Nanuya Lai Lai - Manta Ray Resort
Trip Start
Jan 22, 2006
1
58
156
Trip End
Aug 16, 2006
Manta Ray Resort,
Fiji
Monday, March 20, 2006
On the days when we're due to change islands, I always feel in a strange sense of limbo, a bit like I always feel when I'm waiting at an airport before I go on holiday. To pass the hours I continued reading The Beach, which seemed quite appropriate considering our surroundings at the moment. Although fortunately the events on our particular paradise island were far less sinister than those described in the book.
For lunch we had our first curry of the trip, long overdue if you ask me, before the trip we'd expected to be served curry virtually every single day
01) A crab with a crazy shell
. By this point of the trip my stomach wasn't feeling in the greatest of health, so fortunately for me the curry wasn't a spicy one. Shortly after this, we had to say farewell to crazy man Rato and the other staff, boarding the boat and being ferried out to the Yasawa Flyer, which was heading South towards our final island of the trip.Manta Ray resort is virtually brand new, it's only been open just over a year. The tradition of being sung ashore by the staff was back here and after our boat driver told us to shout "Bula" when they finished, they all fell about laughing. You hear the Fijians laughing constantly throughout the day and night, not just little polite sniggers, but great big belly laughs, they're really happy people.
Our fifth and final hut was once again right on the beach, it has a light (luxury!) and a ceiling fan, so hopefully it won't be too hot tonight. We'd planned to have a quiet afternoon in a hammock reading, but after a couple of minutes outside we realised that we were being savaged by mosquitos. I received one absolutely huge one on my side, I prayed that it wouldn't get itchy because it was located where I could easily scratch it. For the first time so far, we had to deploy our mosquito net in the day and under it we cowered from the mosquitos for the rest of the afternoon
02) Partners in wine
.Before heading up to the main Bure for dinner, I had a shower that was little more than a dribble, luckily I noticed this before I'd put shampoo in my hair, I'd have been there all day trying to wash the shampoo out.
Seeing the Chefs serve the beautiful food that they'd freshly prepared and cooked on the BBQ, I had to take back the sneer that had crossed my face the day before when I'd seen a picture of the food that they allegedly served in their brochure. The picture and the actual food was identical and was easily the best meals that we'd had in Fiji. My plate was again stacked high and for once even I couldn't manage seconds.
We didn't let the small matter of missing Happy Hour deter us from drinking, I stayed safe with my normal "Fiji Gold" whilst Lynne was brave enough to sample another of their mixer free cocktails. At the bar we got chatting to two Scottish women who were pleased to see that Lynne was drinking a cocktail, so much so that they invited us back to their table to eat dinner with them. I'd seen the two of them sat in the hammock outside our room earlier in the day (although I'd somehow managed not to notice that they were in the act of polishing off two bottles of wine). It turned out that Lorna and Kate had been travelling around the world, but had stopped off in New Zealand for a few months working (they were both intensive care nurses). Their trip to Fiji was a weeks holiday away from the stresses and strains of their jobs, which from how they described their daily routine I imagined were pretty intense.
The wine and beer was soon flowing as easily as the conversation as we traded traveller's tales. It quickly transpired that both of them had lived colourful and interesting lives; Kate was using her divorce money to travel the world with, we suggested that she was missing a trick by not emailing her ex-husband back photographs from each destination and saying "this is on you"! She seemed to think this was a wonderful idea, so I apologise now if anyone reading this is the ex-husband in question!!
Three bottles of wine and several dashes down the hill to the toilet later, we were all rather merry. Sadly the night then took an unfortunate turn, when the dog who'd been sleeping nearby to our table for most of the night, suddenly growled at Kate and then more seriously a few minutes later went for Lorna's face. By instinct she pulled her head back out of the way, but she was still left with two marks on her face and it had understandably shook her up. This put an end to the night as none of us felt like drinking after this or being near the dog either. We did tell the owners what had happened, because in a way it was lucky that Lorna wasn't far more badly injured and we all shuddered when we thought what would have happened if the dog had done the same to a small child.
We walked Kate and Lorna back to their Bure, which was fortunately right next door to ours, before collapsing on the bed and finding that with the mosquito net out you couldn't feel any air from the ceiling fan at all. Still alcohol made sure that I wasn't awake long and I was soon in a deep but sweaty sleep.
