Monday 1st February 2010

Bula from Fiji! We made it!
The trip over was pretty long and tiring and didn't get off to a good start when we were told that we were 30kgs overweight... As we were flying with Air Pacific, they don't really have a policy on ski equipment so we ended up having to pay up (after running around to airport trying to find out if we could send our skis to Canada by ship instead - we made it onto the plane with only minutes to spare!).

After a 10 hour flight from Hong Kong, we landed in Nadi where we had a 3 hour connection and managed to get into a fight with a book shop. I tried to buy a book (as my stupid kindle broke on the flight!) and only realised when I got to the till that they wanted US$60 for it. Yes - that's right - US$60!! They tried to tell me that because they had put it through the till already that I had to buy it. After a while of arguing with them, I called Michael over who told them he was going to call the police. That sorted that out!


The next leg of the journey was on a tiny 15-seater plane which took us to Suva, the southern part of the main island of Fiji. We were met at the airport by the Jean-Michael Coustau resort manager who must have seen how tired we looked as he very kindly upgraded us to an ocean front room....




The hotel is amazing and we have already decided that we will be coming back! Chloe has been assigned a dedicated nanny for a week so we can drop her off at the kids' club whenever we like. They have a massive area with its own swimming pools and slides and loads and loads of toys. Chloe loves it there and we spent yesterday afternoon going up and down the slides with her. In fact she seemed so happy that we decided she wouldn't mind if we left her to go for a dive this morning. I was anxious to get back for her nap time as she doesn't usually settle easily so imagine my surprise when I found her asleep in her nanny's arms!



The only complaint I have about this place are the millions of mosquitoes! (and not only at night - they are everywhere during the day too!). Thankfully it seems that Chloe has inherited Michael's untasty blood and they don't seem interested in her at all. I on the other hand have already managed to accumulate 30 bites (they seem to find the one spot that I missed putting mosquito spray on..).

We have just finished lunch and Michael has gone to sit underwater (yes, literallly sit underwater - he is testing out his underwater camera) and Chloe is still sleeping so thought I would take a moment to write this. I guess we will be doing more of the same over the next couple of days (eating, sleeping and diving) so will write my next post then