ARCHIVES: SOUTH PACIFIC

AN ISLAND WITH AN INFAMOUS HISTORY: Pitcairn Island, South Pacific
In 1790, English sailors staged a mutiny on the board the ship 'HMS Bounty'. They found a safe hideout on Pitcairn Island. After being settled by mutineers, the island’s early history was bloody, with many feuds and violent deaths. Now Pitcairn Island is peaceful and its fifty families, many of them descendants of that infamous Bounty crew, welcome visitors to their idyllic tropical home.

SAILING THE SEPIK RIVER: Papua New Guinea
It was as if we were floating among the stars. They sparkled above me in the sky, and gleamed alongside me in the deep black water. It was 4am, and we were travelling by dug-out canoe down the mighty Sepik River of Papua New Guinea. I had to pinch myself to be sure that it was real.

LAND OF THE UNEXPECTED: Papua New Guinea
If you want to be transported into another world visit Papua New Guinea. From the town site of beautiful Madang, palm trees sway in the warm breeze, and turquoise waves lap on the beaches of deserted islands. It is literally a scene from Robinson Crusoe.

SIGATOKA RIVER - SAFARI TO FIJIAN VILLAGE: The Fiji Islands
The 120 kilometre Sigatoka River flows between the central and western mountain ranges to the coast of Viti Levu, the largest of Fiji’s 333 islands. It is the major means of transportation to this part of the island’s interior. Emerald hills of lush tropical growth and shimmering marble cliffs that had seemingly been sliced by a mighty sculptor’s tool pass us by.

HAWAII’S COWBOY COUNTRY - HISTORIC PARKER RANCH: The Big Island, Hawaii
Surprising to many, Hawaiians were raising cattle long before their mainlander counterparts. Even today, four of the USA’s twenty biggest ranches flourish on the Big Island. So signing on for a cattle country tour, my hubby and I check out Parker Ranch, Hawaii’s oldest and largest.

STROLLING LEVUKA - FIJI'S HERITAGE CAPITAL: Levuka, Fiji
With her extraordinary past still harkening to the 1800's, Levuka snuggles on Ovalau Island's eastern side, just ten air-minutes off Fiji's mainland. Once the South Pacific's lawless 'black birding' center and popular with sailors, whalers and sandalwood traders, Levuka is easily Fiji's most picturesque town today.

TRADITIONAL BOAT BUILDING: Lessons In Environmental & Cultural Preservation in the South Pacific
My husband, Isaac Bingham won a Watson Fellowship to fund a year-long project titled Savants of the Sea: Boat Building on Two Sides of the Pacific. Although I am not a boat builder by trade, I was overjoyed participate in the project.

CELEBRATING THE ARTS & CULTURE: Maui, Hawaii
At Maui’s most Hawaiian hotel, the Ka’anapali Beach Hotel, Lahaina, Mike White, the enthusiastic general manager has encouraged his staff to participate in Project Po’okela (excellence), which stresses the importance of knowledge and pride in Hawaiian Culture and provides hospitality, helpfulness, respect and honesty, giving visitors an enriched vacation experience.

SURVIVING CYCLONE NARGIS: Mayanmar
When dawn broke, the gardens were a spectacle of utter devastation: royal palms chopped in half; bougainvillea trellises collapsed into the swimming pool; hundreds of ridge tiles shooting off the roofs and crashing into the pool and as far as the lake. The lake itself appeared through the dawn like an ocean, with waves streaking across it as the cyclone circled overhead.