Fun in Fiji: snorkeling, swimming, and sleeping

Our first full day in Nukubati was just as amazing and the night before had made us think it would be. We took advantage of being on vacation and did vacation-y things like sleeping until the birds and sun woke us up, took a nap during the a afternoon rain shower, and ordered fun cocktails from the bar.

The days on Nukubati go like this: you wake up when you want. When you're ready for breakky you can go to the main building and let them know what you'd like to eat. While you're eating breakfast, one of the hosts will show you that day's lunch options, and you decide what and where you'd like to eat - pretty much anywhere on the island is fair game.

Then you can entertain yourself with whatever you'd like until you are ready for lunch. The rest of the day goes like the first, except that the hosts will come find you around 5:30 to deliver champagne and canapés. And then when you're ready, you can make your way to your chosen dinner spot for your evening meal. At any point during the day, saunter up to the bar to find someone to make you a cocktail or pour a drink. Basically, it's about as laid back as you can imagine!

Our first day flowed along pretty naturally: we had a lovely breakky of omelette and tropical fruit. Then we decided to head out for a snorkel off the main landing area. There is a reef that circles the island, so it was prime for snorkeling around at low tide.

We also took out some glass-bottomed open kayaks. They were great for cruising over the coral and checking out the fish and starfish underneath the waves. And we also encountered a sea snake: he swam around us for a while and then dove down once he was tired of our company.

Post-lunch on the island got a little lazy. It was pretty hot and humid, and a storm was rolling in. This made it perfect for sitting on our giant porch. Naps, reading, and watching the weather roll by ensured.

By the time the weather had passed, we were ready to tackle something else. So we headed out on a trail that climbs to the top of the hill on the island. The trail seemed pretty quiet, except for the giant mosquitoes that seemed pretty happy to see us! At the top of the hill, we could look out and see the mainland and a few other islands nearby.

There was just enough time to hike back, grab a cocktail, and go for an evening dip. Then canapés came around and we got cleaned up for dinner.

 

It was amazing how quickly we got good at being relaxed and into vacation mode! I really think we could do this professionally. =)

 

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Bula from Fiji!

As I learned today, "bula" means hello in Fiji. Which is where we are!

About six months ago, T told me to block off my long Easter weekend and to take a couple extra days of holiday - he had a trip planned for us. He managed to keep our destination secret all the time since, finally telling me the Wedneday before we left that he'd booked us a trip to a Fiji island! As you would imagine, I was beyond excited!!! This is the kind of exotic trip I told myself we'd take all the time once we lived in Australia, but this is the first true "island vacation" for us. I'm a pretty lucky girl!

T had arranged everything for us, which was no small feat. We were headed to Nukubati, a private island on the north side of the country. To get there, we had a wee bit of travel: plane ride from Sydney to Nadi, from Nadi to Suva, and from Suva to Labasa. From there, we took an SUV ride to the coast, and then a boat out to the island. Needless to say, it's enough to make a girl feel like a glamorous criminal on the run.

The travel itself was so fun, though. Leaving Sydney was pretty much like any other flight, but once we arrived in Nadi, all normalcy was gone. The airport was tiny, and looked just like you'd expect a tropical airport to look: laid back workers in tropical shirts, giant fans in place of air conditioning, and one tiny Western Union stall for exchanging currency.

A snack at the single cafe

As we transferred to our domestic flight, we got to watch the airport staff put a man on the luggage scales for "airplane balancing" purposes. Luckily, they didn't deem Toby or I high-risks for plane unbalancing!

Our flight lounge

As it would happen, Nadi was the "big" airport of the day. Suva was incredibly small:

Everyone lined up for the one flight leaving Suva

And Labasa was even smaller. We had to get our bags at Labasa, which was an adventure in itself. We deboarded the plane and walked across the tarmac to the tiny building which was the airport. There were about 70 people in it, all just standing and staring at us when we walked in, which was a little unnerving. Since you could see the entire room, it was pretty clear to us that there were no "baggage claim" signs. In fact, the only signs we saw were "Police" and "Gents Toilets." We decided to just mill around for a moment and see what we could figure out.

That turned out to be a good plan, because within five minutes, a man came in the same door we'd entered, pulling a giant luggage cart behind him. And then it was a free for all to get your suitcase off the cart.

Our two suitcases were the absolutely last two to get taken, completely due to the fact that we were so stunned at the fray, everything was over by the time we wrestled our way to the cart. Which turned out OK, because it was probably our look of being completely out of place that led our driver to come up to us and say "Nukubati Island?" I'm not sure how we would have found each other otherwise, because he certainly didn't have a sign or uniform! But after we said yes, he cheerfully said, "I wait for you outside." All that was left for us to do was fight our way to our bags, locate our new friend out in the parking lot, and we were off on our next-to-final leg of the journey!

We quickly realized that we were in a more laid-back world, when our driver friend made two stops without any explanation at all. Once was to buy water (which he shared with us) and once to drop off a container of gasoline at a house in the middle of a field. Both times he stopped the car, got out and walked away without a word. But he did come back, and we eventually bounced our way to the coast, where our final leg awaited us.

This was by far the best of our modes of transport! It was just a tiny boat with an outboard motor and a cheerful man taking us on the five minute ride to the island. It was a pretty amazing way to end our day of travel.

We were greeted with all of the staff out on the beach, singing to us and giving us traditional flower necklaces.

After some coconut water and some champagne, we checked out our bure, watched the sunset, and had our first dinner on the island.

I've never felt more like a celebrity, and I might not ever have been this relaxed either. What an amazing start to our holiday!

 

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Some more volunteering

Just like I did a few weeks ago, I spent my past Friday volunteering at the Good360 warehouse in Sydney. This time I organized the volunteering day for my team, so it was a smaller group. But I also think we had more fun that way!

Getting briefed on the charity

A big donation in the warehouse, ready to go out

We had two tasks for the day - sorting and packaging donated women's shoes, and sorting five pallets of donated Lush products.

The shoe sorting took us all morning.

 

Just like last time, there were some interesting finds.

 

But we made our way through!

We had lunch in the warehouse cafe. There wasn't anything too interesting about that except for the man casually sitting there with a parrot on his shoulder!

And then it was on to Lush products. Lush had donated all of their leftover Christmas product. That ran the gamut from pre-packaged gift sets to Santa-faced bath bombs. And run you unpack it, five pallets of body products is A LOT. Especially when some of it is boxes full of loose soaps.

To be honest, we didn't really make a dent in getting off that product re-packaged and ready to ship. But we did get fifty boxes or so that were made up and will make some people very happy. So it was a start, and it made for a fun day away from the office!

 

 

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Let me tell you about the Royal Easter Show

The Sydney Royal Easter Show is something I've heard about since we've gotten here.

Typically, it's been something parents at work talk about taking their kids to over the Easter school holidays. I've always kind of discounted the Royal Easter Show, thinking it was something for kids. But this year a friend at work started telling me more about it, and he convinced me it was worth paying the $40 to check out.

And let me tell you, the Easter Show transcends description! The best I can do is to call it a supercharged country fair plus carnival plus food festival. To help describe how big this event is, I should mention that it's at the Olympic Park, just a little bit outside the city center. Special trains run to the Olympic Park for the weeks of the Easter Show, and people all around Australia (and from New Zealand) come to show their goods/animals/skills and compete.

Sheep shearing demonstration, "Wash a chook," and the dogs in their cubicles getting ready to be shown

Hands down, my favorite bit of the Easter Show was the animals. In a way, it reminded me a lot of being home: lots of horses and cows all around. On the day I went, there were lots of schoolkids showing their various animals.

One of the events I attended was called "Wash a Chook," which was an event where schoolkids from around Australia cleaned up their chickens (including blow-drying them) and presented them to a judge to determine the best-looking "chook." It was a hoot!

Another favorite demonstration was a sheep shearing demonstration. Two "champion shearers" demonstrated using both electric clippers and the old fashioned manual technique. One of these guys has sheep sheared in front of the Queen. Twice. Quite an accomplishment! =)

There were multiple pavilions with different animals on display and competing for top prize. Lots and lots of sheep, and rows and rows of fowl.

There were slighty more niche animal events too. Like the shetland ponies pulling tiny carriages...

And, of of course in the poultry pavilion, there was a chicken art competition - because... why not? 

The best poultry art I saw all day!

My ultimate favorite of the animals was the Australian sheep dog demonstration. It was absolutely fascinating, and the dogs were so fun to watch. The farmer who trained these particular dogs brought out three different dogs in different stages of their training and showed how their behavior differed when rounding up the sheep. He also showed how they make the dogs confident enough to run on top of the sheep's backs when they're in tight spaces. I loved it!

If the animals were my first favorite thing about the Easter Show, the woodchopping demonstration was my second favorite. I came to learn that this event is called the "Wimbledon of Woodchopping, " and it was pretty amazing. Treefelling, chopping, sawing, you could basically see any variation of woodchopping that you can imagine. I watched a few different events and they were all amazing - even though they only lasted for a couple minutes tops.

Of course, there were lots of the traditional country fair-type exhibits: cakes, breads, jams, honey, artwork, beadwork, tapestry, painting - entire display halls were filled with all of the goods in competition for the coveted blue ribbon!

There was also a food hall, which I almost skipped. Luckily I decided to stop in because it turned out to be anything but boring. 

The sides of the room were giant displays of Australian produce, arranged to make pictures or arrangements. It was truly amazing - not only some of the giant produce, but also how they managed to make scenes from food. 

I closed out my day at the Royal Easter Show by visiting the Showbag Hall. Showbags were the main thing I've heard about when people talked about the Royal Easter Show. Coworkers talk about how excited they were to go the show when they were kids because they'd get to choose a showbag; now they take their kids and let their kids buy a bag. Basically, they're like a bag full of cheap toys or themed paraphernalia. The really amazing thing is the vast variety of showbags. It's a giant space full of these booths, and you can buy showbags themed from magic prizes (the cheapest bags) to sport teams ($35). I've never seen anything like it; it was pretty overwhelming to take in. But I also completely get why kids go nuts for it!

Overall, I had a few takeaways from the day:

• I'll be going back next year if I can - it was too much fun!
• Next time I'll pace myself a bit. I tried to see everything and I ended up being exhausted with all the walking around. I'll pick a few things that I really want to see and then spend more time sitting and watching events. 
• The Australians know how to do an Easter Show!

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