This morning's ferry ride was much shorter - only 45 minutes. We were the first stop as well! We were staying at Plantation Island Resort. While Richard and I were super excited to see the blue waters and coral reefs of Nanuya Resort upon arrival, the kids were super excited to see the inflatable floating water park upon docking. Plantation Island definitely had more of a cruise ship feel than the traditional Fijian feel most resorts have (when leaving Clarissa even commented that they didn't sing Isa Lei). Outside the main building, they had flags from the countries of the majority of their visitors (I assume)....US, China, Australia, and New Zealand. It was a bit odd to see Old Glory flying, I actually don't see that everyday!
After checking in, we had hoped to catch the boat out to Cloud 9, but it was full for the day. So we booked ourselves for the next day and took it easy snorkeling, hitting the waterpark, exploring the resorts' three swimming pools, and doing some much needed laundry (I'd misread and thought I could do laundry at the previous island...they could do laundry for us....per bag...I did the minimum).
Richard and I were less impressed with the snorkeling here. Probably for two reasons, the resort has done a good bit dredging/habitat modification to allow for the ferry to come right up to the dock and clear under the inflatables. As a result, the water was silty/low visibility and the corals obviously suffered a bit (As a side note, I finally contacted the local university, the fish I couldn't identify - the one you see in the video preview above - is a floral wrasse (Cheilinus chlorourus)...you can now sleep at night....lol). The second reason were less impressed was we had just been spoiled by the remote, nearly pristine reefs of the Yasawa Islands so the bar was very high. While I was doing the laundry, I noticed the sun was setting and called the others.....
Richard made it up to enjoy it with me.
The next morning, we had booked a jet ski tour out to Modriki Island. I had come up to a solution to problem I mentioned in the first staycation post! Minimum age to go on the jet skis was 7 so Clarissa was old enough (but after a bumpy ride out to Takalana Bay, Clarissa opted to not go after all so her tummy wouldn't hurt and hang out in kids club). We had set up/confirmed via email several weeks prior to coming, so Richard and Mason went to check in while I was dropping Clarissa off at kid club. That's when our first major 'OhFiji!' moment occurred. The company said we were suppose to check in 30 minutes early for a 9am tour (didn't see that in any of the information we were sent), they then said we would know that if we would have of confirmed the day before like we were suppose to (doesn't say to do that in the email), then they said they tried to call reception, get our room number and call our room the night before to let us know about the 30 minutes early (we were not only in our room, we also booked with a local phone number...since were local, and they had my email from the booking). So essentially a whole bunch of blaming us for their mistake?!? Richard was ready to throw in the towel, but I had spent
We had a little time before our lunch trip and we had promised Clarissa a ride on the aqua trike. We went to check it out at the activities shed. As luck would have it, it was not one of the 'free/included' activities like kayaks/snorkel gear/SUPs/etc...not only that, the rental company for the aqua trike was the same one that just didn't take us out on jet skis....arg. Unfortunately, we had promised Clarissa so we just had to sucked it up (and the person we had dealt with had stepped away and we dealt with a nicer person who apologized for earlier). Since we had to pay per person and I had rode one back when I was Mason's age I let the others go and played their personal paparazza.
How cool are the fish swimming by....
So past them pedaling over the reef is a long white yacht. We were told that is the Google Yacht. So I went to said Google and googled 'Google Yacht Fiji'....according to an Australian gossip magazine it is owned by a Google co-founder, is called The Dragonfly (every time we went past it, the back was open and we couldn't see the name on the stern), and can be chartered for a mere $770,000/week.....the pictures the magazine showed did look like the boat (we may or may not have snuck a lookie-look when we cruised past it)....so there you go.
We headed back to our room to gather our things for our lunch trip, when our room phone rang....uh oh. It was the lunch trip company, they said the winds were picking up, there might be some bad chop on the trip, did we still want to go? Uh, yes! They said hang tight, there was another group booked it would depend on if they wanted to still go too. Ugh....so we waited a bit, then headed on over to their kiosk by the dock. Luckily...it was a group of older teens/college age siblings, I'm not sure if their parents had initially planned to go or not, but the youngins wanted to go so the trip didn't get cancelled. We went on a boat, heading out to a floating pizzeria, where we wanted to eat pizza and go swimming....so we got wet on the way there...who cares!
So our big adventure took us out to Cloud 9. It's a floating, 2 story, Italian pizzeria, with a stocked bar that is moored on Roro Reef......what's not to love? Totally a 'when in Fiji' place to go!! We ordered some drinks and pizzas, found some seats, and took some selfies to document the fun! So it depends on the day you go. Some days are more families, other days (like the day we went) are more 'spring break parties'. Let's just say, I'm thankful that
Good thing about strapless swim tops - no tan lines.......Bad thing - it appears you are sunbathing topless with your children.....but as you can see below I did indeed have a top on!
I thought about making a blog post of just photos of Clarissa making love hearts on the trip.
Unfortunately, it was too windy to snorkel on the reef to the side of Cloud 9. Richard, Mason and myself all got t-shirts (Clarissa had gotten the necklace at the shell market). Great thing about staycations...you don't really need souvenirs! The tender came back to get us after about two hours. Clarissa is getting dried off here, but Mason is still doing jumps and swimming. I'm fairly certain both kids had a blast as they are already talking about when they can go again (uh, it was a trek to get there....so that might be it little darlings, but we'll see).
A little preview of tomorrow's coming event! At the resort we were staying at, they have the actual raft that good ole Tommy boy used in the movie 'Castaway' (but apparently there is another one at another resort too....so there may have been multiples for each take who knows).
That raft is in really, really good shape for being handmade of rope and driftwood nearly 20 years ago.....oh wait, if you look closer, that's not wood - it's metal pipes, covered with Hollywood stuff to look like wood....aaah, no wonder it still looks new after sitting here on the beach for so long!
When we returned to our room, we had a surprise! A fruit tray, bottle of bubbles, and a note from the resort hoping we were enjoying our stay. How sweet! Alas, our staycation was coming to a close and we only had one sunset left in the islands.
Big full moon rising into the palm trees.
Clarissa playing peek-a-boo by the pretty fancy decorated palm trees (I won't share all 5 pictures of her by each of the different colored trees...lol).
The next morning, we had all our communication lined up properly so we checked in 30 minutes early (which was tricky as I had to drop Clarissa at kids club before they opened....but they were nice even though she was unhappy about being left again after I said it would be a one-time thing). So though they operated out of our resort, the jet skis were parked on another island. So we had a 30 minute (or so) boat ride over to Malolo Island (at least we can check off another island visited since we stepped onto it...lol). We arrived to a fleet of jet skis.
After getting our life jackets on...off we headed on our 3 hour adventure....you can see for yourself!
So our destination was Modriki Island (also called Monuriki Island), but more famously known as the isolated island in the middle of the South Pacific Tom Hanks' character was stranded on in the movie 'Castaway'. Richard looked for any signs of Mr. Hanks....
We took selfies with the big iconic rock that he climbed to the top of in the movie (that's the vantage point where he spotted the pilot's body)....
and as you saw in the video we snorkeled a bit too. While the snorkeling at the resort we were staying at was a tad disappointing, the snorkeling here made up for it. Likely due to the fact it was rather isolated and pristine again. So Mamanuca Island snorkeling gets some kudos as well. After about 30 minutes of snorkeling we had some time to explore the island.
Mason contemplating the meaning of life while looking out into the great blue yonder....
We asked about the coconuts.....
our tour guide said some villagers from Monu Island just across the way, replenish the message as needed. Aaah...wait, Monu Island....where....oh just beyond our jet skis?
That's totally swimmable?!?! We laughed and talked to Mason about camera angles and editing to make it appear there was no land in sight in any direction. Our guide pointed out the beach area that was used in the fishing scene where he catches his first meal.
Oh wow....I see lots of islands in the background there....I even see the big island we live on....(I know I know, Hollywood film crews don't really want to work and live on uninhabited islands...lol). The rock where the pilot was buried in the movie.
We then walked over to the base of the "trail" to the top of the mountain. I say "trail" because it was more of a vertical ascent straight up the face of the rock. Coming back down we got a different view of the island.
Part of the advertised excursion was suppose to include a visit to the the famed cave used in the movie as well, but we were unable to go around the back of the island to enter it that day. Thanks to a certain reality show that rhymes with 'sure-like-her' filming and using it that day (so we couldn't even go by it as they had water police guarding it). We did see on a different island from a distance a challenge set up on a beach with the show logo flags waving in the breeze....so cool! On another side of that island, we also saw what may have possibly been a tribes' camp....I'm so watching to see if it was. Then I will chuckle to know that all day when it seems like they are bored and all alone (except for camera crews in their face), that boats and jet skis are whizzing by making all kinds of noise.
We then got back on our jet skis and had the 45 minute bouncy ride back. Mason loved every minute of it (and Clarissa and her tummy would have been miserable). We returned the jet skis, but in true 'Fiji Time' fashion our tender boat to take us back to our resort was no where to be found. After waiting about 30 minutes (so kids club is now closed for lunch...after having dropped Clarissa off prior opening...cue massive mommy guilt), I called the resort to tell them we are trying to get back but we are stranded thanks this company. The resort was super nice about it and said she would be taken care of, finally the tender shows up, we make it back, Clarissa and someone from kids club are waiting for us on the dock...we apologize (and later go give the kids club people some tips....which I know we aren't suppose to do). While we enjoyed the actual jet ski portion of the trip and the guide was great. The customer service/logistical aspects of the company were horrible...even by local standards. We were talking to the people at the Cloud 9 kiosk when we were waiting to see on the weather the previous day and they heard everything that went down when we were suppose to go out but were "late". They told us that they hear conversations like ours pretty regularly...so while it didn't fix the situation it did make us feel a tad better that we weren't totally over reacting.
It was after 1:30 pm by now, so we grabbed a late lunch as everyone was starving (but hey...the lunch cafe was empty). Given we had to check out of our room prior to the jet ski trip so they could get it ready, we had to track down our bags in the luggage room to get some dry clothes to change into. We had done some scouting the previous day and there was a changing room/showers in the community bathroom in the main building. Only drawback to the community showers (as I had suspected), only cold water...so they were quick rinse off the salt/sunscreen showers. By the time we'd gotten changed and went to take our wet stuff back to our luggage it had already been pulled to be taken down to the boat dock (talk about cutting it close...though being a small place I was able to find our bags a bit later and stick the wet stuff in and not have to hand carry it on the ferry). We had a few minutes to get a cold drink and relax under a palm tree before catching the ferry back to Port Denarau. We then had the long four hour drive back to Suva. That wraps up our stay on our third and final yanuyanu (island in Fijian) of the staycation!
Sorry it took a while to get this posted. I had a few obstacles: 1) being the desktop computer crashing, waiting to get a new one, getting it set up, etc., 2) the sheer volume of photos and videos I had to go through....I started with 760 photos and 170 videos (totaling 2 hours 40 minutes minutes).....whittled it down to 133 photos (I do have 8 more I'm saving for some slow Mondays) and edited the video to 6 themed videos with a combined time of 53 minutes) you know...life - illnesses - background investigations (yep....some positive news on the job front!!), etc. Also....the massive volume of laundry I had to do upon return! 10 days of damp swimsuits, rash guards, towels, cover ups and other sandy clothing....takes a while to get that washed up.....(this is just the swim wear that we decided to soak in the dive gear anti-microbial cleaner).
Current island tally: 3 Yasawa Islands and 3 Mamanuca Islands visited, 320 Fijian Islands remaining (I'm only counting landfall....if you count islands we've boated past/around progress would be much better).
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