Coconut Grove in Taveuni

Boarding plane to Taveuni

Amy and I flew a really small plane to Taveuni, the 3rd largest island in Fiji, however it seems less touristy than many of the much smaller islands in the Mamanucas and Yasawas so I think of it as the “authentic island.” It may be due to the place we stayed since a woman we met in the Yasawas did not love Taveuni as much as we did. We stayed at Coconut Grove, which was built by Ronna, an American woman who at 35 got an inheritance and moved to Fiji with her boyfriend to build a small resort. That was over 30 years ago and her boyfriend left her, but she stayed and made this into a very successful resort. Largely due to her attention to detail and the wonderful women she chose to run the place. The five women handle various jobs including cooking, cleaning, giving massages, and scheduling excursions. Three men help out part time with driving, heavy lifting, and handyman stuff.

There were just 7 of us on the plane to Taveuni

Matei Airport on Taveuni

Coconut Grove sign

Taveuni Weather Station

I love Biscuit their cat

There is one main building with lobby, restaurant, kitchen, and the owner’s bedroom. Then there are just 3 bures (bungalows) so it is a nice small resort. It is literally right across from the airport. They picked us up at the airport and drove maybe 100 yards down the road before turning into the resort, which amused us and the couple who flew in with us, Richard and Suzy. We were greeted by four people smiling and singing a welcome song that indeed made us feel welcome! Flori put a leaf and flower necklace around our necks and led us inside where I spotted a cat! Her name is Biscuit and she loves being petted. I definitely got my cat fix. The last ones I saw were at Bat (or cat) Island in Indonesia several weeks ago. I’m not counting the tigers as I was not able to scratch their ears.

We were greeted with singing and flower necklaces

Coconut Grove Resort viewed from the beach

Welcome mango smoothie

We were seated in the restaurant area, which is a lovely balcony overlooking the ocean where they gave us welcome smoothies, yum! Since we were staying 5 days we also got a Fiji cooking lesson and a complimentary 30 minute massage, YES! Ours were scheduled for late afternoon. We put in our dinner order since they make everything there and needed to know what to prepare then they showed us to our rooms. A path of cement stepping stones with beautiful mosaic sea animals led through down from the main building to the ocean and off to each bure. Our bure was the smallest of the three they have, but it was sufficient for our needs with a decently sized bathroom and a porch with lounge chairs overlooking the ocean.

The Restaurant area overlooking the ocean

Beautiful handcrafted stepping stones

Our Bure

Bedroom and bathroom

Bed with pretty flowers and extensive detailed guidebook from owner which was very useful

Bathroom with safe and fridge

Small towels with instructions on what to use them for

Shower

Dinner first night

The massage was amazing! The best I’ve had since Mae in Thailand or Thlm in Cambodia. What a brilliant marketing move…give people a free 30 minute massage so they realize how incredible they are and get one every day, which is exactly what I did! Sarah was my masseuse and Amy had Flori. Sarah was the best so I lucked out. She has been good at massage since she was young, so she has an instinctive sense of how to knead tired muscles. They all took a 63 hour massage course from someone flown in from one of the main islands, which made all of them quite good and made Sarah amazing! Massages were FJD 125/hour but if you get 4 you get one free so really only 100 Fijian, which is only US$47. They have a little palapa right on the beach where they set the tables up. They were pretty liberal with the oil so I needed to shower after every massage, but they were so good it was well worth it! Dinner that night was also fabulous. We had chicken curry, creamed cassava leaves, potatoes, and rice. I was full but couldn’t stop eating, it was that good!

View from our porch at coconut grove
with the massage palapa on the right

Sunset at Coconut grove

My bobbing head turtle looks right at home in Taveuni

Entering the village

The next day we visited the nearby village and school with Flori as our guide as it was her village. We stopped by the grocery store on the way and got some lollipops that they would give out to the students the next day, Friday. I also brought the last of the pens I had. The village was a collection of houses, much nicer than the simple corrugated metal shacks I saw 10 years ago on the main island. We brought kava to the chief, who turned out to be Flori father! From then on we called her Princess Flori. She showed us the kitchen building and we also got to meet her five children. They are too young to be in school yet, but they tagged along with us as we walked over to the church and school. We got to go in several classrooms including the cute 1st years, and the years 5, 6, and 7. The grade 5 students sang a wonderful song for us, which was one of the highlights of my whole trip. We didn’t know it at the time, but Sarah’s daughter was one of the students singing the song to us. I love the words and they sang so beautifully as it seems all Fijians do. It started with “Stay in school…” and ended with “Respect yourself, your parents, and teachers. Choose right over wrong” (see video below)

Entering the chiefs house

The Chief, Flori, and his grandkids plus Suzy and me

Their kitchen in a building out back

Flori showing us how they dry kava

Laundry out drying in the village

Their nice church built with donations from a church in North Carolina

School behind the village

First year classroom

One of the older classes working on fractions

School playground making creative use of old tires

Flori's village

Video of students singing:

Delicous kokoda which is like ceviche

Lunch was also fabulous. We ordered the traditional Fijian dish Kokoda, which is like ceviche. It was so good! I also got a delicious fruit plate. My dinner was good, but not as good as the previous meals; however, Amy said hers was excellent. The next morning we got up early and went to our diving and snorkeling trip with Suzy and Richard. They had booked the same day as us, and were staying the same number of days as us. Since they were wonderful to hang out with, we did all our excursions with them and enjoyed dinner with them every night as well, at tables next to each other. The dive company was top rated and recommended by our resort, Taveuni Ocean Sports. Since Rainbow Reef is one of the best places to dive in the world, we needed to go.

Nice fruit plate

Preparing to leave on our dive at rainbow reef

Fish in Rainbow Reef

We were on the boat with a couple from Ireland who were completing their Open Water dive certification. Amy and Richard both had ailments that prevented them from diving so they snorkeled instead. Suzy and I had our own dive master guide. The water was very clear and the coral and fish were beautiful. I even saw a few new fish I hadn't seen in Raja Ampat. For dinner we went to Lovo Night at a restaurant down the road. This is where they wrap all the meat and vegetables in foil, and cook them in the ground covered with layers of leaves so they steam. They put all the dishes on a table and we did a buffet style dinner. The food was wonderful especially the eggplant!

On dive boat to Rainbow Reef

Undercovering the steaming food at the Lovo dinner

Lovo dinner menu

Lovo night spread

On the boat along the Taveuni coast

The next day we scheduled a trip to the other side of Taveuni to see pretty waterfalls and do the “coastal walk.” Unfortunately, Suzy had gotten many mosquito bites and one got very infected so she was not able to go and it was just the three of us. The taxi ride was about an hour, mostly because the paved road quickly ended and we were on a dirt road. We saw several kava plants and some drying as that is a main source of income for many people here, along with tourism. When the road ended, we waded into the ocean and boarded a small speedboat that zipped us along the coast. I was sitting in the middle of the boat and enjoyed bouncing over the waves with the wind whipping my hair back. It reminded me of flying downhill on a bicycle and I could see how dogs might really enjoying sticking their heads out of cars during rides. Granted there were a few major thuds as we hit some larger waves. At the front of the boat, Amy and Richard were far less appreciative of our speed as they bore the brunt of the wave action. At last we got to the waterfalls and cruised inland to the first one.

Friendly kids

Viewing waterfalls by boat

Boating to one of the waterfalls

Cool leaves on our coastal walk

After the first one, we cruised by a few more. They were gorgeous falling into the beautiful clear blue ocean water. These are ones you can only see by boat. We then were dropped off on the coastal walk near the end. We walked about half an hour over some wet slippery rocks and muddy trails to the end, which was a clear stream with a waterfall at one end. We swam out to get a better look and I managed not to drown. Then we ate some lunch and walked back along the trail, an hour and a half, to where our taxi was waiting to take us back. Along the way we got some beautiful views of the ocean and rocks, waded through some streams, and encountered some friendly locals walking, fishing, and collecting some sealife (clams?) on the beach at low tide.

Beautiful blue water and waterfalls

crystal clear water and waterfall

Amy and I at waterfall

Amy crossing river

They call these the mushroom rocks

Rock reflected nicely

View on coastal walk

Kids at the beach

Kitty whisker flower

Our taxi driver gave us some distressing news: the resort had called and Suzy had been taken to the hospital. We quickly went back to the resort and Richard went on to the hospital. Suzy had gotten worse, but after the IV, she was feeling better. Apparently the “hospital” is more like a clinic so it is lucky nothing worse happened. Flori had just attended a funeral for her nephew who had gone to another island to play rugby. He came back with a headache and after a week he went into a coma. They flew him to a hospital in Suva and did a brain scan on him, but could find nothing wrong. He died a couple days later and they called it witchcraft (I’m not sure who “they” is, I hope not the doctors). Suzy was released from the hospital in time to have dinner with us though she had to stick with soup and could not partake of the wonderful homemade lasagna the rest of us ate. We were glad to have her back with us.

Dinner with Suzy and Richard

Amy and I got up a bit before 6am to attend an online memorial service, which required sitting up at the lobby porch for wifi. At 7;00 the lobby opened up and we signed forms to check out a kayak since today was our last day to kayak to the third island to snorkel. Fina single-handedly pulled a kayak out from the group, and carried it down to the water’s edge. At we looked out, it looked a bit overcast so we waited a bit, chatting with Richard and Suzy and having something for breakfast. The wind had also picked up and was about 16mph so not very inviting. After all Fina’s work to get the kayak to the shore, Amy and I were determined to kayak so around 10 we gathered our courage and tried it out. At first it went pretty well, but the further from shore we got, the larger the waves got and the wind seemed to pick up also though that may have been my imagination. We were headed between the first and second islands and then we were to cut up towards the third to avoid the strong currents. Due to the wind and waves we were doing two strokes on the left side then one on the right, which was working pretty well. Until we realized that the first and second islands were really the second and third islands. The first island is very close to shore so we had forgotten about it, but as we got closer it became more obvious that it was an island, not part of Taveuni.

Dipping our tie dyes into the ocean salt water

So now we needed to cut parallel to the shore and almost directly into the wind to pass between the first and second islands and avoid the strong current. We didn’t know if the wind and waves would change the suggested path so we kept on with the wind blowing water from the splashing waves into our faces. It felt like we were barely moving, but eventually we did get near the second island. I hopefully suggested that if we went around the back side of the island (the recommended path) that maybe the wind would be less, but Amy pointed out that that was the direction the wand was coming from so we would get the full force! We reevaluated our plans and decided that snorkeling was not necessary and that we had made use of the kayak, so that was good enough. We also took a minute to ceremonially dip our tie-dyed sarongs into the salt water so we could dry them to help set the dye (see pics).

Amy and I dipping our tie dyes in salt water

Once we got closer to shore, the waves died down and the wind died down too. I think it was just because we had decided not to continue that the weather got better, but it may have had something to do with the island blocking the wind.

Amy using the outdoor shower after kayaking

For lunch I had two kokondas (like ceviche) made from fresh local fish, which was fabulous! Then I got ready for my last massage. Sadly, Sarah doesn’t work Sundays as she is active in her church so I had a new person, Fina, who was pretty good though not with Sarah’s ability to listen to my muscles. Still very much worth the US$59 ($47 counting the free one) and significantly better than any of the massages I got in Denarau and Nadi.

At our cooking lesson

Amazing locally
sourced steak dinner

Our last dinner was amazing! They started with fresh baked buns with butter (aka the secret ingredient to make all food taste better). Then a really good soup using my new favorite green, taro leaves. It even tasted healthy and I still loved it (though there was a lot of coconut milk in it which pretty much guarantees I will love it). Finally came the best part, locally grown grass fed beef that has been aged 40 days. They cooked it with some very light sauce/seasonings that was incredible (sort of like chimchurri sauce but different, but along those same lines). It has a brown sauce with it that I did not sully the steak with, but which went well on the greens (also taro) and mashed potatoes. Definitely one of the better steaks I’ve had and a food highlight for me. The only dish I didn’t like here was the shrimp curry, which was ironically the most expensive at $30 for curry + $39.50 for the add-on of shrimp. The delicious steak is only $65. I should have read the fine print. However, they did not charge us for several items and seemed to have given me my second serving of kokoda for free. BTW, the kokodas are a steal at FJ$15 (US $7).

Ladies Singing Farewell Song

They sang a goodbye song for us (it was in Fijian but they jokingly told us it was called “get off my island”) and I wondered what they would do with a child that was tone deaf since singing is so central to the culture here and everyone sings beautifully. We had a nice chat with the others staying here and I shared the video link of “Backyard Squirrel Maze 1.0” which is hilarious…you should all go watch it on youtube. I will try to post it below.

Gorgeous sunrise

My bag sitting on top to the right

Amy and I flew out the next morning. I made my last minute purchases, getting a nice wooden salad bowl and some PureFiji mosquito repellent that really works using lemongrass and citronella instead of deet. I was lucky to have bought it as it was only FJ$28 for the large 8oz bottle and when we saw it at other places they charged that much for the small 2oz bottle! Biu’s daughter works for the company so perhaps they get a discount. They sang us a farewell song and dropped us at the airport. Check in was super easy and they tossed our bags onto the luggage wagon. Awhile later I realized I forgot to give them the Ghirardelli chocolates I had brought. I asked the check-in guy if I could get something out of my bag and he said yes then gestured to the wagon. Mine was on top. I walked over to it through the gate, grabbed it, retrieved the chocolates, then replaced the bag. No one batted an eye. Then I ran 3 minutes down the road (I told you it was close) back to the resort and gave them the chocolate.

Matei Airport check in counter

I love how warm hearted and truly joyous these people of Taveuni are. Next time I come to Fiji, I am definitely adding a stop here. If you book early, flights are just $100 each way from Nadi!

The wonderful ladies taking care of us