Fiji’s Dravuni Island and New Caledonia’s Maré Island were the last two stops of the cruise – and as luck would have it, the one was wetter than the other. Never mind! Tropical waters are warm, and so is tropical rain.
Bula, Dravuni Island!
The tender stops at a pier that is specially assembled before Cruise Day and then taken apart afterwards
I’m not sure whether the clouds, drizzle and eventual steady afternoon rain were a blessing or a curse: on the positive side, there were fewer cases of geriatric sunburn.
There’s no electricity here, and no cars; and, according to Heather from the shore excursion team, “they’re as fascinated by us as we are by them”. This is billed as the true remote Fijian island experience.
It’s a fair way from ship to shore, as you can see here
In Fiji,“Bula” means hello, and always gets a smile! Located on Viti Levu, Fiji’s largest island, Lautoka is also known as Sugar City. Like my home town Durban, its important Indian population descends from indentured labourers brought in during the second half of the nineteenth century to work in the sugarcane fields.
Once again, the Noordam is berthed in a container port
Waking up in Vanuatu’s Port Vila to a sight like this, no wonder I was itching to go ashore. In retrospect, I’d say this was the best stop on the Noordam’s South Pacific Island itinerary.
What a view to wake up to!
As you step off the gangway, you either go right to join one of the ship’s organised tours, or left to enter a market maze. Haggling is not part of the culture here: the price you see is the price you pay.
Annexed by the French in the 1840s and established as a penal colony, New Caledonia (or Nouvelle-Calédonie) is part of the French collectivity, and feels like a slice of France in the middle of the South Pacific.
Day 4: Nouméa
After two full days at sea, we woke up – that’s never too early, with Roy – to find ourselves moored at Nouméa, New Caledonia’s capital city, on Grand Terre island. Many of our 1,800-odd fellow passengers on the Noordam were already up, breakfasted, and streaming ashore.
After almost three lovely months with the family in Perth WA, Roy and I were ready for our 15-28 March getaway – a 13-night cruise on the HAL (Holland America Line) Noordam, round trip from Sydney to the South Pacific and back.
My Roy can be hard to pin down when he doesn’t want to do something. The mouth says: yes, sure, let’s do that sometime. But the eyes – and sometimes a slight twitch in the right eyebrow – say: no, I don’t think so, probably never.
That’s how it’s been about Rottnest Island, located just off Perth, WA. I’d been trying to get there for the past four years, and it just wasn’t happening.
From my South African perspective, Australia in general – and perhaps Perth WA in particular – is a wonderfully child-friendly country, just the kind of place you’d want your children or grandchildren to grow up in.
On yet another blue-sky-perfect Western Australia morning, and Australia Day to boot, it would be distinctly non-Aussie to do anything but head for the beach. The long curve of sand – barely a ten-minute drive from where we are in Burns Beach, Iluka – is a firm family favourite.
Though – or maybe because? – our passport is so dire and our currency so unreliable, one great thing about being South African is that we tend to migrate all over the world. As a result, we sometimes find old friends in unexpected places.
One such Durban school and uni friend of mine, Susan Lazenby (née Hopkins), lives in the beautiful seaside city of Mandurah, an hour south by train from Perth, WA.
You never have to wait long for a train from Currambine Station
Perth Transport‘s Currambine Station is 2.8km from our home in Burns Beach, and the train whisks you south to central Perth in 26 minutes and from there to Mandurah at the far southern end of the line; it’s $12.60 for a Day Rider all-day ticket.
Susan, Russell and family made the move from Joburg to Mandurah 22 years ago. When they arrived, the population was 40,003 strong – “We were the 003,” she says; now it’s closer to 90,000.
Sue taught in Mandurah for 15 years, and now heads up the English department at St George’s Anglican Grammar School in the Perth CBD (www.stgeorges.wa.edu.au/). But it’s school holidays right now, so she was free to meet me at the station and spend all day showing me the place that has become her community.
Teachers tend to know everyone, and everyone knows them. What’s more, Susan is a woman with wide and varied interests and a thirst for knowledge.
That’s how she knows all about this magnificent Morton Bay fig tree on Stingray Point, planted around 1930 on the site of what was to become the hotel Pensinsula, which closed in 2003.
Eight days in Singapore turned into 12 for me. Someone at the Aussie High Comm in Pretoria had bungled my visa application, causing me to miss my 19 December flight to Perth, WA with Roy. Luckily, and to the huge surprise of all, the visa came through just in the nick of time to allow me to board a flight on the 23rd to join Roy and the family for Christmas .
