Fiji

Fiji is a group of about 300 islands located 1100 nautical miles northeast of New Zealand. Fiji's fierce, war-loving inhabitants scared away European explorers, who, as the childish jokes go, didn't want to be the guest of honor for a canibal feast.

The first European siting was in 1642 by Abel Tasman, who was looking for the "Great Southern Continent," a large, heavily populated continent that anthropologists and other academics projected must exist in that part of the globe. The closest approximation to that reality, of course, was Australia, but it proved to be rather sparsely inhabited at that time.

Captain James Cook anchored in Fiji in 1774, but it was one of his junior officers, William Bligh, who drew up a rough chart and had the islands named after him for a while. Apparently Cook wanted no part of canibal encounters.

It was fortunate for Bligh that his charts were accurate, because in 1789, as captain of his own ship, the HMS Bounty, he and 18 of his loyal men were sent to sea in a launch after the infamous Mutiny on the Bounty.

The Captain was able to bring his men safely to Tonga, where one of them was stoned to death by unfriendly hosts. They headed on to Fiji, where Bligh's knowledge of the islands allowed them to escape canibals giving chase. Remarkably, equipped with only a sextant and a pocket watch, Bligh navigated his 23 foot launch over 3600 miles to the Dutch East Indies (now called Indonesia). He subsequently returned to England, where he testified in trials of the mutineers, who had taken the ship back to the paradise of Tahiti.

Today, Fijians don't eat tourists as their ancestors did, but our port lecturer warned us to avoid wandering off on our own. She said this was the only port on our cruise where crime could be a problem.

Nonetheless, when we arrived in Suva, on Fiji's island of Viti Leva (Great Fiji), Julie wanted to go off on our own to the other side of the island. After negotiating with cab drivers, we ended up settling with one, and he led us from a bad part of the shanty town into a worse part. We were having our doubts about this endeavor when he opened a battered old taxi and smiled an invitation to get in.

The drive across the island revealed lush foliage and puncuated by third world housing. The Pearl Resort was another world, a westernized version of a tropical paradise: modern amenities, beautiful hotel, tiki bar by the pool, white sand and blue ocean. The water was warm, but there was no brightly colored sealife for snorkeling below the surface and no surf above. Still, we enjoyed a relaxed day at the gorgeous beach. When we arrived at the resort, we had seen large bed-like areas with tables where we decided to have lunch. The food wasn't as good as the setting, but it was pretty cool. The service was good and the drinks were cold.

Despite our repeatedly telling our driver we would find another cab going back, he was waiting for us in the parking lot, smiling, at the end of our stay at the Pearl Resort. All the people we met on Fiji, contrary to the port expert's warnings, were very friendly. Incidentally, there was a ship sponsored excursion to the same resort which included lunch, and I think we probably spent about the same as they did, but we arrived earlier and had lunch in the special seats.

At dinner, others spoke about excursions to villages to see fire walking and other Fijian activities that they said were terrific, too.