Ono Island, Fiji

Transit day to Ono Island!

We were up early at 5:30am (although part of that was jetlag) to finish our packing, have breakfast, checkout, and take a taxi through morning rush hour to the airport.

The domestic terminal is rather small with only six check-in counters. We had about 90 minutes to our flight and used the airport wifi to catch up on news and post to our blog.

Finally time to board! It was a twin prop seating about 18, about 2/3rds full. We saw Heather’s suitcase in the luggage compartment as we boarded. The co-pilot gave the safety spiel in person (no intercom) and then we were off.

We flew over Nadi Town before turning south to Kadavu. It was a super smooth 45 minute flight. The greens and blues of the reefs and ocean were amazing, the journey here really is part of the experience.

We touched down, went about half way down the runway that spanned the island before taxiing back to the terminal.

Watched the luggage guy unload the plane (took him two loads on his cart) and then met up with the Oneta folks. There were a couple other passengers on the flight also staying at Oneta, Stefanie and Clint (both from the US).

We waded out to the boat, navigated the coral near shore and then sped off east to Ono Island, following the coast. There’s not many roads in Kadavu, the main form of transport is boat. We passed by pristine beaches with palm trees and volcanic boulders, picture perfect. We were lucky with the weather, almost zero wind which made for a very smooth boat ride (being inside the Astrolabe Reef also helped).

Stopped at a random beach and had a yummy lunch under a dilo tree.

Another hour in the boat and we arrived at Oneta. The staff serenaded us as we approached (everyone here has beautiful voices). Had a fresh coconut while Richard (the manager) gave his spiel.

Based on pics on Oneta’s website and visitor pics on tripadvisor I was expecting the place to be a bit rustic. It’s the exact opposite. It was mostly rebuilt from scratch after the cyclone in 2020, and now looks amazing. The manager, Richard, said the owners don’t want the place getting too popular so they just have these old pics still on their website.

Our bure is up a few dozen stairs, with an amazing view of the nearby islands and the Astrolabe Reef in the distance. The resort is on the east side of Ono Island so we’ll get great sunrises. The entire resort is connected by raised boardwalks, so barefeet is fine.

We had time for a quick snorkel in the house reef to test out our gear (we had bought snorkel masks and fins). There wasn’t much to see (the cyclone wiped out most of their coral) but it was rather refreshing.

Showered and then headed down for a drink before dinner. By ‘shower’ I mean an outdoor shower surrounded by beautiful tropical plants, including two banana trees with actual bananas. It’s one of the nicest outdoor showers I’ve seen.

The main dining area catches the breeze coming off the ocean and is really pleasant, even in the heat.

It turned out that we (me & Heather, plus Stefanie and Clint) were the only guests that night. (The resort can handle up to 18 guests). There’s some more guests arriving over the next few days.

Dinner was excellent. After dinner, Richard went through his suggested activities for the next day (manta rays and then two snorkel sites). We were all tired from the journey here and so we turned in early, around 8:30pm.