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| Wedded Bliss at Sunset on the beaches of Fiji!!! |
| Glennīs Next Journal (coming soon) |
| Erinīs Fiji Journals (Coming soon) |
| Glenn's Journals 03-07-03 & 03-08-03 Fiji This morning we had split into two groups. My parents, along with Jim and Sue, had planned to leave around 8:45 am. There plans included stopping in Pacific Harbor for breakfast before conintuing on to Suva. The rest of us (Tim, Stef, Judy, Erin, and I) had planned on taking a more relaxing approach to the day. We awoke out our leisure, had breakfast at the resort, and planned to leave for Suva around 10:00 am. Erin and I had to relocate into her mom's bure as we had not booked a bure for our last night in Fiji. (Remember we came in on Friday night and the rest of the group came in on Saturday morning and our package was for seven nights accomodation.) After breakfast and us relocating we were ready to leave around 10:00 am. The ride to Suva seemed to take longer than we had been told but that could be due to the fact that we are very cautious driving on these roads. We arrived in Suva around noon where we found parking and took off on foot into town for some shopping. Shopping was good as each of us found things that were worth buying. Erin and I had to remember that anything we bought would have to fit in someone elses luggage or carryon so we were pretty aware of a size constraint. We did find a local market with all of the stalls and plenty of wood work. These stalls take some work as each vendor tries to pull you into their stall. Once you are in they pull out all the stops to try and sell you something, anything. We all bought a few things including a kava bowl for Judy and ourselves. We ran into the other group during different parts of the day. We finally stopped for lunch around 1:45 pm During lunch I ran back to the car to put more money into the meter. We had agreed to spend a few more hours shopping after lunch. Lunch was an oriental stir fry which was very good. After lunch Judy and Erin decided to stay back while Tim, Stef, and I continued on to the "flea market". The flea market was mostly clothes so we did not stay long. We then made our way through the fruit and vegetable market before making our way back to Judy and Erin. We made our way back to the car by 3:40 pm. Our next stop was a waterfall just north of Suva. It took us 20 minutes to get there and after a 15 minute walk found our way to the waterfall. It was more of a walk than we had epxected but the trail was well marked. We returned to the car where Judy was waiting for us. The drive back to Crusoe's was uneventful but included deciding if we should stop into Pacific Harbor for a look see. We were ready to return to the pool so we continued back to the resort. We were in the pool by 6:15 pm. Dinner tonight was ala carte so we opted for dinner at the resort. The others returned around 8:00 pm as they had stopped back into Pacific Harbor for dinner. After dinner we sat around the pool, chatted about the week overall, and returned to our bure's around 11:00 pm. 03-08-03 Fiji Saturday morning and our last day in Fiji. Our flights were not until 10:40 pm but we would be picked up at 5:30 pm for the two hour van ride to the airport and the three hours required to be there prior to departure. We all woke up at our leisure today as we had no plans but to relax!! The day ended up being busier than i had planned. We had a few day rooms so some of our guests had to relocate to other bure's for the afternoon. I met with my dad to review my tax forms. He had prepared them for me as we will not be back into the country until after April 15th. Erin has already put in an extension. My parents also made notes in our Bali guide book from there two month stay there a few years back. We also had to distribute out all of the items we had purchased either in Australia or Fiji. Amazingly enough, with the help of all of our friends and family, we found a spot for all of our items. All of us had to verify our bills as well and I spent some time on the internet printing off the rest of our flight itinerary. I finally got a chance to relax for lunch and a half hour at the end of the day before we returned to the bure's for showers. We said goodbye to everyone before we left Crusoe's but we were confident we would see them at the airport. They were not planning on leaving Crusoe's until 6:00 pm. We stopped into the videographers shop on the way to the airport and collected our video. We then arrived at the airport, after two hours of driving, to see a long line out the door. We got into the Air Pacific line and only 15 minutes later the rest of the gang showed up. We also determined that the line we were in was for L.A.. We moved over to the counter for Brisbane and walked right up and checked in within minutes. Erin stopped to help out her mom who had a terrible back ache today. Tim and Stef were very helpful with Judy, helping her with her luggage. It all paid off as Judy, along with Tim and Stef were moved up in the line so Judy would not have to wait. Everyone else was checked in within the hour. Our next stop was to pay our departure tax before we ended up in a restaurant for dinner. It was now 8:45 pm so we had a little time before we needed to go through security to the gates. After dinner we all worked our way through security and met back up at the gate area a few minutes later. We even did some last minute shopping in an effort to spend the last little Fijian money that we had. Some even had enough left to exchange money back to American. Erin and I bought a couple of things at the last minute. I was still shopping when our boarding call was announced so Erin had to give me the eye. I hurried along saying our last goodbye's to whomever I could before boarding the plane. We had a great time in Fiji!!! The flight was uneventful as we arrived back into Brisbane around 12:15 am where Shane was waiting. Baggage took a better part of 30 minutes to show up but once we had our luggage we were outside within minutes. We arrived home aroud 1:30 am and quickly went to bed. We thanked Shane for picking us up. |