The Bula Fiji Vacation

Cathy, myself, Steve and Marcella Hiebert traveled down to Fiji on vacation recently. Bula, by the way, is kind of the Hawaii equivalent to Aloha. It is primarily a greeting though. Fiji has a resort that is part of the Worldmark timeshare scheme that we bought into a while back and since we were in need of a tropical vacation we decided to try it out. I haven't been too impressed with the location of some of their other resorts but this one was much better. It's right on the beach and part of a string of other resorts that are on Denarau Island which is slighty separated from the mainland by the Nadi river (pronouced Nan-dee). This separation is also a little inconvenient since it makes it harder to get into town for cheap food. The resort was "a little under booked, like most of the rest of the island, due to the recent military coup in January. Tourism hasn't quite bounced back to normal levels, but fewer people made for a nicer stay for us. The balcony to our room overlooked the pool, swim-up bar (yes, we did spend some time there), and the beach.

Spent most of our time relaxing, scuba diving and fishing. Marcella hadn't been diving since getting her certification many years ago (I won't say how many to protect her true youthful age) but after a brief refresher she did several dives and got back into the swing of things. Unfortunately, we got hooked up with a bad dive operator the first couple of days. Ended up doing some pretty murky uninteresting dives. On one trip their boat broke down and we were bearly able to limp back to shore. When we switched to another outfit, things were much better. All in all we saw numerous sharks, turtles, some rays, and huge schools of fish. There's a lot of really cool islands off shore that we passed, and most of them have resorts of some sort. I would be tempted to check those out if I went back.

I decided to try some deepsea fishing so Steve and I hired a boat to take us out a couple of times. Didn't land anything really huge but the first time out we got into some yellow fin tuna and caught 4 or five small ones in the 5-6 pound range. I did get a large dolphin fish or dorado (otherwise known as a Mahi Mahi) on the hook for a while. Whereas the tuna didn't put up much of a struggle, this guy was big and jumping out of the water. I managed to work him to within about 15 feet of the boat when he jumped one last time and spit the hook. He must of been more like 20-30 pounder and would have been some good eating. Guess he goes down in the list of "ones that got away".

The big national pastime of Fiji is drinking Kava Kava. Can't say that I'm too impressed. There's a lot of talk and stories about it's mild psychotropic properties, it's a relaxant, people in the government officies sit around drinking it all day so nothing gets done, yahdah, yahdah, yahdah. They are so into it that half the market in town it dedicated to stalls with nothing but kava root for sale. The resort puts on a Kava preparation seminar, and also served it at a cocktail party we attended, and I have to say it was pretty disappointing stuff. Looks and tastes pretty much like dirty sock water and the preparation is reminiscent of the same...wringing a cotton bag of Kava powder in a bowl of water. The ceremony is a touch phallic. The Kava bowl is a large round wooden affair that sits on four legs, and attached to one side is a long coconut rope with two seashells attached at the bowl. It's important that the rope always points at the chief (draw your own conclusions there). When you accept the bowl you clap once and say "Bula". After your drink everyone claps three times and says something like "Muther". After three cups I can't say as I felt anything. Here I am pounding Kava into dust. Convinced that we had been short changed we even bought some in the market and continued to experiment...nothing. Conclusion- Kava is not what it's cracked up to be.

Nice relaxing place to go. We didn't get inland other than the town so there's lots more to explore there. Another plus is no beggers anywhere. If you've been to other third world countries you know what a pain that is. If you go bring your own booze. Liqour and wine are super expensive, but beer isn't too bad.

New House

Well the old house was showing its age so we decided to give her a face lift. First off we decided to upgrade the windows, and sprung for some duel pane low E models with vinyl frames. That job was hired out and the guy did a pretty decent job. The only hang up was one malfunctioning casement on the front picture window. That problem was turned back to the window manufacturer and has langished there every since. Supposedly new parts have been received so we're still waiting for them to be installed.

The coup de grace, however, was the decision to redo the exterior of the house in stucco. That has been an epic, and as anyone who has ever hired a contractor knows, keeping the crew on the job is no small undertaking. I will forever remember his statement after they started the job a week and a half later than scheduled. "This will be an easy job Charlie...just a quick in and out." Over a month later I'm still getting the "quick in and out", but the end is in sight. Most of the color coat went on this week, and would have been done but they ran out of of color. Two days have gone by and I'll still calling to get them to come out and finish. Most annoying has been a huge pile of sand that took over the driveway the end of May when they put on the base coat, and the remanents have yet to get hauled away.

Well it looks pretty good, but can I get them to clean up the mess surrounding the house? Stay tuned.