Used to be so many, now there's no many

We had plans to get up for the sunrise at 5:30 AM but since sleep is such a valuable asset while traveling and considering we hadn’t gotten much of it we hit snooze on the alarm and eventually decided it wasn’t worth it today and we’d catch it another time. Instead we woke up for breakfast and then continued to pack the rest of our belongings since we were leaving for White Sandy Beach today. While we were packing our things the night before I had realized that I was missing both of my sandals. We tried to search all the places we had been throughout the day but didn’t manage to find them anywhere. I was a little worried but while we were eating breakfast one of the Fiji men named Si came by to ask if the shoes he was wearing were mine and thankfully they were. That meant I now had my shower shoes back! We walked the beach one last time before a mini storm came through and Lauren was able to collect quite a few of these little flat seeds that she plans to use to make an instrument for her future classroom. The rest of the morning was spent relaxing on the hammock and taking last minute pictures before we had to take cover from the storm. 

This is the hammock that we often sat in at night since it was right outside our dorm building.

Closer look at the village bures (houses)

 

Right when we were about to leave Lauren noticed that Si was wearing another pair of shoes and they happened to be my other sandals! I could not believe that he had found both of my sandals but I was very thankful. Finally ready to board the bigger cruise ship we climbed into the smaller boat again and met the cruise ship out at sea. 

This is the small motorized boat that goes to meet the cruise vessel.

We figured out that the cruise ship can’t come onto the shore line because of the reef that surrounds the island and plus there’s not a dock for it to come into. We relaxed on the cruise ship with our German friends chatting about America and Germany for the next hour and a half. It was time for us to depart again and we headed to White Sandy Beach to get greeted with a bula song, which is a very pretty song! 

This island was a little bit less populated and the resort was a little more spread out but the people were still very welcoming. We arrived to many bula’s and hellos while we all sat down at a table where the manager explained the resort and collected vouchers. After this was all done, she had one of the boys on the island take our stuff up to the dorm where most of the others were also heading. I must say, I was pretty impressed with how nice the dorms are at White Sandy Beach. Most of the furniture looks like it has a cherry wood finish as well as the beds having extremely nice bug nets hanging above them. 

We sat our stuff down on the floor and headed straight downstairs since that’s where lunch was being held. Our first lunch at White Sandy Beach consisted of some bread, lettuce, chicken and sauce. Though it may not sound too appetizing it was really good! Shortly after lunch, we decided to see if the beach really was all white and sandy. Lauren started off by tanning a little while I decided to stay out of the sun and lay in the hammock to read my book. We didn’t last in the sun long before we had to jump into the water which was a lot warmer than the last beach but definitely very clear. We just sat on the ocean floor with our heads still above water since it was such a shallow beach. Before we knew it three hours had gone by and it was tea time. Water is undrinkable on the island so we had to the smart idea of filling our water bottle with the boiled water that we used for the tea and coffee which proved to work very well. The coconut was still on my mind though so after tea we grabbed the coconuts from upstairs and wandered to finally go crack them to see what was inside. We couldn’t find anything sharp enough and we didn’t even really know what to do so we eventually just asked a Fiji man. Before he even cracked it he informed me that it was a bad coconut and just threw it aside. That definitely shattered my dreams a little but we still had another coconut in our possession. So with nothing else to lose we went up to the dorm to get the other coconut and ask his opinion about that one. This was also unfortunately a bad one, and he informed us that coconuts are bad once they fall from the tree.

We unfortunately tried the coconut milk
before we found out it was bad coconut. Whoops.

The best coconuts are cut down from the tree, so that of course meant I had to get one out of a tree since I was definitely going to try a coconut while I was in Fiji! Stefan (the German guy) and I partnered up to go throw coconuts at another coconut tree to try and knock one down. The Fiji men thought this was hilarious and came to watch. We continued what we were doing until one guy made a move at going up into the tree to get one for us. It was quite the sight to see a guy shimmy up a coconut tree only to kick some coconuts down. 

Once he was all done he told us to grab our coconut and he proceeded to slice it open for us! We were finally able to taste real coconut and we must say that it is an acquired taste. 

Lauren, Riley, Stefan and Anna (the German couple)

Riley beyond excited to finally have a taste of coconut!

There was another beach on the other side of the island called Honeymoon Beach that we wanted to check out so we took out coconut drinks with us and started down a path through the middle of the island. Lauren and I didn’t have any shoes on and after about 2 minutes into the trek we figured that might have been a bad idea. The short walk was exactly what we expected to be, so in 10 minutes we arrived at the beach. Halfway through we walked through a couple’s bure (house) and there was a donation box in the middle of the pathway. They made sure to point out the donation box and look at us expecting us to give something. We were on the way to beach though so obviously we weren’t carrying any money and thinking on our feet we said that we’d send our money with the next group that came through. It was a little awkward and uncomfortable to say the least and the rumor is that they are trying to raise money to build another resort on the other side of the beach, but we’re not so sure about that since they were an older couple with not much. It all was worth it when we arrived at the beach though since it was beautiful with the sun coming down and having absolutely no one there but us. 

We found some more gorgeous shells and with the sun coming down quickly we knew it was time to head back. We were lucky enough to catch the sunset on our resort with clouds in front of it making a pink and purple sky.

As the last part of the sun was setting a boat pulled into the bay and the Fiji people started to unload all their supplies into the resort. Probably took them about five trips each, but that meant there were now cookies at the resort and our German friend Anna was happy about that since we had been starving the whole day. They joined us on the beach and we talked more about America and Germany, sharing our experiences. I think that Lauren is learning quite a lot about Germany which she’ll use this Fall. We ate a delicious three course meal with them, which was the first time in Fiji that we’ve had something that fancy. After dinner there was light entertainment provided by the Fiji resort people which was definitely entertaining. We got to see them do the Bula Dance which is kinda like a welcoming dance, similar to our line dances back home. They also did a couple of popular Fiji songs with choreography. Then they wanted everyone to join them on the dance floor and start to free style. Whenever the owner would call out a number you had to find that number of people and join their group, the odd people that didn’t find a group were out. I lasted a couple of rounds really busting my moves, but I moved too far away from Lauren and the Germans and soon became the odd man out. The rest of them lasted a lot longer, even though Stefan deeply wanted to get out but just couldn’t manage to do so! We also played another game called Bang which involved everyone being in a circle and one person being in the middle. Whenever that person pointed at another person in the circle and yelled Bang that person had to duck and the two people on their sides had to turn to each other and bang each other (by pointing their imaginary guns at each other). The last person to say bang was out as well as the first person who was banged at if they didn’t duck. Lauren was a little slow to react so she got out quickly, but I was literally the next one to follow. It was still fun to watch everyone else and laugh together. A bonfire had started on the beach but after a full day of laying on the beach, dancing and walking we were beyond exhausted and had to call it a night! For the first time I was able to sleep almost the whole night through.