Yellow Fish cruises: Day 52: Suva, Fiji

We had an easy, laid-back day today in Suva, the capital of Fiji. This was our fourth or fifth visit to Suva, and it’s a tough city for repeat visits. We loved our first couple of visits, and did the usual Fijian things: visited a village, participated in a kava ceremony, watched a fire dance demonstration, jumped off and swam in waterfalls, and, frankly, there’s only so much highly watered-down kava that I need to drink. Our recent visits have been more like how we spent our day today: a free shuttle to the Tappoo Mall (small, but four stories tall) to stock up on a couple of needed items and use the high-speed WiFi there and then return to the ship.

I’m not a huge fan of the city itself, though the people we met seemed very friendly. But it’s a tough place to be. Headwaiter Mehai is undertaking some rescue training this cruise, and we’ve watched as he practiced driving both a tender boat and a life boat in recent ports. Today, several of them were taken to a large pool in Suva where they practiced inflating and working with the inflatable boats that are stored in those barrels on the Promenade Deck. Once that was completed, they stopped by a bar remembered by one of their group from a prior visit. They purchased their beers, sat down, and were approached by very burly locals who asked for protection money. I guess beers don’t go down quite as well after that; they left immediately. And that’s just the way Suva seems to me. Scratch just below the smiley surface and friendly Bulas (hellos) and there’s a lot of dark underbelly there.

This was the first time the Ruby Princess has ever visited Suva, and the ship was greeted by a marching band on the pier this morning. I seem to remember something like this on our visits in 2004 and 2006 so I can’t say for certain whether it was a special welcome or just the usual welcome. I was slow to get moving after my busy day yesterday and didn’t wake up until 8am (therefore, once again I have no breakfast menu to post). I went to the Horizon Court Buffet for breakfast and G found me there when he finished his DaVinci Dining Room breakfast.

We walked off the ship about 9:30am and caught the free shuttle offered to the Tappoo Mall. It’s probably only a 15 minute walk or so from the port, but the traffic is heavy and the sidewalks sketchy at best. We recently firmed up our end of season plans and extended our season a bit, so we needed to buy a few items to see us through. We’ve been very reluctant to spend turnaround days in Sydney shopping, and were happy a pharmacy in the mall today offered what we needed.

We were back at the port by 1pm or so, but I stopped to have a 30 minute foot massage offered on the pier for about US $14. That felt sooooo nice after yesterday's hill climb. By 2pm I was joining G in the Horizon Court Buffet for lunch. We rested a little this afternoon (frankly, I had felt groggy all day) and then were in the Elite Lounge at 4:30pm. Friend Virginia was very happy to see us since we had missed stopping in there yesterday, and she wanted to know all about our day on Dravuni Island. She is a bit mobility impaired and didn’t leave the ship yesterday or today.

The funnest part of the day was standing on the Promenade Deck just before sail away as we were entertained by a local band on the pier who were fantastic and had us dancing on the deck to Abba and Proud Mary.

This band was great and a lot of fun

We weren’t especially hungry at dinner, having had a late lunch and then hors doerves at the Elite Lounge. I had to try a new entree, and that was probably the only reason we went. G had a creamy cold soup and then jumped right to dessert.

Day 8 dinner menu, page 1

Day 8 dinner menu, page 2

Day 8 dessert menu

Quinoa vegetable loaf in the back with a few prawns added for good measure

It was delicious.

We skipped the Princess Theater entertainment tonight (production show One Upon a Dream) to sit on the Terrace Deck. It had rained off and on all day, and there wasn’t really a sunset tonight, but the air temperature was warm and the evening was beautiful. Finally, though, we were chased inside by a light shower and that was our cue to call it a day.

I keep forgetting to mention that there are three construction projects that were started on the ship this cruise related to the Ocean Medallion program that will go live on the Ruby Princess in January. The bar next to the International Cafe and the seating area there has been drywalled off. The tables and chairs have been moved into Vines. It already was crowded down there; it’s even worse now and I’ve simply avoided it all cruise long. Two other dry-walled off areas are in the Photo Gallery on Deck 7 and on the starboard side of the Lido Deck between the Neptune and Calypso Pool. We’ve been told all of these changes are related to the Ocean Medallion, but I’m not certain how the new areas will be used.