Accommodation In Upolu

My partner and I recently spent two weeks in Samoa and we found a great new resort to discover if you get tired of beach fales. The Bungalows were private with an ensuite and were the same price as the open beach fales else where. Malaeti'a Resort, located on the South Coast of Upolo was really unique in terms of activities and food. We enjoyed traditional Samoan food, including the fish we caught (the traditional Samoan way), which was refreshing after all the deep fried western food from the other resorts. They also have a gorgeous tidal mangrove to explore by kayak or inner tube, which has a great swimming hole off the dock. We felt like we were family, it was a fantastic experience and completely different than anywhere else we stayed.

This is an interesting place if you like mangrove ecosystems and friendly owners... Not so great if you like a nice beach because unfortunately, there isn't one here.

A really good place for nature lovers.

We also stayed at Sung's and Otilia's and have to say they were THE most hospitable of all the hospitable hosts we had in Samoa. I'll copy paste what we wrote on our blog and thoroughly recommend the place -the whole story and some more from our trip in NZ and OZ can be read on www.travelpod.com/members/johannajulien
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So having been driven around in the taxi of the village teacher's brother we ended up in a place called Malaetia Resort - a great place to stay! We walked in at 8am, that is very very early, and were immediately ushered to sit down and have coffee with the owner, followed by a breakfast, followed by our cool little garden fale looking out to the mangrove forest in the back. The resort itself if just a few fales and bungalows but it's next to a nice inlet that is full of mangroves and is a really pretty setting. The beach is not the best (black sand and no beach at high tide) but the mangrove marsh makes up for it - this is a different place to stay and after nearly two weeks on beaches it was good to change. The absolutely best thing about the place were the friendly and hospitable owners, Sung and his wife Otilia, who invited us for their family Sunday meal and cooked meals for us twice a day even when the meals were not included in our fale price!

We stayed at Malaetia for the rest of our stay in Samoa and thoroughly enjoyed our time - we were the only guests at the time, meaning we were treated with extra hospitability. Sung arranged one of the guys at the resort to take us to Virgin Cove Beach on a traditional outrigger canoe. Virgin Cove used to be a budget resort but it has been renovated and facilities added and it's now far from budget... Having our lunch in the resort restaurant we overheard a Swedish guy from Stockholm complaining about the room service not being good and cleaners not speaking English. And how on the airport the currency exchange booth didn't have enough cash to exhange their thousands and thousands of Swedish krone to Samoan talas..! Some people have a different attitude to travel and we are quite happy not to have that attitude - for sure we enjoy our budget adventures more than that bloke from Stockholm! Virgin Cove is a beautiful place to visit and the beach is gorgeous, landscaped and a bit artificial but definitely everything you dream a Pacific beach to be. There is a less crowded (read: nobody there apart from you) beach west of Virgin Cove where we went for a walk and discovered fresh water springs by the beach, spurting water from under the sand.

Soon it was time for us to head for the airport but before leaving we had the opportunity to "help" Sung and his guys net fishing. Fishing with the net means two guys spreading a net in a big circle, hoping to catch fish in the middle, and at least three people then running inside the net circle, splashing water and making as much noise as possible to scare the fish to swim into the surrounding net. Much more fun than fishing with a rod and bait, especially since we did it at around 7pm in the darkness! We caught three fish and had them for dinner - the traditional way of killing the fish is to bite it in the head, and that's how it was done... We decided not to help with that part! The dinner was delicious, as you would expect. Sung and Otilia had offered to take us the airport on the other side of the island meaning we could enjoy our last evening in Samoa to the max before taking the plane back to New Zealand at 2 am, it's not often that you are fishing just a couple of hours before taking the plane.. Thank you to Sung and Otilia for their hospitability - we recommend their place to everybody!"