I made it back from my travels which were part research and part vacation. Austin, Melissa, and I caught the bus to Nadi on Wednesday afternoon. In Nadi, we stayed with a Pentecostal pastor and his family. It was the house where my host brother Bill stays during his pilot training. It was nice to be able to hang out with him. It was a trip to be back in Nadi. It was the city where we first arrived and spent our orientation. It was crazy to see how badly they take advantage of uninformed tourists in the city. You really had to keep your gaurd up and be nasty to certain cab drivers.
On Thursday, I ventured into Nadi town, where I met up with my host great uncle. He drove me out to Momi, which was the location of the best preserved WWII battery in Fiji. It's a project of the Fijian National Trust. We got to the battery only to find the gates locked. I started to panic, because seeing this battery was a big part of my project. My host uncle told me not to worry. He took me to the village where the park rangers work and got the keys from one of their wives. Apparently the rangers were away for training. We headed back to the gun battery site, where my host uncle unlocked the gates and the tiny museum for me. The museum had some historical photos and info that really helped me with my project. The battery itself was amazing. It had been completely preserved. The actual guns were really impressive, and the view from the top of the battery was breathtaking. It was also awesome that I had the entire place to myself for three hours. After that, I had lunch with my host uncle and his family and then he drove me back to Nadi where I spent the afternoon with Austin and Melissa.
On Friday, we caught a bus to a beach resort where our friend Dana was staying with her American parents. We all went together to the Sigatoka Sand dunes, which was also maintained by the national trust. We hiked a trail around the dunes for a couple hours. The dunes were incredibly impressive. The views were amazing. Dana and I had a race to the top of one of them. I won the race because of a frisbee layout dive at the end. It was really fun and a little bit ridiculous. We spent the afternoon in Sigatoka and then caught a bus to a backpackers resort at Mango Bay.
Mango Bay was a pretty nice place to spend the evening. We walked on the beach, swam in the pool that had a swim up bar, and took advantage of their happy hour.
The next worning we caught a mini bus to Taunovo Bay, a super fancy five star resort. We got to spend a day there, because Austin's host sister was getting married, and his family had managed to secure local rates. We met up with some more of the students there. We spent the morning helping get everything ready for the wedding. The actual ceremony was beautiful. It was by a pool near the beach. Everything was spoken in Fijian, but it was still nice. We spent the afternoon and evening enjoying the supernice facilities. I ended up getting really sick in night. I think I had a stomach bug of some sort, but it was a pretty nice place to recover. The biggest downside to getting sick, was that I couldn't go diving in the morning like I had planned. My health keeps getting in the way of that happening. I think I'll still have a couple more chances though.
The next morning I walked on the beach and layed by the pool. We caught a van home about midday and I spent the rest of the afternoon hanging out with my host family. It was a crazy busy few days and now I'm in the middle of my research project. I'm trying to get it done as quickly as possible so that I can travel some more before I leave in three weeks.
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