TRAVERSE 179
TRAVEL- FIJI
LEIGH WILKINS
THE ROAD TO A BETTER PLACE
We’ d barely made it ten minutes out of Nadi when the traffic thinned, the buildings faded, and the soundscape shifted from the urban cacophony of honking horns and industrial units to the rhythmic chorus of insects and the occasional guttural bark of a roadside dog. The last sight was a tour bus lurching into a resort carpark, packed with sunburned visitors wielding cameras and cocktails. That was the Fiji most people came for. But it wasn’ t the Fiji we were here to find.
Personally, I hadn’ t been looking for day spas, swim-up bars, or canned firewalking shows. I wanted something real, something dustier, rawer, more human. Afterall, isn’ t that the real reason for travel? To explore the at times uncomfortable, to learn more about oneself rather than the price of a king-sized bed or sugary alcohol drink? I wanted to ride beyond the billboard slogans and brochure gloss. So, I threw a leg over a provided 250cc GasGas, pulled the straps on my backpack tight, and pointed the front wheel away from the sea. Four of us riding into a new challenge and an exploration away from the tourist traps.
The bike wasn’ t glamorous, despite being regarded as one of the best of its kind. It wheezed slightly under acceleration, more to do with the heft of an adventure rider and not someone built like a whippet through years of enduro riding. I laughed to myself at the absurdity of it, an under-sized bike with an oversized rider. But the bike was built tough perfect for the conditions, and it didn’ t care about potholes or the state of the road. And that’ s exactly what we needed, because beyond the sugarcane belt, the roads aren’ t paved with tourist dollars. They’ re chiselled out of clay and gravel, washed out in places, barely marked on a map. But that’ s where Fiji gets
TRAVERSE 179