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My Fiji trip didn't really go as I had anticipated. The brochures all showed beautiful sunny islands and beaches. I did some research before I went, and knew that I was going during the rainy season, but thought, well it won't rain while i'm there. I was kinda wrong on that part, cause rain it did!
I arrived at 5:00 am to overcast and drizzly rain. A couple hours later it was pouring. For the whole four days i was there it pretty much alternated between pouring and light rain and every now and again the rain let up for a bit and it continued being overcast. The rain did put a damper on diving...I could only go for one dive offshore, but since I hadn't been diving in 2 years it was a good refresher.
Rain or no rain, the resort I stayed at was fabulous! I was at Manta Ray Bay resort, on an island about 3 hours away from the Fiji mainland.

There really wasn't alot to do except relax and enjoy life...with the help of the staff there we made coconut bracelets...they cracked open the coconuts, removed the outside, sawed a nice bracelety piece and then handed it over to us. We sanded it with a stone and sand then cut out the coconut from the inside then rubbed a little babyoil on it to make it look pretty and voila! A new bracelet...it was pretty cool!



Pilar and Sarah hard at work sanding their bracelets in the rain (although it doesn't look too rainy in the picture)!








Enjoying drinks at the bar wearing our new coconut bracelets...yay us!

My last day on the island we took a little boat ride and went to another nearby island and visited a villiage which was pretty cool. It was pretty tiny but we walked around and went to the school, chuch and community center. The villiagers were super friendly and the kids at the school seemed really excited to have us visit. The younger kids, were especially excited, they had even practiced posing for pictures before we got there, so that when we showed up they ran into position and said "take a picture"!

If only the rules had been that clear and simple when I went to school...











As I was leaving, Fiji finally made an attempt at looking as it does in the brochures, I took this picture from the airplane, the rainbow was quite spectacular.

This entry was posted on Saturday, February 04, 2006 at 12:35 p.m.. You can skip to the end and leave a response.