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Matt, our guide, gives me a nudge as we cruise closer to our destination. “See up there?” he asks, wild-eyed with excitement. “That’s where we’re heading today. Perfect day for it!” I look up at the towering peaks of Maria Island’s highest mountain, Bishop and Clerk, and try to share his enthusiasm.
The Wineglass Bay Sail Walk was set up by the Tasmanian Walking Company in 2014, aimed, I would imagine, squarely at ‘hikers’ like myself. That is to say the type of person who likes the thought of hiking and nature and stunning scenery, yet also enjoys creature comforts. While the company’s other hikes include the six-day Cradle Mountain Huts Walk and the rather arduous Overland Trek, the brilliant idea of travelling on a luxury yacht to hike three of Tasmania’s more accessible and spectacular trails, sleeping in an almost-too-comfy double bed and gorging on the best of Tasmania’s produce also seems to me to be an obvious choice.
It is a six-hour trek to Maria’s twin peaks and, as we set off, I look back at the Lady Eugenie, her mast swaying as the bay ripples. I’ve made the mistake of checking out the dinner menu before departure and can quite easily imagine spending the afternoon enjoying an ice-cold Cascade Pale Ale and Tasmanian cheese platter while soaking up the surrounds. But this is not just a luxury cruise.
The walk begins at a leisurely pace along the coastline, slowly gaining in difficulty as we near the peak. The odd wombat watches us wander by as the terrain changes from open grass to thick bush to craggy vertical climbs. Finally we reach a cluster of boulders that provides the perfect platform to look back down from where we came. There is a sheer 600-metre drop on one side with the peaks of Bishop and Clerk framing the slowly setting sun. In the distance the Lady Eugenie is now just a speck and the sense of accomplishment is incredible. For the first time I think I understand what hikers are on about.
The following morning I make the most of the yacht’s comfort and sleep in. My calf muscles are stiff from the previous day’s climb and I may have had one glass too many of the top-shelf Tasmanian pinot noir on offer the night before. Odd barking noises are coming from somewhere near the top deck and I surface just as we cruise past Ile des Phoques, a tiny island and overcrowded home to a yappy Australian fur seal colony. Dolphins swim alongside us. “Almost perfect, hey?” shouts Chris the skipper, a grin on his face like it is his first-ever trip.
“It’s an easy one today. Bear Hill!” says Matt with a smile. He points at what looks like a neatly stacked pyramid of burnt orange rocks rising out of the greenery of Schouten Island. “It’s more of a climb really. Should be up and down in a few hours if we go for it.” He clearly has no idea about my calf muscles. Two hours later we’re standing on top of a large, round and surprisingly smooth granite boulder, once again looking down on the Lady Eugenie, anchored in a perfect half-moon bay. The water is a clichéd aqua hue and in the distance we can see the Freycinet Peninsula. The weather gods have truly blessed us and I find it hard to think of anywhere in Australia more stunning.
“Almost perfect,” says Matt. “Almost?” I ask him incredulously. “Yeah,” he sighs, “the winds have picked up a bit so we can’t have dinner on the beach. Ah well, ya can’t have everything.” As I explain to him later, dinner on the boat is still pretty spectacular.
Our final journey on day three is the longest, most difficult and easily the most rewarding. It is a seven-hour hike through Freycinet National Park up to the 579-metre summit of Mount Graham for an almost bird’s-eye view of Freycinet’s number-one attraction, Wineglass Bay. It is easy to see why this beach consistently ranks among the top 10 in the world. “I know,” I say to Kia, our guide on this hike, as we gaze down across the bay then back to Schouten Island behind us. “It’s perfect.” We lose sight of Wineglass Bay as we descend Mount Graham along Quartzite Ridge, stopping to sit on one of the huge rocks and stare out at the clear waters of the Tasman Sea.
It is only a couple of hours from Mount Graham down to the beach, and our shoes are off and our aching bare feet in the chilly water before you can say “fill my wineglass”. I can see the Lady Eugenie anchored on her own, perfectly positioned out in the bay. A bunch of other hikers, their tents already pitched behind the dunes, relax on the sand, content, like us, with their day’s adventure. One of them sits beside me and opens a can of tuna. “What a great day,” he says to me. “I’ve earned this!” I smile back, not only to be polite, but also because I can see Captain Chris motoring in from Lady Eugenie and I know what awaits us back on board. “You’re right,” I say to my new friend. “It’s just perfect.”
I nearly choke on my trail mix. “Is that a bottle of…” “Absinthe, oui,” Nicolas says, finishing my sentence. He gives the bottle a rough wipe down with his wrinkled hands and, in a swift pirate-esque moment, rips the cork out with his teeth. The dank forest air is instantly filled with the sweet aroma of aniseed and wormwood.
Nicolas produces two small glasses from his backpack and splashes some light-green liquor into each, before carefully topping them up with fresh spring water from a trickling fountain. Needless to say, this is a far cry from the flaming sugar cubes and mornings of amnesia that tend to accompany absinthe drinking back home.
It’s not yet noon and I look up from my glass, staring deep into the lush valleys of the Swiss Alps. “Who on earth leaves bottles of absinthe hidden in the forest?” I ask my hiking companion. “La fée verte, the green fairy,” Nicolas says. “She leaves them everywhere, always she has done this.” I’m dubious and pretty sure the wormwood has already taken effect, but something about this mystical environment makes me believe him. Besides, I don’t care what colour she is – if a fairy is willing to stash booze in the forest for thirsty hikers to stumble across, then she is my kind of fairy. Leaving a buck for a tooth seems pretty lame by comparison.
I arrived in Val-de-Travers, in Neuchâtel, western Switzerland, not really knowing a single thing about the place. When I thought of Switzerland, I imagined meticulous watchmakers with curly moustaches, plump chocolatiers and rosy-cheeked women in aprons singing in the hills. I honestly never thought I would find myself in the absinthe mecca, the birthplace of this often feared, always misunderstood, potent liquor that is reputed to have hallucinogenic properties.
Illegal in its nation of origin until 2005, and still outlawed in many countries today, absinthe elicits an intrigue unlike any other liquor on Earth. On one hand, it has been condemned by lawmakers, the church and society for a century. On the other hand, it has been revered as the elixir of creativity and worshipped as a cultural icon of nineteenth-century impressionist artists, writers and poets. Among absinthe’s prophets were Oscar Wilde, Vincent van Gogh and Picasso. The reason for this love–hate relationship lies in its magical ingredient: the allegedly hallucinogenic, locally grown herb artemisia absinthium, commonly known as wormwood.
“Bah, oui, you will go crazy,” Nicolas says. “But you must ’ave at least 60 glasses for it to do this. Most days I ’ave just 40!” I’m not sure if Nicolas is joking or not. Either way, I reckon it’s safe, although the forest does appear a little more vivid after my second glass. Nicolas, like most absinthe producers here, once operated a clandestine distillery, and still talks fondly of his days as an outlaw. I get the feeling he misses it, as though legalising absinthe took a bit of the fun out of it. I’ve tasted the nectar of the green fairy and, I must admit, I’m hooked. It’s like no other drink I’ve tried before, and nothing like the fluorescent-green rocket fuel they call absinthe back home. It’s delicate and delicious, has a sweet aniseed taste, not dissimilar to pastis, and carries a bouquet of fragrant herbs. However, there is one distinctive bitter herbal note that sings out above the rest. It’s the wormwood, I just know it.
I’m keen to see this mystical wormwood plant for myself so I ask Nicolas if he can take me to a local plantation. It’s not exactly a difficult request since just about everyone in the valley grows wormwood in their backyard; however, he knows of a grower nearby who is also an ex-bootlegger. He has a decent wormwood plot sitting outside his micro-distillery, Nicolas says, so we take a short stroll to the town of Boveresse to check it out.
Francis is kneeling among a small patch of silver-green plants in a pretty little garden flourishing in the shadow of a large, old-fashioned Swiss country mansion. The old building is covered with painted green window shutters that were no doubt used not so long ago to hide illegal goings-on from the prying eyes of local police officers and informants.
He looks up from his prized garden of wormwood plants and, with a big smile, beckons me to come and take a closer look. On close inspection, I’m a bit disappointed. I guess I kind of expected this infamous plant to have menacing purple flowers or at least spikes.
But, no, it’s quite simply a low-lying herb with pretty leaves sprouting from a soft stalk. Nicolas, obviously enjoying my enthusiasm for his life-long passion, crouches next to me, plucks a small green leaf and stuffs it in his mouth. With a playful smile he screws up his face up. “Tres amer!” Translated it means very bitter, although I know he’s secretly enjoying it. I follow suit and bite off a small piece of wormwood leaf. It’s bitter, sure, but it’s also surprisingly delicious. It has that exact herbal note I had fallen in love with in the absinthe we drank earlier in the forest.
I’ve tasted the nectar of the green fairy and, I must admit, I’m hooked. It’s like no other drink I’ve tried before, and nothing like the fluorescent-green rocket fuel they call absinthe back home.
We clunk our way up the mansion’s creaky wooden stairs, following Francis’s son and heir to the family distillery as he leads us up to the drying room. Still in use today, it is here his father once hid his precious wormwood harvest. At the top of a tight spiral of wooden stairs we emerge into a dark attic. As my eyes adjust to the dim light, my nostrils are filled with the most beautiful herbal aroma. It’s scrumptious, and I find myself breathing as deeply as I can through my nose, savouring the delicious fragrance.
Beams of light stream through small cracks in the wooden walls, catching plumes of dancing dust particles and illuminating hundreds of bouquets hanging from the rafters. There is wormwood everywhere. Like most artisanal absinthe producers in the region, Francis has his own family recipe that includes a unique blend of homegrown wormwood and herbs, including green anise, fennel, peppermint, hyssop, coriander, cardamom, elecampane, star anise, licorice, dittany, angelica and many other (sometimes secret) botanicals.
Back at the cellar door, I sample the house produce (La Valote Martin), and get myself a small takeaway bottle. I’ve got a train to catch – more villages and distilleries await.
During my time in Val-de-Travers I visit many small, family-run artisanal distillers. The majority have been producing absinthe for generations and are proud to proclaim they continued to do so illegally during prohibition. Most grow wormwood, often in their backyard, and produce their own style of absinthe. Every family recipe is unique, using different herbal blends and varied amounts of wormwood, which is still heavily restricted by law today.
There are more than 20 absinthe distilleries along the Absinthe Route, just about all of which have a cellar door where you can taste their produce and buy a bottle to take home. All of the bars and restaurants serve local absinthe, and every afternoon around 5pm is l’heure vert (the green hour), when you can see locals sitting in bars and cafes around tabletop water towers happily chatting away over cloudy green glasses. This region is the Châteauneuf-du-Pape of absinthe.
Tucked away in quaint little villages along the trail are countless restaurants and, to my surprise, many of them utilise wormwood in their regional cuisine. (It really is considered a herb here in the valley.) For me, the standout dishes are beef fillet in absinthe gravy and absinthe soufflé. Far from a gimmick, the gravy is heavily infused with the liquor, giving it a great kick and bitter-spice note I just can’t get enough of. The soufflé comes with a pool of absinthe in the centre and is served with an entire bottle of the stuff on the side, “Just in case you wanted more…” God, I love this place.
I couldn’t be more impressed and surprised by what I’ve found here. Imagining a group of people who operated for a century as backyard bootleggers, I had expected to encounter a heavy-drinking, cagey bunch of moonshine-trippers with chips on their shoulders. But this vision could not have been further from the truth. This mind-bogglingly lush, beautiful valley is home to a community of proud, intelligent, moderate, friendly artists who love what they produce and are more than happy to share their secrets with visitors. Join the trail and chances are you will get stuck at each cellar door for hours, sipping absinthe as locals regale you with daring tales from their days as clandestine distillers and tall stories about the green fairy. And, if you’re lucky, you just might find a bottle of absinthe stashed in the forest.
“This is for the souls of the bad man, the bad people,” announces Nando, our guide, as we contemplate Tiwu Ata Polo, the “enchanted lake” stewing below.
The image may be macabre, but the setting is almost ethereal. An orb of fire has just split the sky from the earth, drenching the mountain in golden light and revealing the dark pits around us as the jewels of Mount Kelimutu: its three colourful crater lakes. The grand reveal is a worthy reward for rising an hour before dawn to push my sluggish body to the peak of the mountain. Granted, a van did most of the work.
According to the beliefs of the local Lio people, spirits of the deceased flock to this dormant volcano, on the Indonesian island of Flores, to be categorised and stored.
A few months ago the water pooling in Tiwu Ata Polo was the colour of rust. Photos from years past show it glowing aquamarine. I wonder if a new addition of fetid ghosts stained it the darker shade it exhibits today and, if so, what did they do to be exiled here?
Kelimutu’s lakes transform up to three times a year, morphing like mood rings from teal to white to blood red. Some claim the rare phenomenon is an unexplained mystery but scientists – never romantics – attribute it to an ever-changing blend of chemicals leeching from the volcano.
A thin ridge separates the “enchanted pool” from the second lake for the departed. Despite its proximity to the murky liquid of nasty souls, Tiwu Nuwa Muri Koo Fai is a melting bowl of bubblegum ice-cream, swirling milky and blue. It is here, Nando explains, that the innocent spirits of children rest.
But it’s Tiwu Ata Mbupu, the crater for those who aged with kindness, that most intrigues. Nando tells me the pool is black these days and my mind thirstily conjures a bowl of Flores coffee – fresh and restorative, with floral notes.
I’ll have to take his word for it. This morning it’s a foamy cup of milk. Clouds froth up the crater’s edge, keeping the oldies safe from sight – a dignity they’ve no doubt earned.
My foot misses its mark on the descent and I stumble on a wild blueberry bush. Punishment, perhaps, for lusting after caffeine in such a sacred place. My toes smart and it’s hard not to wonder: if the stagger had occurred at the crater’s edge would I have wound up with the tender old souls or been banished to the cauldron of villains?
As he bounces his weight on the rear of the vehicle, Fredrik revs the throttle and gets just enough bite into the mush to push off the clearing and back onto the trail. Knowing how to get your mobile moving again after getting ditched, sliding on wet ice or tumbling down a bank is an everyday survival skill in the Arctic. It’s not nearly one of Fredrik’s most impressive, though. Once he left the trail in late winter and found himself chest deep in freezing water. “You get out of the wet clothes quick as possible and head for a cabin,” he explains. “Oh ya, I was naked. Naked is warmer than wet.”
The human body does adapt to Arctic cold, but nude is still nude and you can’t stay warm for very long here once disrobed. While he may have beaten the elements on that occasion, Fredrik isn’t planning a repeat episode any time soon.
Snowmobiles are a way of life in Lapland, replacing skis and reindeer as the most common form of modern transportation. It takes little training to get the hang of the throttle and steering using your body as a counterweight. There is always the possibility of it all going a bit wrong and consequently ploughing into a snowdrift, which is momentarily terrifying until the powder acts as the world’s coolest cushion.
The snowmobile safari from the Aurora Safari Camp, in Gunnarsbyn, to Brändön Lodge is a four-hour ride, taking in a series of forests, glacial lakes and a jaunt onto the Bay of Finland. An hour from the coast, we stop on sea ice to watch the sun mingle with the horizon. In February, Fredrik tells me, the ice below our feet is thick enough for freighters to drive on top of the ocean.
Out here the snow is never still. Instead it’s blown by the wind into drifts big enough to hide a truck. Fredrik likes to take travellers on overnight trips into the wilderness, digging a cave into the massive mounds to act as lodging. After he picks out a suitable drift, we begin to shovel. It doesn’t pay to get too carried away, though, since a small cave is a warm cave. “You get the right snow and it traps the warmth inside,” he explains. “Body heat and a sleeping bag are all you need to stay cosy.”
Sleeping inside the icy chamber is a ball, but it gets even better when Fredrik fries up reindeer jerky in a pan of butter and serves it with a mug of hot lingonberry juice. Steam rises above the pan and freezes on the ceiling. Warmth is a relative concept; as the mercury outside drops to –32°C overnight we stay toasty at around 10°C inside.
Survival in the Arctic doesn’t have to be a hardship – it’s not a battle with the elements, but more of a dance. When the temperature drops below –20°C it becomes a different kind of cold, one that keeps the cap of ice on a river solid and bestows clear skies at night for watching the aurora borealis. It’s a dry chill, which somehow makes it easier to stay warm. Minus two degrees can get wet; –20°C does not.
Just a short sled ride from his home, we meet two of Fredrik’s good friends, Pär Kassberg and Richard Karlsson, both of whom work with dogs to get around during winter. Pär often cooks a meal over the fire for guests at the Aurora Safari Camp and Richard can be relied on to bring a team of his Siberian huskies for a joy-ride.
The safari camp sits on the edge of a glacial lake, offering uninterrupted views of the Swedish wilderness. The canvas tents are an upgrade from the snow cave in every possible way. Akin to the traditional Sami lavvo, they are similar to the digs Fredrik came across when he was working in Africa. A wood heater in the middle of each tent pumps out serious heat, making it toasty warm.
Before the sun sets, we leave the camp to stand on the edge of the lake and observe the sky’s changing colours as the darkness approaches. The landscape is cloaked in silence. Had the men not alerted me to their imminent arrival, I would never have heard the approach of Richard’s dog team.
Handcrafted from timber and twine by a 67-year-old man in Kiruna, Sweden’s northernmost town, Richard’s sled is a work of art. This mode of transport is the polar opposite of the snowmobile – the thin timber rails yield to the environment with grace. Only the sound of the dogs panting competes with the shush of snow beneath the rails.
The huskies’ power isn’t obvious until you witness the launch of the sled. The front rails leap a foot off the ground and I’m thrown backwards with the acceleration. We bounce along for 50 metres before Richard commands the dogs to ease off the pace.
Richard listens to his huskies and trusts their judgement. They possess an ability to avoid danger, aware of subtle patterns in the snow that might conceal hidden traps beneath. They also have a keen sense of survival when confronted with wild animals of the Arctic. “They regard the reindeer as prey,” Richard explains, “but the moose they have respect for. They’ll stare it down, but they know better than to start a fight.”
Richard can guide the dogs away from chance encounters with moose, but reindeer present a different challenge. Although they’re bred to run rather than kill, the pack can decide to chase the deer – on one occasion, Richard needed to muster all his skills and drop steel anchors into the snow to stop them.
“They get into a prey mode and they go crazy,” he says. “I couldn’t turn them around and couldn’t get them to brake. They see a herd of reindeer and they just want to take one down. I was really worried my lines weren’t going to hold – the ropes were straining away from the sled under their force.”
The trails across the rivers and through forests are essential to survival in winter. Fresh falls are packed down by snowmobile traffic before the trails freeze hard again. With each big dump of snow the ritual is repeated so the dog teams are able to do their thing.
I witness the cycle in action. While I’m asleep in the safari tent, the frozen landscape is covered by a massive fall of snow. As I emerge from my haven in the morning, there is no evidence of the tracks that were there just hours earlier. Even the snowmobiles are camouflaged in a fresh layer of white.
Pär makes us breakfast before setting out to clear the trails. Beneath the dump of fresh powder is the threat of unfrozen pools of water that can trap a snowmobile and ruin the day, or worse. On one occasion, Pär and his son both ended up in trouble when one of their snowmobiles became stuck in the ice and the pair slipped into the lake through a crack while they were trying to extricate it.
After dragging themselves from the frigid water, they took turns to jog behind the other snowmobile. In this case, it was far better to be jogging, an activity that at least keeps you warm, than sitting astride the snowmobile, the cold air turning your drenched clothes to ice. “By the time we reached the cabin our legs had turned blue and the feeling in our toes had been lost,” Pär recalls. “The pain began in earnest as things began to warm up and feeling returned.”
It wasn’t enough to get him to admit defeat and seek assistance: “Pure northern men don’t need to call for help. I’ve never made one call in my life. I always get myself out of trouble.”
While there’s no need for him to demonstrate his survival skills this trip, I do get to see – and eat – plenty of Pär’s cooking. Lunch at the camp turns into an event when the murrika (a concave steel plate) is swung over an open fire pit to fry up salmon and char. The boys stand by the fire, poking at the murrika and chatting while falling snowflakes gather in their beards and the smoke from the fire infuses the fish.
On the last day of my stay I meet Lars, a Sami man, and his reindeer herd in the town of Flakaberg. Sami people have relied on reindeer for thousands of years, owing their Arctic survival to the clothing, transport, meat and tools provided by the animals.
Every spring, Lars tells me, the reindeer and their herdsmen head deep into Lapland where wide open pastures are better for calving. Their migration takes place before the ice melts, making the journey possible by sled or snowmobile. This is also the time the Sami people gather to trade reindeer skins. Flakaberg was once the site of the annual market, but for the past 410 years the town of Jokkmokk, a few hours away, has been its home.
You can still buy reindeer skins or take a bite of the animal’s meat cooked on a murrika at the Jokkmokk Winter Market. The bitter cold and remote location mean only the most adventurous of travellers find themselves here. Instead, you’ll discover most visitors are actually locals. Many of the market stalls have a modern feel to them, but some gems remain: you can buy drinks prepared from wild Arctic berries, smoked fish caught in glacial lakes, and Sami handicrafts.
Fredrik and Pär show me some of the market’s more artistic treasures, including a presentation on wild foraging by local culinary expert Eva Gunnare and a fire-dancing performance at sunset. Embers and flames drift across the snow in a display of light and movement.
There are also opportunities to connect more deeply with the culture. Three days of reindeer racing take place on frozen Lake Jokkmokk, and one of the best Sami museums in the Arctic can be found here, along with Sami training colleges celebrating traditional crafts and survival skills.
My favourite treasures in Jokkmokk, though, are the snow balls. Local artist Cecilia Lundin has spent decades perfecting these modern igloos. First she carves blocks of ice from the river then moulds them into balls, before using snow to ‘glue’ them together and render them smooth. Only the Swedish can turn survival into art. You enter the snow ball through a circular portal and emerge into a dome of tranquility. There’s room for two inside and a little nook at the back holds a candle for light. In the long dark of the Swedish winter, it is one of life’s necessities.
“Good place for snorkelling,” Geoff says. The other four passengers and I look at each other with bemused expressions. It has gone quiet apart from the water sloshing against the boat. The island paradise he’d promised us is a mirage in the far distance. “Just a quick one,” he adds. Later, I discover this is how Geoff gauges our swimming abilities.
As the current drags me under the boat, my mask fills with water. I swim to the surface, rearrange my gear and my dignity and am ready to explore. Immediately I’m transfixed. Below me the water is aquarium clear, reef fish flit around a buffet of age-old coral and I mentally pinch myself – I am snorkelling in the Cocos Islands! It’s been on my bucket list for a long time.
Just a few days previously, as the plane drifted in, I wondered how we could possibly land on an atoll consisting of 27 islands and measuring only 14 square kilometres. Below me, it looked as though there was only ocean. An ocean that was every hue of blue and green imaginable, but water just the same. Where was the runway? But there it was and on this far-flung Australian territory, a stone’s throw from Jakarta and a half-day’s travel from Perth, everything is in close proximity.
We finally reach Prison Island where Geoff drops anchor. We do a 10-minute lap of its beaches as he tells us about Alexander Hare. The guy had something of a reputation as a bit of a Romeo and moved his harem of 40 women from nearby Home Island where he had settled in 1826 to produce coconut oil. The women, he suspected, were up to no good with the Sumatran and Javanese men who’d sailed in to work the plantations. Hare kept close tabs on ‘his’ women and enjoyed free rein with the ones he felt worthy of his attentions. Until everything fell apart.
These days, there’s no sign of Hare’s former home or his fate. The water is bathtub warm and there are black tip reef sharks playing in the gentle waves. I can almost reach out and touch their fins. After a few hours that pass too quickly, we’re back in Geoff’s boat and heading to Direction Island, home of the notorious Rip, one of Cocos’s most famous snorkelling spots.
“It’s not for the faint-hearted,” an islander had warned the previous day, and the earlier swimming test starts to make more sense. We ask Geoff increasingly panicked questions as we walk across sand the texture of flour. The coconut palms are rustling gently in the breeze. Are they trying to warn us?
“Been a few near misses,” Geoff offers. “Being July and trade-wind season the tide is rougher than normal. We had a woman from Tennessee determined to go by herself. Ended up over there.” He points to deep water a hundred metres away. “Little fella watching from the beach jumps in his boat to rescue her. ‘Just like catching a fish,’ he told me.”
Although fins would make the crossing so much easier, I’m secretly relieved they’re back in the boat as we jump in and head to the safety of a coral wall. “Better to swim it in the Doldrums, around March, when the water is calmer,” Geoff says dryly.
Although no one lives on Direction Island, people often camp here, some staying for long periods and living a nomadic existence. I can see the attraction as we swim out to a pontoon in the protected lagoon. Apart from us and a couple of moored yachts, there’s no one else around. I feel like a kid again as we dive off the pontoon. It’s an absurd ‘dance as if nobody’s watching’ moment as one silly jump follows another before it’s time to head back to dry land.
The following day, it’s time to explore West Island, one of only two that’s inhabited in the Cocos (the other is Home Island), where about 150, mainly Australian, expats reside. It’s the kind of place where everyone leaves their homes unlocked and the keys in the car, just in case someone needs to use it. There is almost no crime on the island. A magistrate visits four times a year to rule over pending cases, most of them traffic offences. Borrowing a cup of sugar from next door still seems to be the norm.
This is not the sort of place for tourists looking for happy hours and piña coladas by the pool. There are, in fact, just two cafes, two restaurants, one pub, a supermarket and an art centre in an old restored barge on the island. It might go some way to explaining the hospitality of the community in general – within a couple of days I feel as though I’m a local.
The alluring ingredient of these untouched isles is the spell they cast. As I begin to beach hop, the rest of the world and its troubles seem a million miles away. Just below the surface of the ocean – the water temperature here ranges between 26ºC and 30ºC year round – the abundant marine life makes for spectacular snorkelling.
Off the shore, colour dots the horizon as kitesurfers skim across the water, picking up speed to show off their aerobatics. The water becomes a playground as windsurfers and stand-up paddle boarders join the mix. I try my luck at windsurfing, but my fight with the elements is lost too quickly. I retreat to the powder-soft shore and drift off to the sound of rustling palms.
The next morning, I catch the 20-minute ferry to Home Island to join the Hari Raya festivities. These mark the end of Ramadan, when Muslims fast during daylight hours for 30 days. Around 450 Cocos Malay live in the kampong (village) called Bantam, and their culture and history are unique.
They have an individual way of dressing and their own language, both of which take a little bit from the cultures of Indonesia, Malaysia and Scotland. The latter is thanks to Captain John Clunies-Ross, who dropped anchor briefly here in 1814 on a trip to India and returned to live, with his family, in 1827. Of course, by that time, Hare had set up shop with his harem and the two men immediately began a bitter feud, which saw Hare’s women begin leaving him to hook up with the newly arriving sailors. Hare began to lose his marbles and eventually left for Indonesia, while the Clunies-Ross family ruled for more than 150 years until the Australian government took over in 1978. All that remains of that era is the family’s Victorian mansion, Oceania House. It’s now run as a guesthouse where I’ll be spending the next two nights.
As I arrive, the local mosque’s call to prayer floats through the large windows of the Rose Room. The charming owner Avril shows me around and introduces the house’s friendly ghosts, and I almost expect Basil Fawlty to come flying down the spiral staircase. As the sun sets, four other guests and I gather around a Victorian table fit for the Queen to share dinner.
At 5am the call to prayer shifts me from a deep sleep. Swirling colour surrounds the mosque as the worshippers arrive in traditional clothes. After they pay their respects to Allah, the families converge on the local cemetery to read the Koran to the dearly departed. My guide, a constantly smiling local called Nek Neng, explains that all graves point to Mecca. Something strange – to a Westerner, at least – is occurring though; people are approaching one another, clutching each other’s hands, wailing and dabbing away tears. Nek Neng explains that Hari Raya is also a time when people wipe the slate clean of the previous year’s sins. “We forgive one another then start all over again,” he says with a wry smile. As I witness tightly drawn faces flood with relief I wonder if Western society could benefit from adopting such a ritual.
On my final day, I join the whole kampong at the water’s edge to see the annual jukong boat race. Ten newly varnished boats, hitched with pristine triangles of fabric, set sail, eventually fading into the turquoise horizon. On the shore, the sense of community is heart-warming and clean slates the order of the day.
I scramble out of the car and follow Willie as he disappears under a log and into the night. A beam of torchlight guides me over jagged rocks and gnarled tree roots as insects suckle at my ankles. Best-case scenario: I’ll return bite-speckled with tomorrow night’s dinner. Worst-case scenario: I’ll lose a finger. Or two. I’m hunting coconut crabs, or uga (pronounced oong-ah), a delicacy on the remote Pacific island of Niue. They’re giant land-dwelling beasts and are something of a metaphor for this unique island nation, which is rugged and impenetrable on the outside, and full of rich surprises on the inside.
Niue is a remote slice of Polynesia forgotten by the rest of the world and deliciously unplundered by tourism tsars. The world’s largest raised coral atoll, Niue is home to one of the smallest nations on earth by population, and sits just over the international dateline, about 335 nautical miles from its closest neighbour, Tonga. It’s a destination that has Australian immigration officials baffled when I front up at the airport with N-I-U-E scribbled on my departure card. “Sorry, where are you going?” asks the middle-aged official, who has probably been in the job 30 years. “Nu-way”, I reply. “Where’s that? I’ve never heard of it,” he responds. And that is precisely why I’m going.
A sapphire sea shreds into the rocky coastline, oozing white foam as we come in to land. The rocks surrender to palm trees, then a glinting white runway emerges that’s so bright I’m in danger of searing my eyeballs as I disembark. Niue is affectionately knows as the ‘Rock of Polynesia’, and for good reason. The 269 square kilometre land mass is surrounded by 20 metre cliffs and a coral reef that gives way to ocean so deep you can almost deep-sea fish from shore. The downside is there are no long, white sand beaches to laze on.
“It’s not a flop-and-drop destination,” island orientation guide Keith Vial tells me. “If you flop and drop here you’ll need a first-aid kit.” The upside is there are countless caves, chasms and natural pools to explore, and there’s guaranteed seclusion at almost every turn. Which is just as well, because on my first outing I forget my togs, and a pasty Palagi (foreigner) taking a dip in her underwear isn’t a sight I’m keen to bestow the locals. It’s hard keeping dry in Niue. The lure of the water is intoxicating and, on land, sweat is a constant companion. Often the two go hand-in-hand because this is a destination where effort is rewarded in spades.
At Matapa Chasm, a short path meanders through bird’s nest ferns and clusters of purple oyster plants, before arriving at an opening, where nature’s chainsaw has sliced a vast cleft through the limestone rock. The towering chasm walls plug a basin of iridescent water, fed by the ocean and a freshwater underground stream. This idyllic spot was once reserved for bathing by Niuean royalty. I tread carefully over slippery, candy-coloured rocks and plunge into the cold water. As I wade further in, the thermocline hits, warming the water slightly as crabs skitter on the rock walls. They don’t mind that I’m in my knickers.
At the entrance to Matapa, a longer, more strenuous walk leads to Talava Arches – a formation sculpted by pounding waves and viewed from inside a dramatic cave. The ocean here is wild and you’d have to be in the market for a coral tattoo to swim. I’m not. Instead, I head south to nearby Limu Pools. If the angels in heaven don’t mind getting their wings wet, this is where they would swim. The sheltered pools are gloriously pristine, and taking a dip is like floating around in a giant aquarium zapped by a lightsabre.
The island is riddled with exquisite natural wonders, accessible by marked sea tracks peeling off the main road. I arrive at Togo Chasm early in the day to avoid the searing midday heat and my gracious host Sarah Porter is aghast. “There are two cars here, that’s not on…it’s peak hour at Togo!” she exclaims.
We walk through a coastal forest and into an exposed stone-forest of sharp weathered limestone and ancient coral pinnacles. Next we descend a 27-rung ladder into the cleavage of a chasm populated with soaring palm trees. I wade through a concealed rock pool, climb over giant boulders and find myself in the belly of a massive oceanfront cave. The thundering waves smash into the cliff face with such force I feel the thump reverberate through my body.
Further north I find Avaiki Cave – a wondrous dripstone cavern that opens onto the reef. It’s low tide and I tread across to a sinkhole burrowed into the recess of another cave. The rock formations overhead look like candles melted to a pulp. The water has a blue-loo tinged hue, and fish trapped by the tide flounder about. I join them. I’d stay here all day but Avaiki is tidal and I’m doing my best to avoid that tattoo.
Niue has without doubt the clearest ocean I’ve ever seen. On a good day, visibility is 80 metres. That’s because there are no rivers or streams draining into the sea and rainwater is filtered through layers of porous limestone – the same geological marvel that’s responsible for the caves, chasms and underwater caverns that pockmark the island.
During scuba dives, I fin through dark underwater caves festooned with painted crayfish, and brave Snake Gully – a reef wriggling with highly venomous but harmless sea snakes. I snorkel with playful spinner dolphins that poo in my face and perform graceful pirouettes in the air. It’s surreal. I join a fishing charter – a little disheartened to turn from marine friend to foe – and reel in three yellowfin tuna and a mahi mahi. It’s choppy on the boat but my vomit-to-catch ratio is even, so it’s a good day.
Then there’s the uga. Willie Saniteli is a master hunter of these snappy arthropods, which can live to 50 and weigh up to four kilograms. He teaches me how to lay coconut baits, cutting a wedge out of the husk with two deft swoops of his machete. Willie then slices two lengths of husk that we use as ties, tethering the coconut to a tree root hanging over a rock where the crabs burrow. We return two days later at night to find uga perched on the shells, claws raised like conductors on a podium. Willie grabs them swiftly, putting two fingers in the grooves of the shell behind their heads. I have a turn, conscious their pincers could snap my fingers off like a matchstick at any moment. Willie tells me of a neighbour who lost a finger back in the 70s. Gulp.
Willie is symbolic of modern Niue – he grew up here but was lured away by the lights of the big smoke and spent 28 years in New Zealand. “My dream was to be a mechanic, ride a big motorbike – I did all that so time to come home,” he says. Today Willie is an island entrepreneur with his fingers in much more than just crab shells. He runs fishing charters, organises visitor excursions and owns two cafes, including a self-serve honesty bar on the beach; he’s also just started a free range egg farm.
In a tiny island nation with a dwindling population and burgeoning opportunities for tourism, diversity is key. Ninety per cent of Niueans live outside Niue and the population ‘on island’ has plummeted to about 1300. Most of the workforce is in the public service – which has flourished under the island’s free association with New Zealand.
Other local characters like Tony Aholima are doing their bit to keep tradition alive. Tony practises plantation farming, among other things, and is virtually self-sufficient. He gives me a tour of his plantations and livestock, pointing out the piglet that he’ll be eating next month and the lucky male that will become chief porker when he reaches sexual maturity. Without warning he lops off a chicken’s head. It’s almost lunchtime. Tony then slices into a coconut for me to drink from, and it’s not until I’ve taken a few thirsty gulps that I realise he used the bloodied machete. Eew.
I leave him to his chicken and join a local women’s weaving group. They show me how they make intricate handbags, baskets and wall hangings from pandanus and coconut tree leaves. They invite me to stay for lunch and I tuck into takihi (taro with pawpaw and coconut milk wrapped in banana leaf), coconut bread, fish, futi moho (boiled green bananas eaten like potato), luku (fern leaf) salad and, of course, uga. It’s delicious and the crab is sweet and rich.
The Niueans are a resourceful lot – they can’t afford to be at the mercy of a monthly container ship, which may or may not arrive, and a weekly passenger flight that doesn’t always have room for cargo. The people are genuinely warm and welcoming. There’s no poverty, the island is clean and there is almost no crime. The jail houses one inmate – an arsonist, apparently, who is serving two-and-a-half years for setting a bloke’s house on fire. The bloke shot him and served six months alongside his victim, and they’re now best mates.
I quickly fall into island life. My routine is dictated by the tides. I ditch my seatbelt (sorry mum) and wave to passing motorists like a local. I dine with the first high commissioner of Niue and his wife, and greet the couple like old friends when I bump into them a few days later. There are so few visitors here and I know most of them by name, if not by face. We’re all on the same flight home and most are staying at the Matavai (the only resort in Niue). I feel like a local.
The rock has shown me its softer side. And I get to leave with my fingers intact.
We’re heading eight kilometres offshore to the isolated Montague Island, a place of Aboriginal lore and natural wonder. Some call this the Galápagos of eastern Australia because of its large population of seals, penguins, terns, whales and dolphins, which thrive in the nutrient-rich water of the East Australian Current.
The east coast of New South Wales has hordes of cafes and holiday homes filling the once empty patches of land. But I’ve been told there’s still a place that remains rugged and undeveloped. Montague Island can only be reached using a licenced operator, and trips are dependent on the weather.
We see the silhouette of the granite lighthouse that was manned by hardy lighthouse keepers until automation in 1986. Through the mist above the water there’s a man in a yellow jacket waiting on the jetty. Our guide on the island is Dave Blakeney, a local Koori who works as a caretaker for the National Parks and Wildlife Service. Dave helps us, and our crate of supplies, onshore. “If the weather’s bad we could be stuck here for a week,” he says matter-of-factly.
We walk the trail up to the crest of the island. Dave speaks over the squawking gulls, as he tells us of the Aboriginal significance of Montague Island. To the local Koori community, Montague Island is known as Barunguba. The Dreamtime story associated with the area tells of a father, Gulaga (now known as Mount Dromedary), and his sons, Barunguba and Najunuka (the hill at the foot of Mount Dromedary). Dave points to the Stonehenge-like rocks on the far side of the island. It is a sacred Aboriginal burial ground and there are still numerous middens on the island that show its importance as a feeding place. The area is off limits to visitors because it’s still used by the local community to pass on the teachings of the Yuin Aboriginal people.
As we walk through breeding seagulls and crested terns, Dave reminds us that we’re observers here. “We can’t interfere with the life on the island at all,” he warns. We watch a tiny seagull the size of my thumb separate from its mother. Another seagull approaches it and pecks at its exposed head until specks of red appear on the rocks. “It’s survival of the fittest. You have to let nature take its course,” he says as we look back at the dead chick.
We continue down to ‘the fingers’ that jut out into the ocean from the rust-coloured cliffs. The isolation here is immense. I imagine it as an inescapable Australian Alcatraz. I’m told that one resident did break out from here many years back, though. A determined Clydesdale, who was apparently beaten by its owner, braved the eight kilometre ditch between here and the mainland and swam to its freedom.
Thankfully, our accommodation on the island is the refurbished lighthouse keeper’s cottages, not at all prison-like. The walls are decorated with photos and old lanterns from the lighthouse. I sit on the balcony overlooking the broiling ocean and flick through a book on the area’s history.
The lighthouse was built in 1881 after the parts were constructed in Birmingham, England, and transported here for assembly. “It was like an early Ikea flat pack,” Dave adds with a grin.
He jumps around like a kid, pointing out the largest fur seal colony in NSW and the freshwater spring that makes this place self-sufficient. “I reckon I’ve got islanditis,” he says. After weeks at a time with barely a visitor, I imagine he relishes the kind of company that answers back.
After a hearty dinner of local produce, Dave takes us back down to the jetty at dusk for the most spectacular show on the island. We take a seat looking out to the ocean and wait. Just as I start getting fidgety, I see what looks like a little gnome waddling in from the shallows. Then another, and another. As the gnomes get closer, I see that they’re actually little penguins, hundreds of them, clambering up the rocks and waddling to their nests like lemmings invading the island.
In addition to the little penguins, the island also has a large whale population, a variety of different fish and gangs of Australian and New Zealand fur seals. The seals don’t breed here so the area’s pretty much free from sharks looking for an easy meal. This is just the news I’m after, as next morning I get an appreciation of the island from the surrounding ocean.
I tread water in the murky brine. Dave and local diver Frank van Zyl from Underwater Safaris swim off to find a Port Jackson shark and I’m left alone. Something touches my leg and I swivel in panic. There is another bump against my ankle and I suppress the urge to pee in my wetsuit. Below the choppy swell the ocean is alive with life. Fur seals torpedo through the water, twisting and wrestling each other like ocean labradors. Through my mask, I spot a manta ray on the sandy bottom, and to my right Dave and Frank swim next to a Port Jackson shark. A pair of Australian fur seals choose me as their next target and take turns zipping as close as they can to my submerged torso. I duck-dive down and join them as they approach me again. It is a magical moment.
The next morning Wazza roars into the jetty ready to pick us up. As we leave, there are humpback whales frolicking in the bay, and I watch mischievous seals circling around the boat looking for a playmate. I wave goodbye to Dave happy in the knowledge that there is still a slice of unspoiled nature out here on the New South Wales coast.
Fans shout for more as the West Africans’ set comes to an end, but then a spotlight shines on the warrior and a hush falls over the crowd, as if word has quickly spread of the ancient taboo against singing on the slopes of Mount Santubong, a prohibition that local trekkers take seriously but which has no hold here in this Borneo jungle clearing.
Borneo. The name itself evokes a sense of mysticism and mystery. This huge island in the South China Sea – once home to the world’s most infamous headhunters, a tropical place where many villages can still only be reached by boat or small plane – has become home to something quite different over the past 15 years: one of the planet’s best organically grown international music festivals.
Behind me, the Iban warrior faces the mountain and chants a blessing in his own tongue:
“Oh Gods of all Gods
Look kindly upon us
Bless us who gather here
Bless the people who come from upstream and the people who come from downstream
Let us all have joy together”
The spotlight shifts to an old Bidayuh man dressed in black with a red sash around his waist. He’s standing on a boulder near the back of the crowd, holding a rod with a raffia figure. He chants his own blessing before the spotlight shifts a second then a third time. The four men form the points of the compass and signify the fundamental elements: Fire, Earth, Water and Wind.
It’s 10 years since I showed up at the gates of the Sarawak Cultural Village for my first taste of the Rainforest Festival, but every year I meet people who have been coming here longer than me. The festival has swollen remarkably and now attracts about 20,000 people, including couch surfers, yachters and even a primary school marching band.
Over the course of three days, thousands dance to Mongolian throat singers, swoon to a trio of Palestinian brothers duelling on ouds (a Middle Eastern lute), kwasa kwasa with Congolese legend Kanda Bongo Man and rock out to a Czech band called Cankisou that features a didgeridoo and a homemade flute made from toilet hose and a metal broom handle. And this all takes place against the dramatic backdrop of Mount Santubong – which, viewed from a distance, resembles a pregnant princess laying on her back – though that’s a tale for another day.
“The Rainforest World Music Festival has the most extraordinary setting I’ve seen for a music event, ringed as it is by dense forest and dramatically high and ragged mountains,” says Gerald Seligman, General Director of the World Music Expo (WOMEX), a trade industry event for the world music business.
The RWMF was initially the brainchild of Randy Raine-Reusch, a Canadian composer who literally plays thousands of instruments and has recorded with Aerosmith, The Cranberries and Yes. Raine-Reusch was traveling in Sarawak, researching and recording tunes on the gourd organ, when he was enchanted by the beauty of the sape, a melodic four-stringed instrument made from a single piece of carved out wood. Today, no RWMF would be complete without the sounds of the sape, but at the time, Raine-Reusch lamented that Sarawak’s rich musical heritage was in danger of disappearing.
And thus the Rainforest World Music Festival was born to showcase Sarawakian music to the world and bring world music to Sarawak. “Traditional instruments contain a soul, an essence to them,” says Raine-Reusch, who was also the festival’s first artistic director. “They’re the voice of the people and the voice of culture for thousands of years and they have something that touches the human soul.”
It used to be that every band here had to feature at least one indigenous instrument, and there was a time when electrical instruments were totally off limits. Those rules have been relaxed, but the lineup still includes an eclectic mix of musicians from every continent as well as the interior of Sarawak.
Take the performance by Zee Avi, the diminutive Sarawakian singer-songwriter whose compositions have been featured on 21 Jump Street, Parenthood and even in a Johnny Depp movie. Avi could have been considered too pop, too mainstream for the Rainforest festival, but she traded in her guitar for a miniature sape – a sape-lele – and invited two of the Sarawak Cultural Village’s resident musicians, Narawi Rashidi and percussionist Johari Morshidi, to join her band.
“I have two masters playing with me tonight – such an honour!” an ecstatic Avi tells fans during her performance on the first night of the festival.
Instead of singing English songs like ‘Bitter Heart’, perhaps her best-known ditty, Avi instead performs tunes like ‘Mee Kolok Sigek’, which she wrote while sitting along the banks of the Sarawak River in Kuching. While that song is inspired by a popular food (a local noodle dish), her performance includes a folk tribute to Princess Santubong, the spirit in the mountain that forms the backdrop to the festival.
“In every band, the ethnic identity is powerful and dominant,” says Yeoh Jun Lin, a classical musician who rejoined the festival as its artistic director and put together the lineup after a several-year hiatus.
And in an age when most bands are dominated by just a handful of instruments – drums, bass and guitar – I encounter a new way of making music every year at the RWMF. In 2011, women from a village in Vanuatu turned the lake of the cultural village into their instrument, cupping their hands under the water to make booming percussion sounds.
This year, my mouth drops when I see Harkaitz Martinez de San Vicente and Inigo Antonio of the band Oreka TX play the txalaparta, a Basque instrument that nearly disappeared after World War II.
The txalaparta doesn’t really look like an instrument. It’s made from thick planks of wood or lengths of stone laid out one next to the other. Each piece is carved with precision to resonate just the right sound.
It takes two people to play the txalaparta; together they create a single melody. When Martinez de San Vicente and Antonio first explained this to me, I didn’t get it. But when I saw the men playing it together, I understood. For a single person to do this, he would need four arms. “The important thing is the act of sharing the rhythm with the other person,” says Antonio.
Their performance is part music, part story-telling, punctuated by a documentary video that plays behind them, showing them travelling through India and Mongolia searching for new materials to create their music. At one point, they carve blocks of ice into planks for their instrument and use batons of ice to play it.
Like most of the musicians here, Martinez de San Vicente and Antonio perform at least twice during the festival – in a workshop and during the evening concert. The afternoon workshops are more intimate and informal affairs. Percussionists, string players and vocalists from different bands are grouped together to introduce their music. A jam session often results. It doesn’t always work, but when it does, it’s magic.
The late afternoon – in between the workshops and the evening concert – is a time to chill out as a calm settles over the lake in the cultural village and hues of orange and red tint the mountain sky. Some days I exit the festival venue and walk a few minutes to the beach to take a swim in the South China Sea. Others, I check out the longhouses, each one built in the style of a different ethnic group. The newest – the Bidayuh Longhouse – is also the biggest. The round panggah that’s connected to the longhouse traditionally housed the skulls of enemies killed in battle, though here it is used for an art exhibition instead.
While wandering the crafts bazaar and vendor stalls in and around the longhouses, I bump into Zee Avi and her bassist JP Maramba. It’s not unusual to spot the performers in the crowd here, but Maramba stands out this time. One side of his head is shaved with the pattern of a warrior tattoo. Avi encouraged him to do it and he’s happy with the result. Looks good on him, I think as I walk by the hair tattoo tent and consider getting one myself. The idea quickly passes and I opt instead to chill by the lake and enjoy a cold beer.
Unlike other gigs where bands are quickly flown in and out, here the musicians spend as much as a week together, forging new friendships and melodies. The camaraderie spills over to the stage. Late Sunday evening, Zee Avi warmly embraces Ghanaian dancer Paulina Lartey, before the two bust a move together centrestage in the festival finale.
The Sunday finale is not a work of musical genius. The last performer of the evening, Kanda Bongo Man, lays down an upbeat melody as the members of each band that has performed in the three-day festival – followed by the schleppers who carry their instruments, the liaison officers and other volunteers – take to the stage for a last wave. Soon the stage is packed with people, everyone shaking to the soukous beat.
In previous years, Raine-Reusch stood stage right, whistle at the ready, directing each band like a traffic cop at a busy intersection. This year, Yeoh takes a more free-form approach. It’s chaotic and no one knows quite what to do, but as the confetti shoots over the audience, everyone – musicians and fans alike – is clearly having a blast.
I climb onto the stage as well and as I look out over the crowd, my thoughts turn to the coming year. I’ll miss the mountain and the music, but before I depart there’s the afterparty back at the hotel, where Mamadou Diabate pledges to play til dawn. The Brazilians and a French tuba player quickly join in. Every party, I think, should have West African drummers so that, as in the words of the warrior chanters, whether you come from upstream or downstream, we will ‘all have joy together’.
The woman in the water barely looks up. She’s one of a group, all wearing rudimentary diving masks and with eyes only for the ocean floor. They form an arc, about 500 metres from shore, and the one closest is intensely occupied with some strenuous-looking activity just below the surface. We pass close enough to get half a look at what she’s doing.
Underwater bagpipe playing is my best guess. Fortunately one of my boat buddies has been here for months and knows better. “They’re hunting for octopuses,” Fran explains. “Looks like she’s got one.”
Pondering the difficulty of such a hunt, which involves padding barefoot across a viciously jagged reef with little more than a stick for a weapon, I wave to the woman. She doesn’t wave back – unusual in Fiji, the most ridiculously friendly place I’ve ever stumbled upon in two-and-a-half decades of travel – but since her hands are engaged in an underwater life-or-death arm wrestle with an eight-limbed beast, I won’t hold it against her.
The skipper guns the engine and we head further along the coast, where forests of thick palms are punctuated periodically by a scrape of golden sand and a tussock of huts indicating a small village.
Skirting around a section of reef we encounter a man who appears to be levitating just above the water. On closer inspection I see he’s sitting on a kitchen chair attached precariously to a surfboard. He’s paddling this rickety contraption into deep water to go fishing, but pauses mid-stroke to wave.
For Fran and her partner Mike – program leaders with Vinaka Fiji, a voluntourism project based in the Yasawas – this is an everyday commute, but for me it’s a glimpse at real life within the island communities of Fiji.
We’re only a few hours by boat from the heavily visited islands around Viti Levu’s port of Denarau, but this feels a million miles from the scripted and sanitised version of Fiji I’ve seen many times in friends’ holiday photos. While thousands of holiday-makers annually flock to the Mamanuca Islands to enjoy neatly packaged, imagination-light, beach-based breaks, the slightly further flung Yasawa Islands offer the chance to explore a far less predictable, more exciting side of Fiji.
The Yasawa Flyer, a passenger-carrying catamaran, ferries travellers up and down the 20-island archipelago every day. Accommodation is still in lodges and resorts of varying sorts – rated via a coconut-based grading system (three coconuts being the best, one coconut the most basic) – but many of these are village owned and run, and because the islands are bigger and properly populated, there’s plenty of independent exploring to be done.
Here you can experience a genuine cultural exchange, particularly through Vinaka Fiji, which sees volunteers donate their time and expertise to help raise the standard of living, health and education of the local population. There are 27 villages sprinkled through the Yasawa Islands chain, and their residents all exist below the poverty line.
On our boat is Lorraine, a young schoolteacher from South London. For her summer holidays, rather than head to the beaches, clubs and pubs in places like Ayia Napa with her peers, she’s opted to volunteer here in a school and baby clinic. “It’s such a great way to experience a different culture from a unique perspective,” she says, before pointing out there are plenty of benefits to working in the Yasawas, even if you’re not being paid. Besides earning that warm fuzzy feeling of having contributed something to the community, the volunteers get to enjoy Barefoot Island alongside general guests. As well as the all-round idyllic nature of tropical-island life, these benefits include doorstep access to world-class diving and snorkelling, the chance to swim with manta rays almost daily and the opportunity to go night snorkelling, abseiling or sea kayaking whenever the urge arises. The bar is lively most nights, and the company is entertaining, whether you’re sipping kava with locals as the sun goes down, or trying your hand at Fiji Bitter–fuelled coconut bowling with a bunch of Scandinavian backpackers.
My trip began near the top of the archipelago, on Nacula Island. My bure at Nabua Lodge was a basic one-coconut affair, but Nacula’s Blue Lagoon delivers a truly sensational beach experience, with no crowds. I’m a restless beach bum, though, and far more interesting for me was a visit to Nacula Cave exploring limestone caverns, including one that’s only accessible via a leap of faith and a very dark swim through an underwater tunnel.
From there I’d holed up in a three-coconut joint at Botaira Beach Resort on Naviti Island, where, 10 metres from the door of my beachfront bure, I could plunge into some of the best reef snorkelling I’ve ever experienced. It was brilliant, but I’m eager to explore Yasawa life more deeply by the time I meet the Vinaka Fiji crew.
Arriving at Kese Village beach we leap into knee-deep, gin-clear water. At the local school, Vinaka Fiji volunteers have been busy building new facilities for the kids, including a playground that’s being noisily appreciated when we arrive.
Mike shows me around the village, where the project’s helping hand is apparent everywhere, from the installation of a huge rainwater collection tank to the planting of new trees. By the time we arrive back at the boat, school has finished for the day and the children are all at the beach, swimming and squealing under the late afternoon sun, with adults happily looking on. This place may be poor, but there’s no shortage of happiness.
During the boat trip back we see the women from earlier – now on dry land and each bashing the life out of an unfortunate octopus on the beach. They return my wave this time.
Over the following days we visit a number of villages along the coast, to participate in a mother-and-baby clinic on one occasion and to tour a secondary school hosting a sports day on another. Bouncing over the waves on the way back from one of these visits, Fran tells me about the wreck of a World War II plane that’s rumoured to lie on the seabed nearby. She and Mike are planning to dive down and explore it sometime soon. Now that’s a project I’d volunteer to be part of any day of the week.
In the meantime, however, we have a different diving mission to complete. Volunteering for Vinaka Fiji isn’t just about education and engineering projects – there’s also a fragile reef that needs protecting here, and one way to help out is by cleaning clams. Now I’m no marine biologist, but I’d always assumed clams could look after their own personal hygiene, but Dan, Barefoot’s resident divemaster (who is a marine biologist), corrects me. These particular molluscs have just been reintroduced to the region, he explains. Their great skill is the ability to process thousands of litres of water a day as they filter feed.
This voracious appetite for brine soup makes clams ideal frontline warriors in the fight against the dreaded crown-of-thorns starfish, which releases millions of eggs every day. Because they reproduce by the gazillion and leave a trail of devastation across reefs wherever they go, crown-of-thorns are persona non grata around here.
To protect them from predators, young clams are kept in cages, meaning they can’t be cleaned by fish. That’s why, armed with an old toothbrush, I find myself in scuba gear kneeling on the seabed at about five metres, scrubbing baby shellfish.
When the job is done, I have plenty of gas left to go and explore. As I drop another eight metres, a sunken boat suddenly looms into view. Unusually for a wreck, this one’s story has a happy ending. It’s known as the Wobbegong and inside it are the program’s success stories: mature clams, all busily chomping on starfish eggs.
The Dive Shop – run by Reef Safari, which owns Barefoot Island – plays an active part in the Vinaka Fiji program, and numerous dives are conducted specifically for the purpose of exterminating crown-of-thorns starfish. But there’s plenty of pure pleasure diving here too, including an impressive shark dive.
One morning, during an exploratory dive, we completely circumnavigate a small island while underwater. This plus a dive at the Caves of Babylon that features multiple swim-throughs are among the best bubble-blowing experiences I’ve ever had, but it’s an encounter that takes place above water that lingers with me longest.
We’re hovering over our dive site in the manta channel as a boat speeds past. Our skipper extends a wave and the guy standing at the front waves back.
Something is wrong with this picture though, and it takes me a few seconds to work it out. The driver of the boat has his face completely covered by a shirt and a pair of sunglasses. It lends him the look of a smuggler. As it turns out, that’s exactly what he is.
“They’re illegally diving for sea cucumbers,” Kenny, the Fijian divemaster, explains. “It’s a big problem here. They stay down too long – up to three hours! They don’t know what they’re doing. I visit villages all the time and these guys are out of their heads.”
It seems the marine animals are destined for Asia. Rumour has it a ship sits offshore with refrigeration facilities for the haul, supplying untrained divers with tanks and paying them big cash for cucumbers.
There have been many deaths among young guys in the villages – one the week before I arrived – and Reef Safari is sending its staff into the schools to educate kids about the dangers of diving without proper training and equipment.
According to divemaster Dan, the area is about to be declared a marine park and protected, but it’s unclear how effectively it could be policed. If it were up to me, I’d send in the octopus huntresses to deal with the poachers – they don’t take any prisoners.
With bugs teeming in the humidity, it’s no surprise these protein-packed slippery suckers have wound up in sizzling oil and on the plates of hungry Yunnanese.
I pluck my next victim from the pile. Its skin crunches under my teeth, leaving just an empty husk. I wash it down with a swig of Kingstar. This amateur foodie has arrived in the real China.
Ditching greasy memories of sweet and sour pork and noodles slick in cardboard boxes, I find myself in Xishuangbanna in the south of the Yunnan Province. Far from Guangzhou and its sugar-swamped Cantonese cuisine, China’s so-called utopia is a land where salt and sour reign supreme.
Home to the Dai people, Xishuangbanna lures Chinese tourists with its muggy climate and the promise of elephants romping through tropical rainforest. To foreigners though, this ‘Amazon of the East’ remains a little-known lick of land, dipping between Myanmar and Laos.
Keen to sink my teeth into the local culture, I join a cooking class run by Mi Wei An, the head Dai chef at Anantara Xishuangbanna Resort & Spa. Like any culinary journey, the class starts at the source: the local market in Menglun. Mi Wei An grew up nearby, learning to make traditional food with her neighbours before Anantara persuaded her to nourish their guests.
At the market we exchange faded cash for a handful of yangmei, Chinese strawberries the size of lychees, with skin like a cat’s tongue. I scalp a rambutan, rubbing its waxy hair between my fingers as I munch on the translucent flesh.
“Without herbs there is no Dai food,” a cook translates, while Mi Wei An describes the local fare. They point out a tangle of fragrant herbs on a table next to bulging melons and vegetables with tongue-twisting names.
The Dai minority is one of 56 recognised ethnic groups in China, and Mi Wei An explains that there are three types of Dai, each linked to their local environment. “There’s one that’s very close to the Han people, the main Chinese, and then another Dai lives in the mountain,” she says. This second group is known as the Huayao Dai. Our chef hails from the third: the Shui Dai, or Water Dai. “They’re living very closely beside the water, the river.”
The prominence of water spills into their cuisine. My first Dai dish was strewn with moss plucked from the river, dried and pounded into sheets and then barbecued. But I can’t see any of this popular and surprisingly tasty snack at the market.
Chatter wafts behind loaves of pig’s blood and men hack at meat, their cleavers thumping into wood. A butcher heaves pork belly onto a metal dish and I salivate remembering the morsels I ate in Guangzhou. The best pork belly is said to have five layers of alternating flesh and fat topped with crispy skin. The Cantonese dunk theirs in sugar – a finale our chef would dismiss with a grimace.
I pass a flock of leathery birds, gutted, splayed and skewered. With heads and legs still intact, they look like prostrate bats. At the next stall I paw a parcel of glutinous rice. Wrapped in banana leaf, the patty is one of the few sweets made by the locals. Our guide tells me they’re traditionally eaten at Dai New Year in April. After a nibble I suspect this bundle’s hung around since last year’s celebrations.
Back at the hotel, we muster at our cooking stations overlooking the rust-coloured Lancang River, the northern arm of the Mekong, and a fitting backdrop for a Water Dai feast. Fishermen wade in the shallows as we set to work.
For entrée we prepare a pork rib, basil and winter melon broth. My shoulders tinge pink as I dart between shaded stovetops, comparing the clarity of each broth and the texture of the melon. Our concoctions pale compared to Mi Wei An’s, and as she samples my soup she suggests shovelling in more salt than I’d normally dare ingest.
Locals source their salt from a village in the mountains. Although they use a lot, it never goes to waste, Mi Wei An says as she tosses a pinch into her pot.
Next we whip up a shredded chicken salad with tongue-numbing basil. The meat is bland and dry until we crush seasoned lime juice into the flesh with our fists. The battered dish croons with flavour.
We barbecue long, firm eggplants, the purple skin morphing to yellow then golden brown. I gobble the creamy flesh mixed with mint, coriander, chilli and garlic. Strips of ganba (dried beef) hit the flames before we marry the salted, slow-dried rump with a blend of local herbs in a marathon mortar and pestle mash.
Preoccupied with the first four courses, I’m blind to the brewing clouds. As rain lashes the deck, the umbrellas offer little protection from the plump, tropical drops. It’s no wonder Xishuangbanna claims China’s crown for biodiversity. Lightning slices into the botanical gardens across the river and cooks swarm, whisking chillies, chopping boards and stoves inside.
This warm, volatile climate keeps the region alive. Each family grows herbs outside their bamboo stilt houses, and many forage for honey and the mushrooms that thrive in the hills. “If we get snow here, we get hungry,” a local explains. “No food.”
In true Dai style, our feast shuns sugar bar the boluo fan, glutinous rice with clandestine slithers of sweet pineapple, a staple dish of Dai gastronomy, which Mi Wei An serves as a delicious side to stir-fried lemongrass beef and banana flower salad.
Later I head into town for a late-night snack. A round of baijiu (white liquor) melts some space in my stomach and I graze from the street stalls that have sprung up at the entrance of the market. I chew a curl of fried cowhide and raise my beer with a group of local girls, who, between giggles, welcome us to Menlung. Xishuangbanna is a gourmet’s paradise, and Dai food sure hits the sweet spot.
INGREDIENTS
300g glutinous rice (black if possible)
1 medium-sized ripe pineapple
50–100g sugar
METHOD
Rinse the rice and soak it in water overnight. Strain rice and steam for 30–40 minutes, until cooked. Scoop the flesh from the pineapple with a spoon, leaving the skin as a bowl. Chop the pineapple meat, discarding the core. Mix the cooked rice, chopped pineapple and sugar together. Steam again for around 15 minutes. Fill the pineapple shell with the mixture, and serve.
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