Final Fiji

Our next day in the Fijian Islands was also on Vito Levi island but on the opposite site from Suva, the capital. The bus ride to the park was enjoyable and fun but long (2 hours one way) and our tour guide, whose long name began with the Fijian sound for “Joe” so he requested we call him that, gave us a running commentary on sites we were passing plus taught us bits of Fijian language: Vinaka (thank you), Bula (hello/welcome), io (yes) and many more.  In the above picture Joe is wearing traditional Fijian attire of a skirt below his knees. He gave us permission to take his photograph as he held up a sperm whale tooth necklace hung from braided coconut fiber.  

 This stop included an excursion to an Eco Park where endangered species are captive bred, including the Fijian Crested Iguana—about 24inches in length, and taking 5 years to reach maturity for breeding. This beautiful reptile and several native birds were part of the park’s species recovery work. 

More images from the eco park including an endangered parrot and my first ever in-person glimpse of the flying fox—a fruit eating fox-shaped  and furry bat that I just enjoy watching from bat world sanctuary but had never seen in person until this excursion.  It was very cute.

We were traveling to the sugar cane producing side of the island, principally owned and operated by people of Indian descent.  We passed a beautiful temple, one of the largest on the island, in Nadi. 

We made it back to our ship just in time because the 5.5 hour excursion turned out to be 7 hours. But it was booked through Holland America so the ship could not leave without us.  We were not the last bus to return, either, as several later returnees were apparently running on Fijian time.

Our next day was a stop at the beautiful garden island of 

Vanua Levi, Fiji. The total island population is less than 8,000, and we were tendered ashore. After a thankfully short (packed minibus) drive to Flora Tropica gardens, we climbed up what had to be 150 wooden steps on a plank way path (dry rot made that a bit scary) to this beautiful over look before heading back to the town where we tendered back to ship and just relaxed after the hot steep climb.