I’m actually meant to be in holiday mode, here in Fiji with my mum, who turned 80 this year, and another 14 of us aged down to four years.
But here I am blogging, because since 2009 that’s what I do when I travel! I may not (update: did not) get this published while in Fiji, but I am taking notes and photos and below is a practical guide to how to do one of these big family holidays without blowing apart!
Haven't got time to finish this post now?
Save it for later and I'll email it to you!
What you’re going to read here are my first impressions and honest review. We all paid our own way, so I can tell you what I think is good value – and what isn’t!
Because, did you know that most of the travel articles you read in magazines and newspapers are from writers who were hosted by the destinations or the properties? Sometimes they declare that, sometimes they don’t. Even when travel agents are shown around properties, they’re not shown the “tired” parts of the resort, or walked through the buffet restaurant at feeding time – I did all of that!
Why Shangri La?
We picked the Shangri La Resort on the Coral Coast after a recommendation my sister got from a taxi driver when she and her husband visited last year. My niece (mother of three aged 9, 7 and 4) also had friends who’d stayed and recommended it for the type of holiday we wanted.
We wanted things for all ages, from four to 80. We wanted a good beach for swimming, activities at the resort and a choice of dining options.
First impression: it’s huge! It holds over 1000 guests and has more than 500 staff. There are at least seven restaurants, and breakfast is included, plus kids under 11 eat free with a paying adult at three of the family restaurants.
There are two adults-only ones. We have learned which restaurants we like and which we don’t. We lovingly called our least fave, the very large Lagoon Terrace buffet, the Chook Bucket, and only needed to visit once to know we won’t be going back! (Update: the small families also ate there on the last night as the kids were tired and there’s something for every fussy eater).
This a massive buffet restaurant with more kids than would fit into an entire school. It buzzed all my senses, but is ideal if you have picky eaters who just want to return for the same item 15 times, or you just want to be in and done and off to bed.
The next day we found a smaller buffet restaurant for breakfast, Takali, and that has been our family go-to since. Although I admit that hubby and I deserted the whanau on a couple of mornings in favour of an adults-only brekky restaurant (Golden Cowrie) for a more tranquil experience. It’s still self-serve buffet, but all have egg stations for omelets or eggs how you like them.
Costs: for adults at the buffet it was FJ$109 for dinner, and as I said above kids eat free. Maybe that makes it worthwhile for those with young families, but I personally didn’t think it was good value at that price for the rest of us.
The Beach Bar and Grill is located at the main beach, beside the swimming pool and has an a la carte menu. We shared fish and chips for lunch and at FJ$38, thought that was very reasonable. This is also a good option if you check in later and need dinner before bed.
You can also order food from here and have it delivered to you on the beach. Kids’s boxes like nuggets and fries, or a wood-fired pizza.
What are the rooms like?
The resort is about 50 years old and used be The Fijian. It has been tastefully designed and rooms in 2019 underwent a US$50 million refurbishment. The colour palette is neutral, beige and dark wood. It’s nice.
The beds are very comfy and the pillows so good I liked them better than mine at home. (Note: I looked up buying one online – $225, and I think that might have been USD as it was on Shangri La.com).
All rooms have sea views, a patio (ground floor), or balcony. It sprawls around its own island, so there are various different beaches depending on where you are.
We are not really near each other, spread over two buildings of six in the Ocean wing, but it’s worked ok as we have a Whats App group using the free hotel Wifi (which is temperamental), and arrange meet ups – especially around happy hour venues!
Two families had booked the Ocean Grand Deluxe categories and we’d requested interconnecting rooms. Most rooms had interconnecting doors, but the resort could not guarantee this.
It actually caused quite a lot of stress, which I think could have been mitigated if they had better systems. We’d booked eleven months before and the ages of the children (9, 7 and 4) meant we couldn’t have them in a separate room.
The other family had children aged 17 (who the resort did not recognise as a child so we had to book a second room) and 10.
The young family got the adjoining room upon check in (phew), but even three days before we arrived they wouldn’t confirm the adjoining room (again, systems), with the second family moving out of the room on one side and into the other the the next day to adjoin. They wanted to be together as it’s more fun, but weren’t worried about their kids being alone.
The rooms on one wing got amazing towel art from their cleaners, alas over on my side we did not 🙁
How do you get to Shangri La?
Located about an hour and a half away from Nadi, you can arrange a transfer with the resort directly – and pay resort prices. Or you can look into other transport companies.
My sister had met someone from Epic Tours on her last visit so we used them for our transfer to the resort, as they were more affordable than the resort and allowed us to stop at a supermarket on the way to stock up on our mixers to go with our Duty Free!
However, while staying, we came upon Coral Coast Transfers and Tours, and they undercut every quote we got on car rental, taxi rides and airport transfers by at least $20.
Getting around
Once you’re at the Shangri La, you can book various tours. They have a tours desk to take you on school visits, zip lining, jet boating, a Sigatoka visit, or whole day trips combining most of the above.
We rented a car from Coral Coast Transfers for FJ$250 for one day. Yes, it’s super expensive! But Avis didn’t have a 7-seater available, although they were the same price. As a comparison, I rent 7-seaters in Rarotonga for under $100 per day including insurance). See below for our day out.
Resort activities
An inflatable water park sits about 100m off the high tide line and is open to anyone over the age of 7 years. Life jackets are required, so you collect those from a beach hut, and that helps to restrict the numbers of kids and adults climbing all over them. My sister bravely swam out with two nieces and proceeded to spend the entire time on her bum I think!
Afternoon sports games. Our four-year old, Milo, heard that soccer was being played each afternoon and woe betide his parents if they didn’t get him there. He was Lionel Messi, and got in the thick of the action, sans shoes, getting knocked down and getting up again, until the game ended.
In fact he joined in every game that the wonderful Activities Director, Mali, organised including touch rugby. Pretty soon chants of “go Milo” were heard before we could even see him.
A few dads joined in, but as we were after the main school holidays, it was mainly little kids – although Milo was the youngest – and two or three of the resort staff refereeing, and playing.
Pool volleyball is a daily event too, with designated kids standing beside a hoop across the width of the pool to pop the ball in.
For quieter or rainy day activities, there is a kid’s room where things like tie-dye T-shirts and weaving happen. In the early evenings there was a kids disco. They also have some VR goggles and a VR simulator ride that can take four at a time. All these cost extra.
For adults there is a day spa over in the Adults’ Only wing. A 90-minute relaxation is about FJ$230 (NZ$176, US$105). So international prices. Out by the main beach is a outdoor massage hut where an hour’s massage is FJ$89.
For free there are kayaks and SUP boards. You can rent jet skis, and they have an inflatable waterpark which anyone over 7 years can use. You need to swim out to it and life jackets are required, which limits the number that can be on it at any one time. We had much hilarity with this. I’m reliably informed by sister that it’s not as easy as it looks! Because, no I was sitting on a lounger on the beach with a Corona.
Spa
Chapel for weddings
Nine-hole golf
Putt putt
Cultural dinner
Things to know before you go
What can you bring in from outside?
Beach toys like inflatable rings and flamingos, the odd giraffe… In fact my niece saw the cleaning staff on one morning who had three inflatable donuts a previous guest had left behind, so asked if we could have them. Sure!
Alcohol. We brought in wine packed carefully in our suitcases. Fiji alcohol limits are super generous so it worked out we could bring in three bottles of wine and three spirits each! We did not. We bought spirits in Auckland duty free, and on our transfer to the resort we stopped at a supermarket for mixers.
Snacks. We also brought in cheese and crackers. Just make sure the cheese is made from pasteurised milk. Our fave Danish Castello is therefore off limits.
Potato chips don’t travel well, but are frightfully expensive. A $3 bag of salted Bluebird chips is about $8 here at a local store.
When using ATMs you’ll be charged FJ$15 per transaction at the Westpac machines, and $10 at BSP. Consequently the lines to the BSP in Sigatoka were long. This one is the ATM at the resort.
Rent a car for a day
Our smart 7-seater Voxy arrived at 9am the next morning and armed with a vague idea that we’d head off to Sigatoka village, and a large folding a map that the resort provided (you can’t beat a paper map for looking at where you might want to head), we drove out the gates to the shouts of “bula” from the security team, turned right and followed our noses for a few hours.
Husband, me, mum, two nieces and a great-niece, bombing along the one main road that would take us to either Nadi in one direction or Suva in the other. We weren’t going as far as Suva (about a two-hour drive away).
Libby (niece one) had cleverly downloaded a driving map that didn’t require wifi for GPS, as it’s a bit patchy out here. She spotted a place with sand dunes, but we’d passed it by the time we saw it, so we said we’d stop in on the way back. Oops, passed it again.
Where to go from Shangri La
Sigatoka is about 30 minutes away, but we didn’t put the foot down as the village life en route was so interesting. Great for our younger ones to see the washing hanging on clotheslines in front of ramshackled houses. Cows and horses tied along the roadside. Sugar cane growing in the fields.
Sigatoka is a market town beside the winding Sigatoka River. Known as Fiji’s “Salad Bowl” for its fertile fields, we browsed the colourful produce market, shopped for souvenirs, got a delicious iced coffee in a cafe, and the 7-year old, got two braids in her hair for $1 each. In fact even I got one! (Yes, mutton was dressed as lamb that day).
The Sigatoka Sand Dunes, it turns out, are impressive and you can visit on a tour, or just pay $10 per adult to enter the national park if you have a car. You can boogie-board down them, leap down them, photograph them, and learn about this site which is home to , pottery villages, river safaris and beautiful beaches.
Kula Adventure Park is about 40 minutes towards Suva from Shangri La, opposite the Outrigger Resort, which my husband and I have stayed at before. We did a reccy here and one of the families got a taxi (details below) and spent a few hours here a couple of days later. They have reptiles you can hold; snakes, iguanas. Water slides and a zip line, all set in lush bush.
Crab Shack for lunch was a wonderful treat. It’s located beside the Outrigger Resort (where I stayed for my 50th birthday and wrote about here), with picnic tables outside on the lawn on the edge of the beach.
Natadola (pronounced Natandola – with a sneaky n) Beach is one of the loveliest in the area. The Intercontinental Hotel is located on it, but as we were not guests, and Libby had found the “scenic route”, we bumped and turned over a mainly dirt road, even across a dry river bed, and found ourselves alongside the resort between that and Yatule Resort.
And as luck would have it, there were a few massage huts on the beach with lovely ladies hoping we’d indulge. So indulge we did. Thirty minutes for FJ$30, or 60 for $60. Hubby and I went into one hut for couples, lying on the table laden with towels. The face hole was a little wiffy, but she sprayed some nice scent around and I chose my attitude and got into it!
Libby had a lady in the next room, although as the sides were open between us, it wouldn’t really have mattered. Only back, neck and shoulders so lying on our fronts the whole time. I’d absolutely go back again.
Libby then had a swim in the beautiful beach and made inquiries about renting a surf board the next day ($50 for an hour), and ended up having a crazy experience in a local taxi and a ride back with the masseuse! You can also go horse riding from here.
School visits
One of the things I really wanted to do was take resources and gifts to a local school. There are school visit tours you can book through the resort, but in our case I had been liaising with the head teacher at Nadroumai school, on the introduction of Shangri La resort staff.
I wanted to see if we could visit a school that doesn’t get all the spoils, one that the tourists don’t go on tours to.
So after learning what types of classroom resources they needed, and with an extra suitcase packed with everything from paints to reams of paper, pencils, scissors, books, stickers and posters, we arranged transport with the resort to visit the 89-pupil Nadromai School.
Only about five kilometres away, it took about 20-minutes to get there as the dirt road was so bumpy. Deep into the interior where kids come from villages hours away. Some board here, some come as day pupils.
They were expecting us at recess and the teachers had prepared some refreshments. It was absolutely wonderful. The children all filed into one classroom and sat on the mat, while we were asked to sit on a row of chairs in front of them. So eight of us aged from 7 to 80, gave out gifts as teachers called out children to come and receive them on behalf of the school.
Their most famous pupils are New Zealand All Black and Sevens player Waisake Naholo and his brother Kini Naholo, who was born in Fiji and went to school at Hastings Boys High School, NZ, and who played rugby on this field behind me (photo below).
