06. South Pacific Cruise

Fiji

Although the distance from Lautoka to Suva is not far, cruise ships manage to still arrive after sunrise with time to spare to get all the shore furniture ready for guests to disembark soon after breakfast. Our docking point in Suva is at a container wharf with shipping containers stacked up to 7 high. Next door is the central Suva bus station. Buses are the main public transport system for Fiji.

Suva

Suva is the capital city of Fiji, located on the southeast coast of Viti Levu, the country’s largest island.

Population: ~90,000 (about 330,000 in the greater Suva–Nausori urban area) Role: Political, administrative, and commercial centre of Fiji Climate: Tropical rainforest – warm and humid year-round, with frequent rain Port: One of the South Pacific’s most important ports

Quick facts:

What Suva is known for:

Government & diplomacy – Parliament House, embassies, regional organisations Education – University of the South Pacific (USP) main campus Shipping & trade – major container and cruise port Health services – Colonial War Memorial Hospital Urban life – markets, nightlife, museums, and a strong Indo-Fijian and Pacific cultural mix

Beside the bus station is a very active farmers market which seems to run day and night. The shopping centre is beyond the market. This enables us to walk to town or catch the free shuttle bus. All the tourist buses come onto the wharf to collect or drop off excursion passengers. The wharf precinct is very busy as you can imagine.

We took the shuttle bus to town in the morning and returned to the ship for lunch.

Negotiating a price and what was on offer can be tricky and without much knowledge of where we will visit, at the end of the negotiation process. We “did a deal” thinking we would be departing within a few minutes. Not to be. The bus was a 20 seater and each seat represented a different deal that had to be made in order for the tour of the city to start. We waited for 40 minutes for that process to be completed. (Fiji time).

Fortunately, a tour guide accompanied us as the driver’s job is to drive and grunt. We were shown most of the cities important landmarks and buildings and made it to a waterfall up some “hairy” roads; roads that I would never consider driving our motor home on.

A tradition that used to be normal for departures by cruise boats from Suva was that the Fiji Police Band would play for 30 minutes prior to the casting off; that has been deleted from the farewell procedure which used to be a highlight.

Our next destination had to be changed due damage at the tender wharf at Dravuni Island. Near to Viti Levu is the town of Savu Savu on the second largest Fijian island of Vanua Levu. Our captain decided that was a good alternative. All these little towns on the islands are very busy with what seems to be, a town where you go to if you’re not fishing or in the garden.

The shuttle tender was quite crowded and the town only required a couple of hours to explore and experience the culture of their way of life.

Or next destination was in the Kingdom of Tonga.