trip to the South Pacific

Hello everyone !

After travelling to French Polynesia (Tahiti, Bora Bora, Moorea, Tetiaroa and Huahine) in 2003, I would absolutely love to visit a few other Pacific islands in July / August 2008.

As a single female traveller I prefer going on organised trips and explore the islands and their fauna/flora/culture rather than lie on the beach all day. Can anyone recommend any good tours / tour companies in Tonga, Samoa, Vanuata, New Caledonia or Fiji ?

How safe is Suva nowadays ? I've read on a travel advice website from the Aussie government that travel to Suva is not recommended.

I would appreciate your help !

Cheers,

Sofie

Suva is as safe as any city. Just avoid a few of the back streets late at night on weekends, when there are lots of drunk guys around near the bars. Other than that, just think of it the same as you would when traveling to any city, same general precautions.

Agree with Raro, except to say that Suva isnt really a place for tourists to go to as there isnt that much of interest, in my opinion. Its also away from decent beaches.

i like Suva and had had no problems there whatsoever. granted some areas might be a little rowdy by night

I also liked Suva - in fact it may just be my favourite city in the South Pacific.
Lots of fine, colonial architecture, leafy parks, good value places to stay, eat and decent shopping by Pacific standards.
Had no problems there whether by day or night - though of course heeding the above warnings about drunks is sensible anywhere.

As for those tour companies: rest assured every country you've listed has them.
Just wait till you get to each one, rather than trying to arrange everything in advance.
Once there, you may even decide that you don't need those tours, after all! ;-)

We just return from our second trip to Fiji and loved it. This trip was much better then our first trip a few years ago.
The tour company that handle our second trip was Fiji Adventures. Fiji Adventures arranged everything for us.
They arranged the flights, transfers, hotel and the adventures. They worked with us on what we were interested in instead of selling
a prepackaged masses tour. (Like our first trip)

We stayed on the beach at the Uprising Hotel located in the town of Pacific Harbour on island of Viti Leuv.
Pacific Harbour is the adventure capital of Fiji. All the adventures are located there, shark dives, whitewater rafting, ocean kayaking,
jungle trecking, native village visits and shows.

The highlight of the trip was a newly open zipline tour. (It's so new it is not even in the Lonely Planet guide) The zipline tour consists of cables connected to a series of tree platforms located high the canopy of the rainforest. You fly from treetop to treetop. We were on the zipline tour while National Geographic (Italy) was working a video. You can see us on their video. Their website is at (www.natgeoadventures.com.it) You can find the video by clicking on the name "Haero" (The guy who did the video) or by clicking on the world map's down pointing black arrow where Fiji is located on the map.

Suva is about an hours drive from Pacific Harbour.
We liked Suva and had no problems. We especially liked the downtown market and the Fiji Museum.

On the first trip we took to Fiji we went to the Yasawas Islands.
I like it there too but after a few days on the beach wanted more activities.

Another vote for Suva, as long as we are in the IMO category ..

Government travel advisories tend to over-emphasize risks -- obvious war zones excepted. If you took their comments about Suva seriously, then half of nightlife Sydney would be off-limits.

it is fair to say that 'tourists' interested in their 1-2 week beach vacation wouldn't find much of interest in Suva. But, there are more than a few of us 'travelers', interested in history and local culture, who view places like Suva as a priority destination.

Add yet another vote for Suva. I like the town - a lot.

I agree that Suva is worth a couple of days. Some interesting architecture, etc.

Thanks heaps for your replies !