-shell necklace and I strongly encouraged her to buy it, which she finally did just as our bus was boarding. |
Monika: But even fun has to end, and finally we had to get back to the bus. Luckily we did not have to go all the way back up the trail we came. There was another parking lot closer to the lower pool and there our bus was waiting for us. We were taken to a small lodge for some refreshment, tropical fruit slices, muffins, and orange juice or coffee. At the end was a performance of native Fijian dance, first two women, and then 3 warriors danced for us. Very entertaining. Before the performance, I had wandered around and seen a necklace I liked, thin shells cut into stars. When we left, Bob suggested I look at the necklaces, and I immediately picked up the one I liked. It was only $10, so the sale was made. On the way out the three warriors were standing there for fun pictures. |
Bob: The bus brought us back to the ship, where the first thing we did was slip out of our muddy clothes to take a shower and wash the worst of the mud off of our shoes and pants. But we did that quickly enough that we still had a half an hour to walk around on shore before the "all aboard" for the ship. Unfortunately, most of the tourist-oriented arts and craft stalls had closed for the day although the fruit and vegetable vendors were still going strong. Everybody we met was extremely friendly and we did not encounter begging or high-pressure selling. In fact, we both concluded that Fijians are some of the very friendliest people we have met despite having a military government, high levels of poverty, limited economic opportunity, and often inadequate housing. The friendliness of the people was the single big plus that would attract us to return. |
Monika: On our drive back to the ship, the bus stop at a very nice overlook from where we could see the city of Suva and our ship at dock and also the mountains off to the side. Back on ship we showered and put on dry clothes before heading up to the Lido deck for a late lunch. We still had some leeway before the “All Aboard” time, so we went back out into town. I was especially interested in the vegetable market. Although some of the booths were already closed, there were enough open to give a flavor of the place. And the friendliness of the people was overwhelming. Either they would greet you with a smile and a "Bula" - the Fijian Hello -, or they would respond smilingly when we said Bula. A bunch of teenagers were sitting on some bags, yelling "Bula" and "take my picture". Of course, we obliged and they seemed really happy. |
Bob:
At dinner that evening, our table mates reported that they had in fact encountered a couple instances of begging, but not any high-pressure salesmen. Ian and Judy reported one guy who looked vaguely threatening, but Roya and Alex stuck to safe neighborhoods and did not experience any such problems. As our ship departed, we were serenaded by the Police band who were very good, in my opinion, for over an hour until Sea Princess actually pulled away from the dock and slowly headed out to sea. |
Monika: But we were getting tired and it was getting late. Back on the dock, the police band was playing with a very good singer. Two Fijian women were waving a Fijian flag. We went on the promenade deck to keep listening to the rather good music. When we left, the singer was singing "Now is the time when we have to say Good Bye" a song we were practicing with Pop Choir. It followed us out of the harbor and made me sad to say "good-bye" to these wonderfully friendly people. When the Captain welcomed us back on ship, he first reminded us that today was ANZAC day, the day Australians and New Zealanders remembered the gallant young soldiers dying on the shores of Gallipoli in WWI. He then reminded us that during the night we would cross the International Date Line thusly: "Tonight you should move your clocks forward one hour and back one day, in other words, tomorrow at 2 AM it will be 3 AM today". |
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