Cruising with Rexcat and Rexie

Our final island before Australia was Suva, Fiji. As we get in, the harbor is a busy place.

We get off the ship and a native warrior is there to greet us with his war club.

As we are waiting for our excursion, we are glad they had a tent with chairs to allow us to wait. It was hot!

They wouldn't let us get on the bus earlier, because they said it was hot. That was nice of them.

Everything from there went downhill. They had to move in a crane to lift some items onto the ship. So, they moved the tent and we moved the chairs back. Once would be nice, but it was three times until they were finally satisfied we were out of their way.

At the time of the excursion, some people got up and started to the bus. Everybody followed. Practically every other person asked if we had the correct bus because no one told us anything.

We wait 15 minutes in a hot bus. Funny thing, but the bus driver was still under the tent. Did I fail to mention the bus had no air conditioning and we had no breeze? So, someone got off the bus and asked why we were sitting in a hot bus instead of leaving. Finally, we had someone come on the bus and tell us that the tour guide was stuck in traffic.

So much for letting us on the bus because it was hot!

She got there and we finally left 35 minutes late. Here was our first stop. Someone asked what this was because it wasn’t mentioned in the description. We then find out that the tour guide had no idea which tour we were on. We had to give her the description of the tour so she knew what we were to do. It continued to go downhill from there.

I did take an interesting shot showing how the locals dried their clothes.

Next, we stopped at an old gun battery which was built in the 1920s to guard the harbor. We were supposed to explore the underground ammunition storage area and the accommodations as our guide talked through the history of the location. Of course, this didn’t happen. When I say stopped, I literally meant that the bus stopped (no one got off) and then we started again. I took no pictures because there was nothing to see because of the fence. Oh well!

Next, we stopped at the skxnwiunsxxx. I have no idea what at it was because she had no microphone and most of us were not able to hear what she said. I wasn’t cussing, or was I? At least I took a picture. You figure out what it is, because at this point I don't care.

Next, we stopped at the Boron house, which is now a government building, where we were to see the changing of the guard since they only stand at attention for one hour. Guess what? We started 35 minutes late and therefore we were there at the wrong time. Oh well, again!

Next, we made several stops for taking pictures. No one was allowed off the bus, but we did stop.

Then we stopped at the botanical gardens. I probably should rephrase that as we stopped on the street at the botanical gardens because the bus driver didn’t want to drive into the parking lot. It took 5 minutes to get to and from the gardens because we were on the street. I think I failed to mention we only had a 20 minute stop here. I figured it couldn’t get worse. Oh, was I wrong.

Several of the people on canes, including Rexie, didn’t even get off the bus. Why bother? By the time they would get there it would be time to go.

So, as we sit in the bus the driver says that is the last stop. One of the people with a schedule said that we were to stop at Holiday Inn for refreshments. Once we told the tour guide, she said we would make one more stop for refreshments.

As everyone gets back on the bus, several people mention that there was a museum in the back of the gift shop which housed the rudder from Captain Bligh’s ‘Bounty” as well as the boots from Reverend Thomas Baker, a missionary that was cannibalized. Of course, our tour guide never mentioned this. All we were told was that it was a botanical garden, not a museum. We didn’t have a description so we relied on our guide to tell us what was at each stop. What a mistake.

We found out that the reason our tour guide was late was because our tour was the 4^th tour of the day for her. Four tours with the last one starting at noon. No way! No wonder she was late.

We got off downtown, even though she didn’t want us to. We found out later, that our 3 hour excursion took exactly 2 ½ hours. What a waste of time and effort.

As we made our way back to the ship, we went through one of the largest farmer’s market we had ever seen. It was huge and stretched as far as we could see. It took our several minutes to get through it.

On the other side of the farmer’s market was a bus station, of sorts. This was the type of bus we had on our tour. None of them had air conditioning and most were older than sin.