FAMILIES

Get kids off their devices and out exploring Fiji’s string of 333 islands, both on land and underwater. It’s where everyone gets to have a holiday – parents included.

+ Must-do

Fiji’s islands are a dream escape for families. Kids can collect hermit crabs, make friends in the kids’ club, build sandcastles and enjoy old-school fun where days seemingly stretch on forever.

Book an island-hopping cruise where you can swim and snorkel in tropical-fishfilled waters, visit a village and experience a different side of Fiji. You can step ashore on uninhabited Modriki Island, where the Tom Hanks movie Castaway was filmed, on a South Sea Cruises’ day trip aboard the classic schooner Seaspray. You’ll see various locations where the movie was filmed and the 83-foot schooner anchors off Modriki so passengers can go ashore to explore and snorkel.

One of the best things to do as a family is to visit a traditional village. Most hotels and resorts offer this experience. Many of the staff from your hotel or resort actually come from nearby villages. See how the local people live, where Fijian children go to school and learn about local traditions and history. You can usually buy handmade jewellery, wood carvings and other souvenirs, too.

Play Robinson Crusoe on your private island. Many resorts will pack you off with a substantial picnic along with snorkelling and kayak gear and deliver you to your own private atoll. Take a siesta in a hammock or snorkel the shallow reefs. The kids will love having the island, and you, all to themselves.

+ Stay

Many of Fiji’s resorts, ranging from relaxed barefoot properties to luxe five-star digs, offer kids’ clubs and other facilities, which are often complimentary or included in the tariff. Activities include: coral reef exploration; Fijian arts, crafts and culture; handicrafts such as necklace making, T-shirt printing or basket and coconut-leaf weaving; visits to local villages and a farmers’ market; a myriad of water-based activities; coconut bowling; crab hunting and storytelling. It’s not uncommon for tears to be shed at the end of the week as nannies say goodbye to their charges.

As you step ashore, your feet sinking into the warm clear waters, you instantly feel at home at magical Castaway Island in the Mamanucas. The resort’s 64 stylish yet simple bures come complete with daybeds and contemporary interiors. The island offers safe, pristine swimming beaches and coral reefs ideal for snorkelling. Children adore Castaway’s kids’ club, which although little more than a room, offers heaps of fun, outdoor activities including sandcastle building, craft projects, treasure hunts and more. There are family and adults-only pools, the Sundowner Bar and award-winning feet-in-the-sand dining, a dive centre, a coral-conservation program and warm Fijian hospitality.

Fiji’s largest resort, set on 44 hectares of a private island, with a sandy beach on one side and a blue lagoon on the other, is popular with Australians for good reason. The Shangri-La Yanuca Island, Fiji offers 442 comfortable rooms while facilities, including the renowned Little Chief’s Club, and a stay-and-eat-free program (for two children under 12 years old, per room) make it terrific value. There are loads of fun activities such as golf, lawn bowls, banana-boat rides, scuba diving, crab races and snorkelling in a fish-filled lagoon. Parents love the swish all-service spa.

Be careful before booking a family holiday at Jean-Michel Cousteau Resort. Full-time nannies, candlelit dinners, the South Pacific’s most-awarded kids’ club and snorkelling or diving in worldrenowned reefs deliver a family holiday that’s forever hard to top. Parents can hand children over to specially trained nannies and staff, relax by the pool, have kids tucked in at night and stroll hand-inhand along the sand to a romantic candlelit dinner safe in the knowledge they are in the best of hands. It’s the only resort in Fiji that employs a full-time, onsite marine biologist, Johnny Singh. Singh enthusiastically imparts Cousteau’s passion for the ocean to adults and small guests through the excellent Ambassadors of the Environment program (involving a Bula passport system), snorkelling expeditions (including night snorkels), glass-bottomboat rides and educational presentations. It’s where lifelong friends and memories are made, hence why so many families return again and again to this magical eco-friendly resort.

+ Don’t miss Channel your inner Tom Sawyer and try bilibili (bamboo) rafting as a crooning Fijian poles you downstream – the South Pacific version of a Venetian gondola. A Navua River Boat Adventure tour includes the chance to ride a traditional bilibili, while the annual bilibili race is a fun and colourful spectacle not to be missed. Alternatively, let the kids build their own bilibili raft. Jean-Michel Cousteau Resort’s terrific teens’ program sees adventurous kids build and launch their own bilibili raft.