Talofa Samoa!

Adriana and had I planned a mini-holiday within our Australian trip, and on New Year’s Day we flew from Melbourne to Apia, the capital of Independent Samoa (formerly Western Samoa, and yes that’s different to American Samoa).  Because of the Date Time Line we actually arrived JUST after midnight on New Year’s Eve – almost got to do it all again!  We made our way to our hotel and got to bed late.  The next day we walked into town to explore Apia and found the place completely dead because of the public holiday and the fact it was also a Sunday.

Getting on our plane in Sydney – it was a stinking hot 45 degrees Celcius on New Years Day there!

There’s not much to see in Apia so we made plans to travel across to the larger (and less touristy)island of Savai’i the next day.  We caught the ferry across and then crammed onto a Samoan bus to get to our destination: the beach town of Manase.