24 hours and I’m already sick of this place….
It was only 30° yesterday and even cooler today The Indian buffet for dinner last night was too big and I couldn’t make much of a dent. Same at breakfast …I could only eat the muesli with yoghurt, pears & pawpaw, then barely half of the other stuff, settling for beans on toast, bacon, sausage and an omelette, then finishing with marmalade on toast with a coffee. I had tried to work up an appetite by going for a 25 minute walk around the resort, then a 20 minute kayak and 10 minutes on a cross trainer …but I think that only helped work off dinner! We hired a car for the afternoon and tomorrow morning to check out resorts in the area for Mu’s wedding next year. The plan there was to head back to Shangri-La (the wedding venue) then see what alternative accommodations are like as the Shangri-La is quite expensive. On the way there though, the plan changed to just check-out the venue, then look at the Outrigger. The Shangri-La is huge, utilising about half of the 200 acres it is set on (Naviti is a reasonable size and only 21 acres). It has a large conference centre and the marquee that can be used as an inclement weather alternative can cater for up to 800 guests …like I said, it’s huge and pretty damned tidy ….just a pity about the price. We were able to have a good chat and look around with the wedding-planner man and that was all good. We had tried to get into the Outrigger for this trip, but there were no vacancies and that’s pretty damned big and about 20 minutes up the road compared to the 40plus minutes to naviti. So that was that, we returned to the resort, had snack, had a read, went for a latish dinner, which was a seafood buffet, but it didn’t look that appealing or have tht many options that I’d be into ….plus not being very hungry from the snack, I just had a burger and Ann had tomato soup. Finished off the day reading ….It’ll be tough but I will survive! Day 2 The tedium continues, but this morning I had a plan!! I ate too much yesterday so this morning I decided to drop the toast & marmalade and the sausage. Scoffed the muesli but with yoghurt, peaches and pawpaw, then slipped the toast in prior to going for eggs. (a change in strategy here as there's a wait for eggs to be cooked and the other stuff cooled yesterday so I had a fix). Bread did it's first run through the machine, but I hate raw toast, so in it goes for the second of three runs and at that point I happen to notice the length of the egg queue!! (Thinks Oh FFS). I put raw toast in for third run. Then continue a scan of the dining area (sort of like scanning the road ahead, as a good biker does) and notice a cute wee boy licking a spoon ....nah...it was a damned big ladle stuffed stuffed down his gob!! ....and then he put it back in the peach bowl!! (Double FFS) (I knew it was the peach bowl because he started scoffing them by hand as he headed back to his table). I go back to the table to scoff the toast (with marmalade) and second coffee as I come up with a new plan. By this time Ann had finished her muesli etc and was heading for eggs, offered to get some for me and I was all, ‘nah she’ll be right, I’ll just give it a miss and have the other stuff (also thinking there was no way I needed eggs!) So off she goes and I’m sitting there thinking she’ll be getting scrambled eggs …that’s good because I don’t need or want a full omelette ….or maybe I should go for a cheese omelette?? ….nah, scrambled will be good. Then as she gets to about forth in the queue, I go up and make the toast ….then she gives me my full omelette!! Bugger, I think, Oh well, can’t waste it so I get the bacon and beans and a third coffee!! Came out of that a little fuller than I should have been and we head for the car to go for a wee drive towards Suva, but Ann suggests, “Why don’t we go all the way?” so that’s what we did! I was thinking it’s only about 80 Km, so should only take about an hour or so …yeah right. Max Speed Limit all over Fiji is 80kph, the roads are narrowish and potholed. The drivers drive at 80kph and brake for most / many of the corners. They don’t have yellow or double-yellow lines as in NZ, they just stick with white paint ….but mostly it’s a double-white. The towns / villages can be 60 or 50 kph ….but most tend to have a proliferation of humps (definitely at each end but often a few in the middle as well) and any faster than 20kph could do damage to the undercarriage. I mean, I say humps, but one gets the impression that they were cast using a forty gallon drum cut in half! ….and more on the potholes! Sometimes they been fixed and the road surface is a little rough, other times they are just potholes, but every now and then, you can’t see the bottom!!! I mean, you see a pothole up ahead, you swing one way or other to avoid it, then you find yourself heading for a series of ever-enlargening, bloody great gaping holes and wishing the car was a rubber-tracked vehicle! ….and back to the drivers! I mentioned they are brakers, but they are also tailgaters, double-yellow (or white in this case) passers and generally totally spatially-unaware. ie. They sit in the right lane on passing lanes ….and don’t pass; they pull out, take off, then slow down; even if they don’t want to pass, they still tail-gate to prevent others from passing ….and there aren’t slow bays or much room for trucks to[J1] make room ….but I suspect they wouldn’t anyway and it’s nothing to have a truck with a queue of twenty odd vehicles following …at 50-60 kph in 80 zones!!! So we went for a drive to Suva ....and I won't be doing that again!! We got back, went for a swim in the pool …..ok, we hopped in the pool and chilled out, then later Ann went to the gym while I went kayaking for 45 minutes and tonight went to the Chinese Restaurant rather than overindulge in the lovo evening meal …..and I’ll finish the night with a read. (Mark Twains – A Connecticut Yankee in King Arthur's Court ....since I saw the Bing Crosby movie as a kid and don't recall much of it)
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This blog is pretty much just about motorcycling ...but every now and then I might rant or dribble on about other things. Categories
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August 2021
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