During my last few months at college I decided to take some time off, away from the UK and explore the other side of the world for the first time.
It all began when I started researching books in the library on foreign travel and the options available for a person like myself.
Found an organisation in Melbourne, Australia that can organise volunteering work anywhere in the world, so I joined up and they found me a place on various conservation projects, starting in Fiji, then on both islands of New Zealand.
Once I had all of this sorted out, I flew out to Fiji in November, what an amazing place this was for a 20 year old who had never left Europe before !
I arrived a week early to find my way around and chill out before the project started.
The first time I met an Indian Fijian was down at the beach, we got chatting and me invited me to meet his family, so off I went, they all seemed very friendly, in the teepee house on the beach.
He said he would like to make dinner and asked me to choose one of his chicken to kill for dinner, when I saw the machete alarm bells were ringing, so I made my excuses and left !!
This project took me and a group of volunteers deep into the Fijian rainforest to meet the villagers who had never seen white people, the little children touched our skin when we arrived and the excitement in the village was something I had never experienced before, it was like another world….
Well it was another world, very different from the world than I knew anyway.
I stayed in a few different villages in the rainforest helping to construct walking trails through virgin rainforest high in the mountains, this was an amazing experience for me working as a group with the local villagers using machetes to cut through the dense tropical plants, vines. It was hot, wet and very muddy, hanging onto the vines to prevent us sliding down into the unknown. We were all given water containers and food to take every day which consisted of breadfruit, fruit, rice, etc, the local south pacific islander food.
As a big hurricane was forecast our boss arrived at the village and explained the situation, we had to be evacuated immediately, so it was sad to say goodbye to the villagers and off we went back to Fiji town for safety.
As the wind outside got stronger and stronger we began to see the seriousness of the situation, we were told not to open any windows or doors or the roof would be blown away, so we were on lockdown for a few days.
Outside the tops of the tall palm trees were bent all the way over with the strong winds, the pressure was such we could feel the house under strain, it was a scary few days but we were all safe, so that’s what matters.
In the main town, ‘Nadi’ local salesman try and sell you anything at all, they are very good at it, I’ll never forget one technique they used, you write down a price then I write down a price.. Well the price I wrote down was pretty low, when he saw it he was almost in tears !! I did buy something cheap just to help him out, the Fijian Indian population most are quite poor.
From here I flew onto Auckland, NZ where another project started up in the north of the island near to the bay of islands, which is a beautiful area.
Here I was with some a German guy, 2 girls from the UK, 1 older guy from USA and a French guy, we were on an isolated part of the island taking part in various conservation work. It was pretty cool as I was the tractor driver as nobody else could drive one.. We spent new years eve here where we borrowed a rowing boat to get to a small community party in the village up the river. Think the locals were surprised to see us !
From here I did similar conservation work at a National Trust property in the south where I also had my 21st, the owners put on a party for me, was very good.
We also made the local paper here where they were very interested in us volunteering here, we had a photo and write up about us all.
After this finished, decided to try hitchhiking further south and stay with some friends I met, this was a really enjoyable experience, saving me some money along the way too.
This first trip really gave me the travel bug, once home again, all I could think about is where to go next !!
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