It took us 36 hours of straight travel by train, plane, and boat to reach Uepi. First, we had to undo everything we did to get to Koyasan, after the 6 am service. We went down the cable car, took several trains, then switched to the subway before boarding the bullet train to Tokyo airport. This probably sounds more complicated than it is. Although there are a lot of train connections, the path to Koyasan is well traveled - you are given a list of transfers and the trains are all timed so that you don't stand around waiting. It just took a long time to complete the circuit back to Tokyo. You can see the bullet train we took back to Tokyo below, there is a reason they call it a bullet train, that is one of the fastest rides either of us has ever taken on land.
Then we had a 9 hour overnight flight from Tokyo to Brisbane, Australia. From there you take a plane to Honiara, the capital of the Solomon Islands. (For those of you interested in history, Honiara Airport is the site of the airstrip that was fought over so viciously between Japan and the U.S. During WWII. The name of the island then was Guadacanal. - Scott).
Customs was cleared, then we had to drag our baggage 10 minutes down a dirt road to a small tin shed to make the connection to Seghe Island. The plane was a very small bush plane with 20 seats (see above). After dropping some people off at Gatoke Island, we landed on a short grass strip at Seghe. The island basically contains a grass runway, a boat dock and tin hut, and that's it. The runway is surrounded by the ocean just feet from either end. This makes for an interesting landing. Finally, we took a 30 minute speed boat trip with several other couples to reach Uepi Island.
Uepi is a very small island; it really only contains the resort, which consists of a large gazebo containing the bar and dining room, a small dive shop, boat docks, and individual guest bungalows. The rest of the island is jungle, which can be easily walked via trails. They offer kayaking, diving, snorkeling, hiking, volleyball, crab sighting walks, manta ray snorkels, shark feeds, and day trips to a local village. Anything you could want in a tropical vacation. (There is also a reptile population here. You can see the Solomon Island Boa that was on the path in front of our bungalow the first night. The picture isn't great, he was a bright red, and kinda cute. - Scott)
It was very strange coming back here. I took a tropical marine biology course 7 years ago during college that took place both here and in Fiji. The palm trees and ocean views are just as I remember them. The resort and it's welcoming owners, Jill and Grant, look almost exactly the same, if a bit older. I tell people all the time how wonderful Uepi is, and I don't quite know what it is about this place that makes it so much better than everywhere else. The diving and scenery are spectacular and the food is of gourmet quality. We will see how the diving in the Great Barrier Reef compares to Uepi in a week, when we go to Australia. I suspect Uepi will still be the best. I will let Scott describe the diving to you, since he sees it with the fresh eyes of a new diver. All I can say about Uepi is that it is a hidden paradise that is well worth the journey. -Anna
No comments:
Post a Comment