Lonely Planet™ · Thorn Tree Forum · 2020 |

# Mt Batilamu hike Abaca Country forums / Pacific Islands & Papua New Guinea / Fiji
jdl28 05:42 UTC 30 Aug 2012 | The Mt Batilamu hike is absolutely amazing. It is run through the Abaca visitor centre which is about 40 minutes outside of Lautoka. You hike up to the top of the mountain stay in a lodge up there, wake up to fantastic views and hike down the next morning, there are also waterfall trails you can do at the bottom. Book directly through the village. Unfortunately I booked with a man George Prince- he charges more than double ($280) the going rate. We gave him some feedback about the food not being very good and things not being on time and he had us trapped in his backyard yelling at us and the villlage on the phone, telling us it was all our fault refusing to take us back to Nadi and trying to force us to go back to the village. An awful experience! To book through the village and avoid all that ring Kalesi Bose at the Abaca visitor centre her phone numbers are 7365419, and 9293230. The prices are as follows Overnight hike, including park fees, guide and accommodation = $80 Overnight hike as above including food = $100 (beware the food might be very basic there are cooking faciities to bring your own) You can also stay at a lodge in the village for $30 (cooking facilities available) or in the village for $50 including food. To do a day trek up Mt Batilamu it costs $25 per person for the guide + park fees of $10 For a guide to take you to the waterfalls it is $15 per person, but the trail is well marked so you don't really need a guide. For the overnight hike make sure you tell your guide/the village that you want to leave before 2pm. If you want food included book at least 3 days in advance as there is only a very small shop in the village (this is why they had such basic food to give us apparently). To get to Abaca from Lautoka I found three different drivers (you need 4 wheel drive) phone numbers are 9058505,9897346, 9911197 it costs $40 one way I think you could have up to 8-10 people. Please support the village by booking direct and passing on this information to your friends. The hike is truely amazing and the people in the village are lovely, I hope that this info helps you to have a much better experience than we did. |