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(still need to fix the picture links … original story (with broken pic links) here)

We just returned from Toberua and I just finished writing the report …

While still in New York we received an email from our friend / Toberua Dive Person that her last weekend on the island is coming up and that she would love to dive with all her Suva dive pals one more time … after securing that we would get ‘our’ bure #9 again, we signed up That would be our 4th weekend trip to that little island just 90 minutes away from Suva.

So on Friday we set off by taxi to catch the boat at Nakelo landing at 6 PM … It seems Fiji to experiences shorter days in winter … for the first time we did our 6 Pm boat ride to the island in the dark, It was very beautiful. We were welcomed like family and were happy to have our bure ‘wakaia’ again.

When I checked out the bar area, I noticed some familiar faces: Angela and Jochen (this time with kids) who we had met last valentines weekend and Don & Evelyn who were having their daughter’s here last time … we all sat around a table and had a nice chat .. mainly about expat lives in Fiji.

Also new was that we had our dinner not in the restaurant area, but the terrace in front of the bar-bure … very nice with candle light right at the water front:

Paw Paw Gazpacho or Salad with Crab Meat
Opaka (fish) Filet on Smoked Marlin with Veggies,
Crepes with Coconut Icecream

After this we were so tired that we went straight to bed … As far as I can recall, I fell asleep with my clothes still on and contact lenses in … Saturday:

Breakfast, then getting ready for diving: One tank dive with Rachel’s successor Sandra. First I noticed that I forgot my booties (shoes to be worn with my fins) So Sandra got me other fins my size. Then I noticed that my mouthpiece was wrong (while being serviced in NY, the service person re-attached it the wrong way) … and on the way down one of my contact lenses popped out. The dive was thus a bit stressful, the smaller fins felt very funny, the viz was already bad, now I could see it with only one eye, and I seemed to hog air like crazy. Allegedly we saw a turtle … The dive was relatively short with 42 minutes, but that was ok …

Return, Lunch: Corn/Crab fritter with some avocado salad and thai spice sauce, followed by a sesame-chicken kebab with rice and desert was vanilla ice over some fruit caramel custard … The kids on the neighbor table used their ice-cream to turn their coca cola into a muddy looking drink which they called a “Spider” … hmm

Very lazy afternoon, no diving … Ritsu took a big nap .. I explored the island, started reading Michael Moore’s “Stupid White Men” and watched some TV shows on my TiBook .

Around 6PM the usual suspects congregated at the bar and we just chatted some more … We had never seen the island so crowded actually. Besides us Suva people (there was also a USP prof by the name of Spike with his family) there was a group of 4, probably from the US .. and then a group of 6 or 8 .. celebrating some anniversary …

Dinner was set up again at the bar terrace, and curiously enough, there was no prior menu selection, which usually means it is BBQ night There was one big table set up for the Rachel farewell party. And around 8 we started sitting down and going for the appetizer buffet: Fijian dishes like Fish in Lolo, Kokoda, Palusami, Duruka (supposed to be some kind of fijian asparagus, but also related to sugar cane .. ) Dalo, lots of veggies .. and Lobster Tails !!! And darn were they good !!! I could not hold back, I just had to get a second helping

The chef (who looks a bit like LL Cool J in “Deep Blue Sea”, but the name keeps escaping me) worked the BBQ and did some great beef, sausages and chicken … After all the lobster I had only space for a bit of beef .. but that was just great … hmm .. there was some desert I guess .. but more fun were all the cakes that suddenly showed up .. the table of 4 was having a birthday … so, of course, we all sing “happy birthday” .. the table of 6 gets an anniversary song (which I had never even heard of before) and while they already started to bring Rachel to tears early on with songs like “Leaving on a Jet Plane”, they brought her a very fancy cake, decorated with a cream covered set of mask and snorkel. (Which we later tried to make Rachel put on … but she resisted fiercely)

Big cheers and then speech first by Vern, the owner (who me had met already last time) and then Rachel, who took us as an example that we would only come if we got our favorite bure, as to what kind of friends she has. It was all very high on emotion .. but was lightened up considerably when Zac, one of the musicians, started snake line dancing (well .. not sure what it is called in other parts on the world … but you just grab the shoulders of the person in front of you [the SHOULDERS !!!] and follow rhythmically … Most of that happened just around the table, but when it was my turn to lead, I just walked them all down to the beach So the night went on .. but we got tired soon and went to bed (well, Ritsu actually ended up falling asleep on the outside swing) …

I heard later that the festivities continued well after 2 AM

Sunday:

Not a very sunny day this time, and the wind coming from the other side … after breakfast it even started to rain … The one tank dive was delayed in favor of sleeping a bit longer … once on the dive boat we nearly forgot our 5th diver .. the sea was the roughest I have seen so far in Toberua, but we managed … We went to “The Playground” again and it was a much nicer dive than the day before … The visibility was not that great, but we ran into a couple of sharks (actually I think it was the same shark several times over) and saw quite some stuff … after the dive it was tricky to get back on the boat in those rough seas (and being so close to the reef, higher waves there) but all worked out and we returned to the island just in time for lunch which was a potato/shrimp croquette, Ritsu then had Spaghetti Bolognese while I had a salad with Walu (local fish) and again some fatfree / non calorie desert afterwards … Ritsu had a massage after lunch while I finally washed that salt water off my skin and just continued reading … then it was already time to pack and hop on the boat to get back to Suva … Well, not before taking one last group photo with Rachel and Sandra.

Again a wonderful trip, and we already know we will go back in about a month to celebrate our first anniversary.

Oh, I just found this interesting article on the cute Toberua seas snakes, which we saw again … while they DO have a deadly poison, they do NOT use it for defense, they do not bite humans .. unless you really really piss them off … They are quite beautiful and you can actually touch them (but should not)