We were lucky enough to be invited to Ben (Alan and Kate Scandrett's son) wedding to Chantal in Fiji. This was also a great opportunity to warm up prior to the relative cold of New Zealand and the World Cup. The wedding was based at the Intercontinental Hotel which was frankly magnificent. It appeared that every North facing window had spectacular views. This is from the restaurant (one of three) where the reception was held. Blue sea, white sand, 30 degrees and a range of cocktails that could not be faulted – a pretty good start to our stay.
The wedding took place on the grassy slopes overlooking the sea. The bridal party was led out by a well but diversely dressed group. The contrast from matching grass tops and skirts to Jake’s matching tie and hatband and Charlie’s flowing silk layered dress was all pretty eye-catching.
However, the best dressed was without doubt the person on the ……right….
Chantel looked lovely and the trauma for Ben of nursing the dress from Canada several months prior to the wedding was worth the effort.
I will leave pictures of the actual wedding for the participants to publish – suffice to say it was great and Chantal in particular seemed to bubble through the whole ceremony which was a joy to watch. The registry office backdrop took a lot of beating.
After the ceremony we were on our own to participate in cocktails (we only needed telling once) while the professional photographers earned their keep. Some of the girls were in fine spirit but also thinking of a couple of absentees (Carol - who Jan has her arm around - and Ivan who unfortunately were not able to travel).
Prior to the reception we were fortunate to be able to take some photos as the sun set. It is hard to imagine a more romantic setting.
The evening meal, wines and speeches seemed to go very quickly and then it was time for the newly weds to take the dance floor. After this move it was apparent that some had done this before as Chantal did not end up flat on her back.
As the evening got hotter some decided the best way to cool off was to go for a swim. However, although they may have felt cool some were anything but…..
The following day some of us visited the local village (where many are employed at the hotel). After walking round with our guide giving a description of village life (including tribal laws) we were invited to have some coconut juice. It was very refreshing although not the easiest cup to drink out of.
We were also invited to participate in a welcoming ceremony and while I was away to the side taking some photos, our motley group nominated me as our chief. We met in the village hall and participated in some Kava. I was also presented with a magnificent garland which was some sort of compensation for being put in the front of our group. You can see that Kava has little effect.
The resort also included a magnificent golf course which has many holes with views of the sea. The bunker on this par 3 also included trees and coral to add to its attraction (distraction).
Some of the inland holes took advantage of extremely high tees dropping several hundred feet to the fairway (hard to pick up in the photo). The fairways were narrow and if missed the ball was lost. Together with some pretty strong winds this made the course one of the toughest I have played. Most were lucky not to lose several balls.
Not that that was an issue for the locals as at regular intervals pre-loved balls could be bought. There were none for sale in the golf shop so another local industry thrived. Familiar faces from the village kept popping up at the golf course, village tour, and hotel ceremonies (sun setting etc).
On our first golf round I partnered Bryan from Canada (Chantel’s sister Jessica’s partner). He could hit a ball a long way but not always down the middle. Having lost quite a few balls the stall at the fifth hole was timely and some $10 worth of balls were bought. By the 8th (and a few more balls dedicated to the bush) word had got ahead and Bryan was expected. A young girl ran up, checked his name and then realised it was appropriate to make a great fuss of him. Needless to say this demand and selective supply was successful in a further $10 being spent!
The hotel had several pools. One was for children while another nearest the ocean was strictly adults only. The pool appeared to flow into the sea. The cocktails helped with the illusion.
We tried all of the restaurants over the five days. Here we are with Jan and Ian and Chantal’s folks from Canada (Jim and Coleen). They were both great company who handled the shock of the somewhat raucous Australian contingent with aplomb.
Apart from golf and swimming the main activity seemed to be finding a suitable spot for drinking and chatting. On one evening Ian was concerned that he did not return to Australia with any wine which is the sort of invite that is impossible to decline.
There is little more one can say about the location – it was photographic at any time of the day or night.
We count ourselves very lucky to have been invited to such a great occasion and trip. The location, weather, food and drink could not be bettered but the top billing was without doubt the company.
We had anticipated that the trains would run to some sort of schedule but we were forgetting Fiji time. During the week we saw an engine jump off the tracks and on a number of occasions derailed loaded wagons with sugar cane everywhere. Our idea of a timetable was a bit optimistic. As a result we had trains running through the resort at any time including the middle of the night which although quaint did detract from sleep.
The climate is great for plants and we visited the Sleeping Giants orchid garden. I had no idea of how many orchids there are. We wondered along a bank of them with large differences in size
and the variety of colours were hard to imagine.
Further back in the garden was a rain forest. The buttress roots on this tree were more of the hurdling than tripping over variety.
One of the reasons for moving to the Anchorage was the adjoining resort had a dive base. Their offshore location was Beachcombers island which was an hour boat ride. Unfortunately there were high winds and quite rough conditions which made going ashore on the island a hazardous affair – especially if you were staying on the island and had bags to off load. The entertainment factor for those onshore at the bar was however good value. I decided that the weather and unprotected dive sites did not warrant getting wet and feedback from some of the divers who did go suggested this was a good decision.
Back on the mainland we visited Nadi where there is a quite spectacular Hindu temple. As the guard insisted on us removing our shoes some 50 metres from the temple and the concrete was too hot to walk on for our more sensitive feet we opted for pictures from afar.
We also spent a day with a hire car and went round the island. Some spectacular views on the way and pretty challenging road works up in the mountains resulted in us arriving in Suva in time for a late lunch. The museum is in a large garden and houses a number of canoes. The Polynesians sailed all over the Pacific in these small vessels sometimes for months at a time navigating by the stars, wind, birds and sea conditions long before compasses, sextons and sea sickness tablets were available.
Armed with a suitable tan to upset New Zealanders we left for Auckland at the start of September. 
