Short on time? Skip to the 4-minute trip montage at the end.
“SHhHHHH!!!!!!”
“What do you mean SHH?”
“SHHH!!!!”
“WHAT?”
“WOMAN, SHUT, THE FUCK UP!!!! I’M TRYING TO MAKE SOMETHING GOOD HAPPEN!” (You really do need an Eddy Murphy doing Bill Cosby voice on this one, or at least I was doing the best I could manage)
“Why won’t you tell me?”
“SHUT, THE, FUCK, UP! If this works out, it will be worth it. Grab a drink, and, BE QUIET!!”
I turn back to my tablet and continue.
Let me back up about 30 minutes from this moment….
<rewind>
It’s been a shit day at work. One of the corporate soul-sucking days that by itself had 46 hours in it.
The bright spot was grabbing a few beers with friends after work, and us all venting for an hour or so.
I’m home, grab my tablet, and see an email from Scott’s Cheap Flight’s newsletter(now going.com) advertizing
“FIJI round trip from Denver, $874”
Fiji, the land Robert Dinero’s character was dreaming of in the classic “Heat”, the land of the legendary surf spot Cloudbreak. Blue, warm, water…..
Fiji? Fiji! Fiji! …ok, let’s calm down a bit.
My first thought, “Is this a real flight?” Real as in, is this a flight humans would like to take. “Oh, it’s 4 days each way relaying through Turkmenistan with a brief layover in Mauritania!”
Turns out, it IS a real flight. Denver->Dallas->Fiji.
Ok, how about the dates?
I pull up a calendar, turns out this seems like it IS real. Like buy it and go real, holy shit.
Ok, now I need to grab passports and credit cards and try to make this happen.
90% of the way through the process, the airline website starts hating my tablet. After all Jen and my passport info, frequent flier information, TSA precheck info, and credit card numbers are in, I can’t click the ‘make it happen’ button. Simply won’t click.
I grab my laptop and repeat the entire process, being 4 drinks in and about to spend a chunk of money going half the world away, I’m double checking everything.
A latent fear of bureaucracy gives me a recurring travel nightmare:
‘Oh you had a typo? Sorry, I can’t let you through”
20 minutes later, I turn, raise my hands and loudly exclaim:
“WE’RE GOING TO FIJI!!!”
Flight is Fiji Airlines as a codeshare with American Airlines. American is running the Denver to Dallas legs, Fiji Airlines covering the Dallas to the city of Nadi on Viti Levu island.
Choosing seats for the Fiji legs, expensive, but no problem. Ok we’re up quite a bit from the $874, but how many times will I get to go to Fiji, and on the 12+ hour long leg, how much would I be willing to spend to get out of the middle seat in the toilet adjacent row hell?
American and Fiji airlines, this must be the first time they’ve done this
I have seats on the long flight legs, but want to have non-middle seats for the Denver to Dallas legs.
Fiji website: “Go to American to book your seats”
American website: “This flight is operated by Fiji, we can’t give you seats”
We get on the phones and get the same cross finger pointing…This is a bit nuts.
This is 2026, and I’m calling the help lines? Multiple help lines can’t let me select a seat on a flight? Is this a joke? We’ll keep calling. What feels like nine or so calls later we have seats on the American run flights.
Misdirection madness, help line helplessness
IT’S GO DAY!!!!!
Get to Denver airport late Saturday afternoon, after a couple long flights we’re set to land Monday at 5:00am. You cross the international date line and the equator as part of the adventure.
Get to Denver and clear security, no issues, then we have a few beers waiting for the flight to Dallas. Airport overpriced, but A-ok so far. Things are looking good.
Flight is uneventful, until they come on the speaker and announce we’re getting routed to Austin rather than Dallas due to weather.
I check my watch and confirm this is a problem. We are 100% missing our flight to Fiji.
Land and deplane in Austin and we’re told we’ll be routed back to Dallas shortly.
It won’t matter, our plane to Fiji is lifting off now-ish, without us.
American Airlines comes on the speaker and we are directed:
“Pick up your bags at carousel 3”
This seems odd, but we’re a bit tipsy and very tired. It’s about 12:30am.
Tired and getting lonely as people and airport workers leave the airport. Our bags never arrive at carousel 3. We and a few other people heading from Denver to Fiji are scratching our heads in dismay.
We’re then directed to get to our gate to hit the 1 then 2, then 3am flight back to Dallas. I don’t understand going to Dallas as Fiji only flies every few days out of Dallas. Getting to Dallas doesn’t matter, but…it also doesn’t matter because.
We can’t get back through security without a ticket from Austin
Complication? There is no one around to give those tickets. The entire airport is closing shop. We are now outside security.
A helpful American airlines employee tells us:
“You don’t have tickets from Austin, so you can’t get through security to get back to Dallas. You shouldn’t have gone out through security to baggage claim!”
“They told us to pick up our bags.”
“Oh they shouldn’t have told you that.”
Helpful, really, but clearly, here we are. We need a room for the night after figuring out how the heck we’re getting to Fiji. Fiji airlines only flies their long legs every couple days from each of Dallas and Los Angeles.
What feels like another 9 phone calls later…. Jen is handling this as I’m losing my shit and trying to not fully lose my rag in an Instagram arrest worthy manner. Steam is coming out of my ears, and my inner monologue really wants to get out. This would be bad for everyone.
American Airlines: “We got you a hotel! and you can fly out of Los Angeles to Nadi Sunday at midnight! Ok bye!”
We check our phones for confirmation emails. Then dial customer support, again.
“The hotel you got us is in Dallas, we’re in Austin.”
God dammit Donut! <nods to Dungeon Crawler Carl>
Many calls and much frustration later, it’s around 1:30am Sunday morning Austin time.
“We got you a hotel in Austin!”
Fucking super, ok well at least we aren’t sleeping in a shut down airport.
We’ve got a plan….Custer had a plan.
The plan is to fly to Los Angeles Sunday from Austin at 7pm, then take a midnight flight from LA to Nadi. If this goes as the brochure would indicate, we’ll be getting in a day late, arriving Tuesday 6:00am.
Jen shakes her head and asks “Should we just cancel and head back home?”
I have the time booked off, we have a mission, we will get there if I have to row a boat made from banana leaves.
I compose my face before letting words out.
“Hon, let’s continue the adventure, I think it can likely only get better from here!”
There, I fixed the voice coming out as a much better version of the 4 letter verbs caroming off the inside of my skull.
Our plan…seems semi-formed as we consult the modern tools of travel.
Semi-formed?
The person on the phone rebooked us in theory, but none of the apps or the websites reflect any changes that were supposedly made. No idea where the bags are, the app isn’t showing their location, both Fiji Airways and American Airlines show no plans changed. Apps don’t have boarding passes, etc.
Basically zero assurance or confirmation the changes we made over the phone are actually in the system.
Being based in Denver, I fly United for the bulk of my travel flights as Denver is a United regional hub. I had no idea how much United got right until I flew an American/Fiji codeshare.
According to those American/Fiji apps, we’re still traveling from Dallas -> Nadi(Fiji) and are enroute.
After more phone calls, we decided to get to Austin airport early and maybe get on the 3pm Austin to Los Angeles flight.
It will be the same flight out of Los Angeles in any case, but we get a tick more breathing room if we go earlier, and don’t really know what we can do otherwise. Really not trying to have a potential weather delay strand us in Los Angeles for days. What can we do to help the odds? Get to the Austin airport early and hope to fly standby.
Zero additional clothing really limits the workout or anything potential. I’m going to be in these clothes for the next 26+ hours, do I want to turn them into Joe-swamp-soup? No…Well, not more than they already are.
Austin itself isn’t helping as it’s hot, gray, and muggy.
We head to the airport around 11am for our possible 7pm flight to Los Angeles.
American Airlines people at the airport are super nice, and try to get us on an earlier flight via priority standby to Los Angeles. Turns out we just missed standby on a mid afternoon flight, we were literally the next people on the standby list… close, no cigar. Back to 7pm to LA it is.
Austin airport is small and bustling. Going through security, I get to 3rd base after getting flagged at security for ‘my sensitive areas’. I got felt up so much I felt I should tip the guy. No seriously the guy went full on cluster clutch at the crescendo of the extensive high crotch rub down.
The security guy must have had something for middle aged white guys as he was doing the same thing to a Johnny white-collar worker just behind me as our bags were extra scanned.
A random young man waiting to pick up his bag on the other side of the carry on scanner remarked “Man, that TSA agent is going after people”
Love what you do and you’ll never work a day in your life, this guy was living his best stranger crotch clutch life.
Grab a pretty mediocre BBQ plate at Salt Lick BBQ restaurant and hope either both of us get on this flight, or we magically teleport to Nadi, waking up from this bad travel dream.
It’s too early for a drink, and too late to have coffee, so we just sit and fidget.
Spoiler, we end up drinking. At $15/can or pint of beer, we end up spending $200 at the airport over 7+ boring hours with me trying to shake off being fairly violated at security and the travel anxiety of plans gone awry.
Our 7pm flight to Los Angeles boards and we take off as we’d hope. We may actually make this work.
Everything is on time and we land tired in Los Angeles around midnight pacific time. How many hours have we been traveling? Wait, we took off Sat from the house at 2pm Mountain Time(MT), went to Austin, Central Time around midnight (CT), left Austin at 7pm CT Sunday, now getting on a midnight Pacific Time (PT) flight? Fuck, it’s been a while.
The people at both American and Fiji, in person, are fantastic.
Giant on a 14 hour flight
We board the long haul flight on a HUGE jet and get situated. We’re getting comfortable when a giant Fijian sits next to me. This should be interesting for a long flight. Turns out, zero issues. The guy was a football lineman, and was so thick front to back, that his shoulders rested in front of mine. Literally zero space contention with a guy who looked to be about 6’1” and 270 lbs of solid human.
I take an Ambien, put on my fleece, snug up my extra-awesome keep your head up neck pillow, lower my sleep mask, and get a solid 6 hours of sleep. The fleece was a good move as the cabin went sub arctic in the middle of the night.
The rest of the flight is pleasant and uneventful. It’s about 5:45am TUESDAY when we land. We have crossed the international date line and lost a day in an instant.
BUT WE LANDED IN FIJI, HOLY SHIT!
Walking the jetway into the Nadi Airport, we are excited but sleepy. We clear customs without incident, then run into the other couple from Denver at baggage claim. The sad panda news is not unexpected at this point. The bags are still on the Dallas tarmac. Nuts.
No bags, no clothes, no flip flops, no sunscreen, no toothbrush, ugh. This is a carry on packing fail if there ever was one. I’d packed too much in the way of electronics and forgot the change of clothes bits. Total rookie move.
We fill out the ‘what does your luggage look like’ forms at the Fiji lost luggage desk while a white middle aged lady is losing her mind because her very expensive looking white suitcase has a scuff on it.
Side bar: What kind of idiot buys expensive luggage? The kind that stands in baggage in paradise and screams their heads off. Adding this to the ‘red flags’ pile of biases.
Ok, back to sleepy reality, I try to not stagger as we wade out of the airport.
We meet Sachin from Sachin’s car rentals in the parking lot. He is nice and gives us suggestions for shops around to buy some clothes, as we still have none. For this adventure I’ve rented a Toyota Vitz, basically the Asia-spec Toyota Yaris. It’s just big enough for 2 people and luggage, but we don’t have luggage so….let me wedge myself into this thing.
Our plan is to head into downtown Nadi, and just buy some cheap clothes at Harrisons that we can use and reuse until our bags arrive. A few t-shirts, flip flops and some quick dry shorts are on the to-acquire list. We’re going to be on a beach on a small island, so the shopping list is thankfully short.
Oh yeah, hey, this is a right hand drive vehicle. I told Sachin I’ve never driven on the left. He laughed, gave me a few tips and away we went. I’m still groggy, jetlagged and chanting to ‘STAY LEFT, STAY LEFT’ to fight decades of only driving on the right.
We stop at a Harrisons right down from the airport, but it doesn’t open until 10:00am. It’s 7:30am now. We debate food here and wait for this shop to open, or find another shop. Another shop wins.
There is another Harrisons in downtown Nadi, the main town about 10 minutes away from the airport. It should be open now.
I fail parking lot almost immediately
When trying to exit the parking lot in the stop and slow island ‘rush hour’ I have my car on the right side of the exit, and quickly come nose to nose with a local trying to enter the parking lot. Whoops, totally my bad. I put the car in reverse as quickly as I can with the shifter being on the left, and re-orient to the left side of the exit while apologizing profusely.
Dammit, the parking lot defeated me, I need to get my left-side drive game going better.
Google maps is a mess on directions, and at times we’re driving in loops in morning traffic. It’s a small island and we seem to be the only people that don’t know where we’re going, which…yeah, we don’t know where we’re going.
Every low speed high traffic driving loop fuels the steam coming out of my ears. We just need food and clothes, this place isn’t big, come on google maps.
We finally lurch into a parking space in downtown Nadi. I’m hungry and frustrated by the drive and mis-directions.
I’m on new place high alert, we don’t exactly blend and I’m highly aware of it. Hungry and enjoying the smells of food coming down the street, we are about to cross a small intersection. A Fijian man, maybe in his 50s waves, smiles, says hello, then crosses over and walks up. He is in flip flops and a light Hawaiian looking shirt.
He asks us how the day is going, and we say hello and briefly mention the flights and zero luggage. He introduces himself as Josh who has just walked his son to school, and he has the day off.
He insists on taking us around. My Florida stranger-danger radar is on high, but this guy seems to radiate kindness in an alien way, and we could use the help.
Josh takes us to a fabulous local Fijian shop called Bula-wear where I pick up a couple pairs of quick dry shorts and a few shirts. Jen grabs a swim suit and sundries and we’re off.
We insist on taking Josh to breakfast, and we all enjoy a great meal while Josh gives us insight into the local economy, different ethnic groups who visit Fiji, and a bit about his former career playing professional rugby across the world.
Great stories and an unfiltered earnestness is making us laugh, easing the unsteady in time feel long flights leave behind.
Josh then asks us if we’d like to meet the chief’s son Jacob, who runs the cultural center in Nadi.
We check our watches against the ferry schedule to Likuri Island, now that we have clothes, we have time.
“Sure, let’s do it”
Josh takes us to meet Jacob, the chief’s son. We have a kava ceremony, and it’s relaxing and fantastic as we are educated about the tribes of Fiji (there are 14) The cultural center has war clubs that I was drooling over, and thought my 16 year old son would LOVE, but have zero idea how I’d carry it back.
“Excuse me Mr TSA guy, I need to bring my four foot long war club onboard…What’s it used for? Oh, bashing people over the head!”
Fijians, built differently
When I shook both Josh and Jacob’s hands I was struck by a few things. By most standards I have big hands, XL gloves, can palm a basketball, etc. When I shook their hands both of them made my hands feel thin and weak. I swear their hands were at least double the thickness of mine. The bones just seemed heavier and much more dense.
I was thinking when Josh was in his prime ruby days, it would have been hella-awful to get hit by this tank of a human on the field.
Josh then directs us to a local grocery store where we load up on water and beer for our stay in Likuri. We buy Josh a nice bottle of whiskey as thanks for everything he’s done for us.
Not 2 hours into the trip and we’re getting great hugs from a sweaty and laughing local. I like Fiji.
We part ways with Josh and wish him great thanks as we go from Nadi down to the ferry dock for our shuttle to Likuri Island.
After more google near-mapping, we found the dock. A couple locals are hanging out, and tell us we might as well check Natadola beach which is just down the road. “It’s going to be a while”
We take the high tech, heavy duty, offroading badass Toyota Vitz and of course, google maps misroutes us to a locked gate that is supposed to be the dirt road to the beach. A wrong turn later and we’re literally driving slowly through a few back yards over rain rutted dirt roads. The Vitz doesn’t exactly have ground clearance so I’m trying not to high-center the car.
The houses are made with tin roofs and stacks of cement blocks with dogs, goats, and chickens walking around. The locals smile and wave, so do we, then make a hasty U-turn, slowly looking for Natadola beach, purported to be one of the nicest on Viti Levu’s south coast.
We get to Natadola, but in the parking area, it’s littered with garbage. Discarded wine bottles, beer bottles and general junk. Who litters in paradise?
We walk from the parking lot to the sand, and wow, it IS beautiful. Looking down the shore to the Intercontinental hotel complex, it looks amazing down there and VERY clean.
We walk up and down for a bit, then head to the dock for the ferry.
Ferry to Likuri is a pleasant ride, and we chat with a wonderful couple vacationing from Spain. I’m missing the bug spray that’s lodged in our luggage, ½ the world away.
Paradise found, Likuri Island
Likuri island is SMALL, and awesome. We check in with a paper bag full of just purchased clothes and a lot of beer. It could be worse.
The place is wonderful and everything the last 40+ hours were not: Quiet, relaxing, with almost no people.
The Likuri island resort consists of a couple dozen bungalows on a very, very small island. This place is fantastic, feels authentic with thatched roofs on the TIki bar area.
We have booked the ‘Beach Burre’ which has air conditioning and a fridge. A nice lady guides us to the Burre. It is clean and everything I’d hoped for. We stock the fridge with beer and take a much needed shower, which is outdoors.
40 hours of travel funk come off me and I hope I’m not creating a biohazard with the runoff.
There is a wonderful silence in a sea of relaxation with amazing over-water views. The air is clean and the temperature is perfect. The water matches this and I unclench everything I’ve had clenched for….a while.
As we settle in on day one, the thing notably missing is BUG SPRAY. I’m a mosquito magnet, and I’m taking some hits. Nothing like Florida, but after living in almost bug-free Colorado for 25 years, it’s notable. I have ‘Bens SuperMax 100’ bug spray, but it’s in my luggage somewhere between Dallas and Fiji. That and flip flops should 100% have been in my carry on. <makes note for future travel, kicks self in ass>
Fiji pricing, not Vegas pricing
After traveling to several touristy places over time, Cancun, Vegas, etc, it has become a staple move to load up on water, beer and such before you get to the resort. My cost-radar went on high knowing this ultra small island leaves literally nowhere else to go to purchase anything.
I’ve encountered $32 beers at the Cancun airport(actual price), $50 sunscreen at the pools in Vegas(Same, this is a real number), and general ‘let’s fleece the tourist as hard as we possibly can’ prices as a shareholder profit maximization mantra.
“The fuck you mean a can of coors light is $16 and it’s 107f outside? $16 ATM fee, with a $200 max withdrawal limit?<Caesars palace pool, Vegas 2024>”
I needn’t have worried. Beers and cocktails were entirely reasonable, $5 for a good local beer, $9 for a hand made pina colada that might have been the best I’ve ever had. The pictures I’ve posted of the menus are in FJD currency which is about 0.40 * USD.
Beginning of day two, I realized they DO sell bug spray on the island and it was the best $7 I can remember spending. WOW, what an improvement!
The weather is perfect, but we dodged a bullet on this one. Two weeks earlier a monsoon swamped the mainland of Viti Levu, and the downstream runoff buried the entire beach of Likuri Island in a sea of down tree wood.
It took the staff days to clear the beaches, which look amazing.
The resort is the perfect size, everyone friendly who works or stays there.
A jogging tour of the island. Huff, puff, huh? I’m done
I decide to take an exploratory loop of the island, and do a slow jog. The trail ends after a few hundred yards, and I have to bushwack to the right to get back to the beach. I jog on the sand for the rest of the trip. Total time including a bit of backing up and re-routing around some tidal pool dead-ends… about 18 minutes.
That was…short. Peeling off my shirt I dive into the ocean and enjoy the water.
Battery packs, a small tech hero of this story
I have a local power to american plug converter, but …you guessed it. It too is in our luggage. The carry-on friendly Inui power bank turns out to be key to keeping our phones alive and snapping pictures during our luggage’s absence.
Snorkeling, wrong time of day, right kind of attitude
There is a snorkeling trip mid afternoon out to a local reef. This is included as resort activities and Jen and I jump at the chance. A quick, beautiful boat trip out, and ‘here we are’.
Things I loved about this trip, Fiji has not nerfed the planet.
“There are life jackets up top if anyone wants one. You can just jump in if you’re ready”
These are my people, I forgo the life jacket and happily giant-step off the platform. The water is absolutely the perfect temperature. It’s mid-afternoon, and there’s about a 15-20mph breeze. This is churning the ultra shallow water quite a bit. Great time, but visibility was far from optimal.
We enjoy cruising around then return to the boat, sun-soaked and happy.
Likuri Island Fire show, wow
The island got a lot busier on Wed afternoon and night as many people took the ferry over from the mainland to watch the Likuri Island fire show. The fire show was amazing and easily the best I’ve ever seen. The dancers in the fire show are also the people that make breakfast, lunch, clean the resort, run the daily activities, and man the front desk. Running this small resort on a tiny island is an all-hands in affair.
Fiji Airlines website bad! Likuri staff amazing! Obey My Dog! <Best Zoolander Mugatu voice here>
The Fiji Airlines website continues to unimpress as they and the app have zero tracking information about our bags.
As we try to confirm our bags have landed and are being directed to our next hotel, Tim from the Likuri front desk calls baggage at the Marriott for us -> THANK YOU TIM!
“THE BAGS MADE IT!. They are holding them for you now.”
The Marriott didn’t recognize the bag tags and were contemplating sending them back to Fiji Airways. Jen had booked the room using a Marriott friends and family discount, so the bag tags in my name didn’t add up for the handlers at the resort as the room was in Jen’s.
The days on Likuri were a mix of just relaxing in the quiet and activities offered by the resort. Coconut processing over a fire barrel was interesting and the results amazing. Mostly I decompressed and spent time in the water, but there were many things to do if one so desired.
Food was a buffet 3 times a day, kicked off by the drumming of a Fijian communications log/drum called a Lali. When the buffet was ready, they’d play about 30 seconds of drumbeats to announce it.
Trivia: The Lali was used for inter island communication.
Food was generally excellent, with good variety and we enjoyed the meals.
Everyone is awesome here, except the French
The resort is small enough to where you meet everyone on the island, resort staff and other travelers. Don’t know if it’s the size of the resort, or the type of people who choose a small remote resort, but everyone was friendly. Smiles, hellos, and easy smalltalk were everywhere all the time, of course preceded by the omnipresent “Bula!” greeting.
Notable exceptions, a group of about 6 French people who looked to be professionally unimpressed with everything showed up day 2, and tended toward scowling and dismissive hand gestures and muttering as their default mode.
I did have a great conversation with a 60-ish year old man in that group, who had lived in Bali for the last 30 years and who also notably had 50% of his face heavily tattooed. A north/south dividing line between regular skin and creative tribal designs. I think 3 decades in Bali had improved his world view in a way not shared with the others from France. He was utterly charming and I enjoyed my time talking with him.
The Fijians are my favorite people on earth, full stop.
The staff, Mess, Margarita, Sai, Tim, all fantastic. They make the small island resort magical. Friendly with a non-stop “Bula!” greetings, they made the trip feel special.
Leaving too soon
Two days was not enough, we’re really missing our 3rd day that was eaten with travel woes. Sadly we check out, trade a lot of hugs with the staff, and hop on the ferry back to the dock.
The high performance sex machine Toyota Vitz is waiting for us, and we begin the trek to the Marriott in Momi Bay. I try to contain all 60 of the horsepower of this raging vehicle….awwww yeah. Wait, I need to wedge my thighs under the steering wheel…please hold….ok, legs in, gave cheese to the mice in the engine bay, now we’re going.
Best copilot driving directive ever
We’re cruising north to Momi Bay enjoying the lush tropical views on very small winding roads. We turn a left hand corner with surrounding dense foliage and my copilot Jen forcefully yells
“COW”
Sure enough, a cow was stepping out of the dense greenery and right into our path.
Most perfect, directive, ever. Literally zero fat on that. 1 syllable.
I hit the brakes hard. We stop then slowly pull around. The cow was nonplussed.
A simple drive up the coast with a stop to reload water and beer and we continue north with the chant of “Stay left, stay left” coming out of the Vitz.
Google maps let us down again, which led to a ‘quicker to go the 20 min back’ conclusion while questing for water and beer. U turn, drive, buy, continue north.
Momi Bay is a bit remote, the last 10-15 minutes of the drive are a low speed affair through green hilly countryside on to a peninsula that is the resort.
We stopped at the first building at the sign ‘parking lot’ then find out from a super nice local who smiled and introduced herself, we’d stopped in the hotel conference center.
Whoops.
“Follow me” and the Vitz is trailing her golf cart to the actual parking lot.
Marriott Momi Bay, wow
They got this resort right. It literally looks like the brochure. The groups of rooms are blended with the natural water, and the pricier over water bungalows are amazing. They blended this resort with the natural beauty in a seamless way that is stunning to behold. Rather than a concrete and steel cube placed in paradise, the lines of everything blend in a harmonious way.
Check in is without incident, and we GET OUR LUGGAGE BACK!!!!! I literally hugged a suitcase, judge me, I don’t care. I’ve been living in a pair of not that great fitting quick dry shorts with no razor or deodorant for a few days. I’m surprised they didn’t call the hobo police on us when we were in the lobby trying to check in.
Again, the friendliness of the locals everywhere is a thing to experience. From the roadside 7-11 equivalents to the other people shopping to the resort personnel. Everyone is just awesome and damn happy.
The property is beautiful, literally brochure perfect. Water everywhere, but not much beach. Lots of land into rocky tidal pools around.
There are 4-5 restaurants on the property. The food is excellent and not terribly priced. The Fish Bar restaurant has the best views of the sunset, and the sunsets are out of this world. The bar at the Fish Bar is amazing for both the food and drinks.
Day or so later, as we walk around the property, we duck behind a dive shop to get a peek at the coast.
There are two guys out back, and we start chatting. One of them is the owner’s son and he tells us about the shop. They do surf, fishing, and snorkel/dive trips.
We decide to do a 3 hour snorkel trip and check out the legendary surf stop Cloudbreak.
(YES! <checks bucket list item as ‘scheduled’>)
Local food, humble establishment, great food
We decided to take a break from the resort and try a local restaurant just outside Momi bay.
A quick jaunt down the road, avoiding the horses walking down the street and we arrived at a roadside restaurant, which was mostly shack-ish in nature. Google reviews were positive, so we embraced it and I got some amazing fish curry.
This place was totally worth experiencing.
Sand bar, Turtles, Cloudbreak
We hop in the small skiff and start away from the resort with the owner Eddy at the helm.
As we zoom to the horizon, he points to a large bag near the front “Fins and masks in there”
First stop, sandbar. We’re a few miles off the coast, Eddy stops the boat and says “you can hop out here” We are now in knee to waist deep crystal clear warm blue water and standing on wonderfully soft sand bottom, miles from shore.
We hang out for a bit, then go to the first of our two snorkel stops.
First snorkel stop is over a very shallow reef. Good fish, but it takes a bit to realize my mask is fogging when I thought it was reduced water visibility. A quick wipe/rinse and ahhh…that’s better.
The second stop is AMAZING. There are sea turtles everywhere. The only downside are some small, gnat-like stinging jellyfish in the water that love Jen’s skin. I’m doing ok, with only a few hits here and there. The snorkeling is so good, I can ignore this.
After about 30 min swimming about with Eddy directing us toward groups of turtles from the boat, we get back in and take a short trip to Cloudbreak.
There are about 20 surfers in the water enjoying the insanely shaped perfect waves.
Being several miles offshore, I was surprised there was a 4 story tower built in the water for the surf competition judges to occupy. Eddy explained they built this at low tide.
Back at the resort we enjoy pool time, drinks, sunshine and happy people everywhere. There are fantastic Aussies and New Zealanders everywhere. Just friendly outgoing people. For them, this is a 3-4 hour flight. I am Jack’s green envy. I’d be here 4 times a year if the flight was only 4 hours.
Fijians continue to be my favorite people on earth. Warm and happy
We make friends in the bar and pool. The resort is small enough with just a few bars/restaurants/pools so you tend to see the same faces, like a larger version of the Likuri resort.
Random joy from having a suitcase sneaks in often. SOCKS, I HAVE CLEAN SOCKS. This is amazing.
Best sunset of my life
Dinner at Fishbar overlooking the water. The red tropical sun dipped visibly as we watched it descend in a wave of color and clouds. This was literally the best sunset I’ve seen, full stop.
Music, Fiji does it right
Somehow Fiji gets the volume right everywhere. Music is great, but not overpowering. Live music, which I typically despise, was extremely enjoyable. There was a notable singer at the resort, Queenie. She had a voice so perfect I didn’t think a human could make those sounds without auto-tune and sound engineering. Just hypnotizing.
As we cruise through the days, I simply can’t get over how well the entire resort is done. It’s big-ish, but not like Vegas or Mexico resort huge. The landscaping is perfect and unlike other places we’ve stayed, there are plenty of poolside chairs available. Pool service is excellent for both food and drinks, I dig this place.
People, Fiji gets it right
The TL;DR to this whole area is: People tend to know how to act. Perhaps it’s the cost and difficulty getting here that self selects out the Spirit Airlines and Carnival Cruise crowd. Sure there was the random idiot around, but it was so much the exception and not the rule.
Everyone here seems happy, and it radiates around in waves. Not sure how you can have a bad day in a perfect climate looking at the Fijian-blue water. Maybe I should ask the French?
Our trip back was without incident. We went Nadi -> Los Angeles -> Denver. The flights were on time, the bags made it. What an adventure. Oh yeah, freak snowstorm in May had me hand scraping off the car while in a Bula(Hawaiian) shirt in 38 degree weather. So bad it was hilarious.
Fiji parting thoughts
I enjoyed all of Fiji that we experienced, but I think I need to come back to explore some of the other 300+ islands in the chain.
The warmth of the people, the stunning beauty of the land and the water. I look forward to returning