BSAC TRAVEL CLUB - Trip Reports

TRAVEL CLUB

Coconuts Beach Resort Samoa

Samoa is a group of volcanic islands in the South Pacific. They lie about 15º south of the equator, to the northeast of Fiji and Tonga, and to the northwest of the Cook Islands and French Polynesia .
Samoa was divided politically at the beginning of the 20th century, when various European nations were trying to establish control over the islands. The eastern part of the group accepted protection from the USA, and remains American Samoa to this day. The western part became a German colony until WW1, when New Zealand took control on behalf of the UK. Western Samoa gained independence in 1962, and formally changed its name to Independent Samoa in 1998. Independent Samoa consists mainly of two large islands, Savai'i and Upolu.

The climate is tropical - hot and humid. The islands receive between 2 and 5 metres of rain a year, but most of it falls at night. The dry season is in winter from May to October. The islands lie in the cyclone belt, and there is a risk of tropical revolving storms during the summer between November and April.

My wife Jen and I spent a week on Upolu in late February/early March 2002. The weather was good and the sea was calm. Our visit was a stopover on our return from a six week trip to New Zealand, so the timing was determined by wanting to be in NZ during their summer.

Money
The currency is the Tala. When we were there the exchange rate was about 4.7 Tala to one pound sterling. In November 2004 it's about 5.0, reflecting the weakness of the US dollar, to which the Tala is linked. We also visited nearby Rarotonga in 2002, where the NZ dollar is used. Three years later, inflation aside, the pound is worth 22% less there, but 6% more in Samoa. . This illustrates how much changing exchange rates can affect the cost of your holiday. It's worth thinking about when planning your trips. If it's a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity then you must go to the place you've been dreaming about. But if you have a long wish list of places to work through during your life, scheduling visits according to where the pound is currently strongest could save a lot of money over the years.

There were no ATMs in Samoa when we were there, but that may have changed. It wasn't a problem since we paid for most things by credit card. US dollars are widely accepted.

Flights
Air New Zealand and Polynesian Airways are the only two operators who fly between Australia/New Zealand, Samoa, and the USA. There are a few small airlines that fly between Samoa and various other island groups in the south pacific. We used Air New Zealand for our flights between NZ and the UK, and it only cost another £100 or so to add on two Pacific stopovers, of which this was one. Air New Zealand also calls at Fiji, Tonga, Rarotonga, and Tahiti. We've had quite a few flights with them, and have no complaints. Flying the trans-Atlantic/Pacific route gives you a huge baggage allowance of 64kg each. The downside is having to change planes in Los Angeles and go though US immigration complete with all your baggage, for some unfathomable reason. On this occasion, we bought the flights through Bridge the World, who were marginally cheaper than Trailfinders. Shop around.

We carried pony cylinders, empty and valves open, in our checked baggage all the way from the UK to NZ and back without any problems. Since our trip the US has changed its rules (several times) and currently you can take empty cylinders in checked or carry on baggage but the valve must be removed. Some US divers report successfully transporting cylinders without removing valves, but you have been warned.

We flew Auckland to Apia on Upolo, with a brief stop in Tonga. The only problem with this flight is that you cross the international dateline, arriving around midnight. In our case it meant that we left NZ on a Monday and arrived on a Monday, which makes a mess of your diary!

Upolo
The island is about 50 miles long and 15 miles wide. The population is about 120,000. Outside the towns and villages the landscape is about half and half rainforest and plantation. Inland there are caves, forest walks, and waterfalls . At the coast there are idyllic palm-fringed beaches, and mangrove forests. The local people are laid-back and friendly.

We rented an air-conditioned jeep for a day and drove around the eastern half of the island. It cost about £25. The main roads are metalled and pretty good. We also explored down a few tracks, eventually meeting a steep loose one with a drop into the sea one side and a rock face on the other. At that point I bottled out and reversed back. We saw plenty of interesting villages and local life, quite unspoiled, exotic even. There wasn't really time (or inclination) to visit all the tourist spots, but we did go to Piula Theological College and Fatumea Pool. There are two caves by the beach with deep freshwater pools in them. They are connected by an underwater tunnel, which we snorkelled through. The underwater entrance took a bit of finding.

We stayed 3 nights in Apia, the capital. It's a bit scruffy - the roads are dusty, and there is quite a lot of litter. The Palolo Deep Marine Reserve (much of it only knee-deep at low water) is within walking distance of the town centre. There are some pleasant gardens, plenty of shade, and reasonable snorkelling with quite distinctive small fish. About 50m from shore there is a deeper gully system, but the visibility was only 6-7m.

We also stayed 3 nights at a resort on the south west coast. We did some kayaking through the mangroves. That was lovely, lots of birds, and glimpses of villages.

We also watched two fiafias, traditional Samoan dancing. It sounds touristy, it is touristy, but the dancers are so friendly and enthusiastic, it makes a really good evening.

The Lonely Planet guidebook to Samoa is good, and the free map and "what's on" booklet you get at the airport and all over the island is pretty good as well.

Accommodation
In Apia we stayed at Aggie Greys, a hotel named after its former owner. It was once famous amongst the well-to-do, and many of the rooms are named after film stars who stayed there. We thought it could do with a facelift. However it was comfortable and not too expensive (we ate all our meals there, and saw the fire dancing show, and it worked out at about £65ppn). We had an amazing meal one evening in the a la carte restaurant. Jen ordered lobster salad. When it arrived there were two whole, decent-sized, lobsters plus a delicious salad full of tropical fruits. The price - about £7.50!! We were the only people in the restaurant that evening. In fact the whole island was pretty quiet - perhaps it was because it was only a few months after 9/11.

The second part of our stay was at Coconuts Beach Resort. This is a very tastefully designed place set amongst the palm trees on a large lagoon. The food was very good, the setting is peaceful and the rooms were comfortable. The resort was set up by a group of Californian lawyers who fancied a change of lifestyle. We weren't keen on the rather self-satisfied way they held court at the bar and in the restaurant. Maybe it was just the difference between Brit and US style, and perhaps more noticeable because there weren't many other guests when we were there. Anyway, it was not a huge problem but we would stay somewhere else next time. We ate all our meals there and it cost about £75ppn.

We stayed in upmarket places, but there is a wide range right down to fales as basic as it gets for maybe £3 per night. A fale is traditional Samoan house - just a hut with a roof and floor but no walls.

Diving
We researched the diving before we went (mainly through Google) but didn't pre-book anything. We just walked up to the dive centres, and were able to arrange dives for the following day. We did one day with Moana Divers out of Apia, and two days with Pacific Quest Divers on the south coast. We had all our own gear including pony cylinders, so just hired tanks and weights. The prices were similar - about £40 for a 2-tank dive.

Moana Divers
Run by Samoans, they were fine. The boat is a flat-top about 10m long . The skipper was sound, and the crewman/dive guide (we don't do guided dives) was a nice guy. The pickup was wherever you surface, British style. The crew were tickled by the DSMB we sent up, they'd never seen one before. I got the impression that most of the divers they get in Samoa are holiday divers.

In the morning we had the boat to ourselves, and we dived Five Mile Reef. This is an enormous (presumably 5 miles long) slab of pristine coral, not hugely colourful, sloping gently from the depths up to about 15m on each side of long axis. Visibility was around 30m, and there were plenty of fish including barracuda and humphead wrasse. There were also many smaller fish around the coral heads, some unusual and distinctive. Jen and I are not heavily into species identification so we christened some of the types: Peugeot 206 fish were the same metallic blue as Jen's car; and wrong-way-round fish have a stripy tail that looks like a head.

In the afternoon we picked up another pair of divers, who were beginners. We dived at Vailele Spot near Vailima Brewery. This is a reef running parallel to the shore that is split by deep gullies. There was plenty of coral, and small fish, but the vis was only about 15m.

Pacific Quest Divers
This outfit is based at the Sinalei Resort, just along the beach from Coconuts. It's run by Roger, an American. The boat is similar to Moana's. There was a dive guide, who seemed a nice chap, but we didn't dive with him. The dives were all from an anchored boat, which was manned at all times. It was US-style 2-tank diving with a surface interval of about an hour. There were other divers both days, again not very experienced.

My notes on the dive sites were:
Homestead Reef 24m: 15m plateau with gullies to 30m, brownish coral, small fish
Shark Plateau 24m: tuna, big schools (blue with yellow stripe) several cruising reef sharks, excellent
Agemoa Beach 400m off - drop from 10 m to sand/rubble at 30m. Unexciting
W of headland S of Agemoa Beach - reef at 15m dropping to 30m either side, slight current, decent coral, shoaling fish

Roger told me about other sites with many sharks. They sounded excellent but it wasn't clear how often he takes people there. On the website, he now advertises trips for advanced divers to undived sites, in an inflatable.

Since our visit a third dive operator has opened up, based at the Coconuts Beach Resort.

Summary
Samoa is an interesting and exotic island for a stopover. Our one week stay cost about £1500. If you are happy to use budget accommodation you could do it for half that. If you want to see the island and dive, you could do with longer than a week. The dive operators are competent, the diving is pleasant, and a couple of the dives were very good. I wouldn't go to Samoa just for the diving that's currently on offer. However, being quite undeveloped, it could be an interesting place for an exploratory expedition - if you could get enough people together.

Richard Scarsbrook - BSAC First Class Diver/Advanced Instructor, RYA/MCA Coastal Skipper
Jen Scarsbrook - BSAC Advanced Diver/Advanced Instructor

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