We woke up this morning to a beautiful cloudless sky above us and glowing turquoise waters below. I just had to take some more photos of our surroundings.
I am going to swim to this little cupcake motu, climb it, and pluck a coconut from atop that sole tree.
After breakfast, we headed ashore to find the village of Moana-i-Cake, where we will meet the chief and be welcomed to Fulaga. Here is a shot from shore looking back at our boat.
We had to follow a trail for twenty minutes through the beautiful Fijian wilderness to get to the village.
Jan made us dress nicely because she wanted to make a good first impression.
It was a really nice hike.
This tree stood out alone and looked to be dead except for the few flowers blossoming at the top.
It is fall back home in Canada right now, but here in Fiji, the first day of spring is just around the corner (September 22nd).
We had to stop and gaze at the incredible beach and bay that we could see on our left through the trees.
This is on the opposite side of the island where we anchored.
After twenty minutes, we finally reached the village.
The first people we ran into was a group of women preparing food for lunch. It was really quiet when we entered as The children were in school and the men were all out tending the plantation on the other side of the bay. After meeting all the ladies, we were escorted to the Chief's house by a girl named Sara.
She answered many of our questions on the walk there. The village has 80 people, and this is the primary village of Fulaga (the other two villages are called Moana-i-Ra and Naividamu).
Here is the chief's house.
Take off your shoes before entering.
Normally, you do not speak directly to the chief and have a representative from the village speak for you, but since the men were not there, we were allowed to speak to the chief and Sara acted as a translator.
We went through the whole introduction process and gave our offering of yagona.
After we were welcomed into the village officially by the Chief, Sara brought us to the school to see the children hard at work.
We got to meet all four teachers who work there.
I disrupted this one class and stuck my head in the window to say hi.
There were four total classes in session, and they were in the middle of their reading time.
I could barely walk after sitting cross-legged for so long.
How would you have liked to have this in your schoolyard?
After ruining reading time for the kids, we were invited to join the ladies that we had originally met coming in. They were in the process of weaving and serving lunch (which we were invited to join).
They served some sort of cabbage soup with cassava (a root similar to potatoes, breadfruit, or tarot root).
This little guy joined us for lunch. I was glad to not be the only one with food all over my face.
They took us afterwards to see the woodcarver and some of his amazing work.
The bowls were amazing, and that little black thing at the top-centre is called a 'cannibal fork'...yikes!
Sara saw us out and invited me to come play volleyball with them on the morrow. I'll have to bring some of my Miller Lake skills to Fiji.
We saw this really bright blue Kingfisher on the way back.
On the way back to the boat, we decided to take a detour in the dinghy and check out some of the motus all around us.
This place is just breathtaking. It is hard to believe we have this massive bay and all its treasures all to ourselves.
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