Bula and welcome to Fiji

Luggage ready for the boat

Jemma drenched

Our arrival into Fiji was tropical, but not in the way we had expected. We landed in torrential rain (not sure how the pilot managed to land – the last plane had had to be diverted because the storms were so bad.). We waited in Nadi airport for a taxi with the guy from the hostel who had come to collect us. It was pouring down with rain, flooding everywhere and there weren't any taxis because the roads were so flooded. After about an hour of waiting, a taxi finally came and drove us to the hostel. It felt like real travelling again because the car was an old banger with no seatbelts and the driver drove really dangerously. We got to our hostel, which was basically just a hut by the port and everything was damp. We decided just to go to bed and hoped we would wake up to better weather the next day. There were storms and non stop rain all through the night. Every time I woke up I could hear it outside and felt worried that it would not stop by the morning. It didn't stop. It carried on for the whole next day and it was so bad that the town was shut down due to flooding and no cars or boats could leave. This meant that we were trapped on the mainland, which isn't the prettiest of places to be trapped. We spent the whole day trapped in the hostel, eating, talking to people and trying the kava (the local drink which is disgusting and tastes like mud). At one point the rain stopped and we decided to seize the moment and go for a walk. 

 About 30 minutes into the walk, the storms started again and we got absolutely soaked. It really wasn't fun. All of our stuff was wet, the beds were damp and I was so depressed because there was no prospect of getting off the mainland to visit the islands as we had intended to do. People were telling us that it was due to last another 5 days. I was horrendously depressed and had a headache. The whole hostel and the surrounding areas were flooded and there were no shops near by to buy food so we just had to buy meals from the hostel. We went to bed again that night to thunder and lightening, praying for a miracle in the morning. In the morning, a miracle happened and a small gap in the grey clouds appeared allowing us to see a tiny patch of blue which gave us hope. We managed to sit down with the guy in the hostel and plan a week of island hopping and he booked us on the next boat that afternoon. As long as it didn't start to rain again, we would be off. The rain just about held off for us and we eventually got on a boat along with two Americans we had met. We were so happy to arrive at our first Island, Mana, to a group of singing ukulele players and sunshine.