An Octopus's Garden...

Well I'm certainly dragging my feet with these Fiji posts, though I blame the hectic last 2 weeks at work entirely. These photos give you some idea of the place we stayed at on Waya Island in Yasawa group. These islands are home to the (in)famous Blue Lagoon, as well manta rays and all kinds of undersea creatures. Here too you can see the long-promised palm trees. These dotted the white-sand beach, and this one is flying the Fijian flag. We stayed at a place called the Octopus Resort. All of the islands in Fiji are privately owned by Indigenous Fijians, and the land is leased to hotels and resorts (which range from top-end to budget back-packer). Basically, you can't go and stay on an island unless you stay in a resort of some kind. This one was pretty good. It had a good relationship with the local village, from which most of the staff came, and was not too swanky. The visitors ranged from young families to backpackers to older people. Our bure was in the garden and we were surrounded by palms, hibiscus, bougainvillea and other tropical plants. One slight down-side was the communal dining. After the fast couple of days, when it was kind of diverting to meet other travellers, it just got to be a bit of a chore. Still, the food was amazing so it evened out a bit. I had kokoda (marinated raw fish) nearly every day - yum! I've also been craving the great iced coffee they served there. Our daily routine on the island - where we stayed for six days - was pretty much the same every day: eating, reading, lying around, swimming and snorkelling. The snorkelling in particular was great: there was a live coral reef just off the beach, which had hundreds of beautifully coloured fish darting through it all the time. Turtles too apparently - though I didn't see one.