Bula Vinaka…. A Warm Welcome From Fiji!

And much emphasis on the warm!

I just met  with the tourism people here who are going to kindly provide me with a support vehicle for my 4 road days in Fiji, also hotel nights for my 8 nights.

Vinaka! Vinaka! Thank You! Thank You!

I start running Oceania from Suva on Wednesday morning I will run back to Nadi traversing the island from east to west. This will be almost a year to the day when I started running South America…. I think we have come a long way together.

Older readers to the blog will know that Fiji was not on my original world run route but as I have heard so much about this glorious country over the years I decided to try to squeeze it in as country number 17 of  the run. Just a reminder 25,143km have been run in 596 road days.

The Fiji plan is for my support driver to pick me up at the hotel at 4am  and drive the 3 hour plus drive to Suva. They are working on some publicity/press conference  before my planned 8am (prob …ish! ) departure. Fiji is currently +13 hours ahead of GMT.

Fiji is made up of 333 islands.  Viti Levu being the main island, so much so that many people refer to it as ‘ the mainland. ‘ Suva, the capital city and home to some 200,000  inhabitants  is situated on the east coast. Viti Levu is also the main international hub for Fiji tourism, their main industry.

My arrival in Fiji was pretty straightforward. Visas are issued on arrival with validity of up to four months, very generous when you consider the landmass of Russia which has a standard 30 day visa! Speaking about this, Russia also expects the traveler to return to their own country to apply for a Russian tourist visa. That’s not all, as you then have to give an exact date and location  of entry. So a  late arrival means time out of your 30 days… As one person said to me a few weeks ago… ” There are enough countries in the world so why bother with the difficult to visit countries? ”

For me the very first thing a country can do to promote its tourism sector is to scrap visas or issue a visa on arrival which is basically the same as no visa required for visa hassled me!

A well wrapped up Nirvana …   Vinaka ( Fijian for thanks! ) to my hosts and great friends Roger and Cindy in San Diego –  arrived in the airport here with me. Nirvana will be left wrapped up for my flight to Auckland, New Zealand on the 15th.

Thanks to my great friends Cindy and Roger from El Cajon near San Diego.

As I will be returning to the wonderful Tanoa Hotel for my last couple of nights here in Nadi, Aggie the friendly duty manager will take care of Nirvana, also my heavy bag while I am off enjoying myself running along the Coral Coast.

My meeting with Kiniviliame Raicebe the marketing officer for Tourism Fiji  and James Sowane  the managing director of Pacific Destinationz who are Fiji’s main travel operators went really well.

Among the great tips I got ( this probably dreary January day  back in Dublin ) is if it gets too hot to run along the beach. Life is so tough for this globetrotter    :(

From closely questioning James and  Kini, as Kinivilame thankfully prefers to be known as, I could see that Fiji is going through a major re branding of  the country at the moment. For a country of 830,000 population with a total landmass of roughly the same size as Northern Ireland tourism is very important. Or rather repeat tourism. Kini spoke of how Australians keep coming back here to holiday and as James spoke of how loyal the Aussies and Kiwi’s have been despite a couple of bad floodings  in recent years, not to mention Cyclone Tropical Evan.

The Fiji Logistics meeting with James and Kini.

The Fiji tourism re branding continues. If you click on their website above you will see the strangely named ‘ Fiji Me ‘ tagline.

The new branding will have the new tagline ” Fiji: Where Happiness Finds You ” Fiji’s tourism campaigns will focus on the warmth and friendliness of it’s people. The new campaign is obviously designed to encourage tourists from around the world to make Fiji their number one holiday and conference destination.

” Us Fijians are a very resolute people , we work hard to promote our country to the outside world.

” Tony you will see how friendly our people are when you start running here tomorrow. ” I was assured by the lads. ”

Everyone I have met so far greets me with ” Bula ” meaning Hello. After a year and a half in Latin America it will take me a while to stop responding with Hola!  

James wearing a traditional Fijian ' Sulu '

Hard work is indeed needed due to Fiji’s remoteness being 3,100 kilometers northeast of Sydney, 2,100 kilometers north of Auckland. 5,100 kilometers southwest of Honolulu and 7,100 kilometers southeast of Tokyo. Once you arrive you soon forget about all that effort and enjoy the beauties and smiling faces of the people on these paradise islands.

A multi racial, multi-cultural country comprised of indigenous Fijians, Indians, Europeans and Chinese.

Fiji is represented by the major religions of the world. I am told that I can expect to see Christian Churches, Mosques, Sikh and Hindu Temples in the countryside as well as in the cities.

Fiji is an English speaking country although the two major races Fijians and Indians speak in their vernacular. I am also told that the people that live along the short 187 km route of the so called Queens Highway where I will be running speak over 300 dialects.

Air Pacific  the national airline is also involved in this national re branding. On Fiji Day, October 10th 2012, the 42nd anniversary of Fiji’s Independence from the United Kingdom, they announced they would soon become Fiji Airways. A very obvious improvement as even I had wondered if Air Pacific was a low cost US airline.

Currently there is also a debate going on about the national flag and although a Commonwealth member many people feel they should drop the Union Jack from their flag.

Many thanks to my Aussie friend Ash who runs the Runways running store  in Parnell St. in Dublin. Ash took the trouble to make contact with Tourism Fiji for me. I have tried contacting tourism offices in the various countries I have run through but invariably I am just ignored. Thanks Ash for your persistence and for sorting me with some vital equipment for China and Central Asia.

While on this subject I have sent on a large boxes of supplies to Australia, Michael Gillan my support driver tells me it arrived safely today, all 17kgs of it! A 13 kg parcel is also expected in Bangkok, Thailand any day now. Also smaller packages to Singapore and Indonesia are en route. I am still trying to source a contact along my route (China route details in New Asia Route blog posting of a few weeks ago. I see Urumqi,  China as a vital location in which to find a contact. Anyone know anyone there!

Also thanks to Stafford Bagot and Fergus Owens for sponsoring some days on the road!

So for me the timeout is over, back on the road tomorrow and not running a step since I ran into the South Pacific ocean nearly a month ago makes me as nervous as Hell, what with that support vehicle watching every step.. ” Are you sure he is a runner running around the world! ” I can hear them say as I attempt to run off my Christmas belly!

My Fiji route press HERE

For more information about Fiji press HERE

Ni Sa Moce!   = Goodbye For now.

Then I found this…  Mai Kana  = Lets eat

I arrived in Fiji this morning. Many thanks to Tourism Fiji and the Tanoa Hotel group here in Nadi for putting me up in a wonderful resort hotel. Please click  HERE   to see photos and their website.

It’s very hot!I hope to start running Oceania on Tuesday. Thanks to everyone for their best wishes.

Hi Everyone. I just had a lovely Christmas and New Year with my family in Dublin. I hope this was the same for all the readers to this blog.

I leave Dublin on Thursday morning bound for San Diego where I will make a two day stop with my friends Roger and Cindy.  I pick up Nirvana there and prepare for my flight to Nadi, Fiji on Saturday evening.

I will be leaving leave Dublin with the fear of being charged excess baggage as the last time I stepped on a weighing scales I checked in at 75 kilos, the heaviest weight of my life. Before Christmas  I arrived in Dublin weighing only 70 kgs!  By contrast  I arrived in Dublin weighing a scary 62 kgs last summer on my previous timeout. Everyone,  told me I looked like death warmed up then. I think that speaks volumes about the food in Ecuador, Peru and Bolivia and all their skimpy bits of meat and very little else. I promise if I ever return to those countries I will do my own cooking. Yes compare that to the wonderful steaks in Argentina!

Another interesting factor to take into account was just before I returned this time I was pushing Nirvana through Patagonia. On my previous timeout I had sent her on ahead to Buenos Aires running most of central Americas and the Andes with just a backpack. What that meant in Patagonia was that I could visit a supermarket whenever I hit a town and load her up with so many goodies that I was eating all kinds of delicious stuff like chocolate logs after I cooked my dinner at the end of the day. I was still eating plenty even five days after those rare supermarket visits. Also on average I ate about 600 gm of biscuits every day My doctor says there is no such thing as ‘ junk food ‘ all food is good for me, some just has more calories than others! Yes doc, that’s the kind of motivating talk I love so much  :)

Anyway, enough talking about food, I really am worse than a dog for talking about food.

I will be arriving in Nadi, Fiji early, very early, really early, like rarely seen before on the run, 5.15am!! Monday. Hopefully I will run that belly off quickly!

I have heard so much about Fiji a hidden pearl, almost unknown on our side of the world. Most visitors come from New Zealand, Australia and the USA. I am very excited bringing my world run there and kicking off Oceania, my third continent there I look forward to informing the readers about this South Pacific wonderland. Please stay tuned.

Hi All,

I guess its about time I posted something! I have been very busy working on logistics for Oceana: Fiji, New Zealand and Australia.

Not to mention putting some supplies in place along my Asian route in Indonesia, Singapore and  Thailand and that’s just the shortened ‘ Readers Digest version! ‘ A lot more besides as well as just being pure lazy and having a lovely Christmas with my family!

Mam still continues to worry about me as she does when I am running across blizzards in the USA, deserts, bandit country, across 4,5000 metre mountains in the winter with no sleeping bag or the balmy winds of  Patagonia, so fierce the wind actually blew apple chewings from my mouth across the road. Yes Mam worried even when I was standing in the kitchen beside her drying the dishes!

“Son I am afraid you will hit your head off that open press door”  

Please watch out for an interview in this Sundays ‘ Mail on Sunday ‘  newspaper. I am told it is going to press as planned, but things can change. Update.. Not in paper today, perhaps next week or another day..

Best wishes to Eoin Keith my friend and former team mate on the Irish 24 hour team.

Eoin is making a massive step up in time and distance having run ‘ only ‘ 24 hours in the past. Well on Saturday 29th Eoin will be running a 3 day race in Phoenix, Arizona  -  one of my favourite and special races from my competitive career – Press  HERE  for race website, For updates press the red square on the homepage where it says ‘ Results and Webcam ‘

Eoin will be taking up where I left off with my old rival and great friend John Geesler in this 72 hour Across The Years race,  so named as it ends on New Years morning. I emailed John to say..

” Sorry I wont be there to give you a good butt kicking John so I have sent Eoin over to do the job!”

John is highly respected for his sportsmanship and humor all over the world and is a special friend to Team Ireland so please log on for live updates from the 29th. Please feel free to send the runners messages which are read out to them as they run by the communication tent on the track. At midnight on the New Year the bubbly is cracked open, fireworks explode and a party begins. Many runners walk a lap or two except the serious ones, I wonder who they are!  Good luck Eoin I know you can take the title back to Ireland

Hola!

2012 was a tough year on the run with a disappointing total of around 11,000 kilometres run.

This was mainly due to my two timeouts (including this upcoming one) averaging about a month each. Also a week off in Peru. Not to mention a crucifying 7,000km and seven months in the Andes mountains with no support vehicle!

The reason for my last timeout was personal as is this one. I am fighting very hard to keep the focus on the run but it has not been easy. My close friends will know exactly what I am talking about. It has been a traumatic year in my personal life, the most difficult year of my whole life. I have kept all this off the blog.  I even considered cutting a year off the run to finish in October 2013.

In order to achieve this I had considered cutting off the bottom half of South America and heading from Northern Argentina to the Chilean coast, skipping Oceania and starting Asia in Shanghai, China. I even have (a now expired) Chinese 3 month visa in my passport. Eventually I decided to return to my original plan and the original route, to run around the world the way I had dreamt of running it.

I am very tired now and need a rest with my family. I will spend Christmas and the New Years period in Dublin. I expect this to be my last timeout. Perhaps when I get to Europe a long weekend Ryan Air flight might prove to be irrestible. It takes an average of an additional week total to get to and from my route for these timeouts. Christmas 2013 I expect to spend in China, in the Gobi Desert. I need to ‘ get the finger out ‘ as we say in Ireland or perhaps even the leg out in my case and get some serious running done or I will be in danger of missing my dream finish with the finish line of the Dublin marathon on October 27th 2014.

So the plan is Thursday 13th December I fly from Ushuaia with Nirvana to Buenos Aires and stay with my great friends John and Clara Boyle who have helped me so much here.

Saturday 15th I fly with Nirvana from Buenos Aires to San Diego, California and arrive on Sunday morning.  I will stay there one night also by kind invitation by my other great friends Roger and Cindy Darrieulat . I will leave Nirvana with them. I will then take a return flight to Dublin on 17th arriving on the 18th. I will return to San Diego on 3rd January 2013. I have vivid memories of the very steep hill up to their house in El Cajon. In the Andes many times I said that such and such a hill was as tough as Roger and Cindys hill!

San Diego was chosen for a couple of reasons – one being that I did not want to drag Nirvana across the Atlantic twice and needed a place to park her. It would have been much easier for me to fly one way from Buenos Aires to Dublin and then another one way flight from Dublin to Fiji or forget Fiji and just fly from Dublin to Auckland, New Zealand. Had I done that I would have not travelled across the Pacific Ocean and continued on in a western direction around the world. I would have been travelling in the opposite eastern direction. That was not within my criteria.

Another reason for choosing San Diego was because it is substantially cheaper to fly from North America to Fiji than it is from Argentina and then cheaper again for the timeout in Dublin.

On Jan 5th I fly from San Diego to Nani, Fiji arriving early on the 7th. One day travelling and one day extra as I will be travelling over the international date line. I did a real Phillias Fogg on this one and forgot about these two days as I had planned on 10 days in Fiji and now only get 8!

I even wondered if I would be the first runner to run across the island till my buddy Ash from Runways in Dublin emailed me  to say Fiji in January will be unbearably hot, at least it was for his run across the island many years ago

January 15th I take the short flight from Nadi, Fiji to Auckland arriving around lunchtime. 

After that I plan on 6/7 weeks total for both islands in New Zealand before arriving on the Australian island of Tasmania around beginning of March and then onto the mainland in Melbourne around St. Patrick’s Day. 

Some Stats:

North America = 14,024km run

South America = 10,742km in 276 road days.

Americas = 24,766km

Plus 377km run in Ireland

Total to date: 25,143km for 596 road days

The end of the Americas - the most southern point in the world

Hi everyone! Today I ran the last 24km in the Americas from Ushuaia to Lapataia National Park

This was the start of the Americas in Cape Spear,Newfoundland,Canada 9/Nov 2010

And this is what I wrote that day over 2 years ago..

 ”And the run through the Americas all the way to Tierra del Fuego has finally begun! ”

Back here in Ushuaia It was a bit of a mental effort getting out onto the road today as I had focused so much over the last two years on finishing in Ushuaia!

Ushuaia at last!

Total to date: 25,143km for 596 road days, I think that’s almost exactly a marathon a day average. Of which the South American distance was: 10,742km  in 276 road days 

Also to my sponsors: The North Pole Marathon, Great Outdoors, Chariot Carriers, John Buckley Sports, Runways, Drymax Socks and High5 Sports Nutrition. Also the many blog readers who have sponsored a day, meal and or hotel night - my run would not be possible without all of your great help  

Near the finish!

 .

.

It feels great!

 Then this man called Ramon and his wife Nathalia and family gave me a lift back to Ushuaia. You didnt expect me to run back!

And on the way we did some sightseeing.

While I almost fell asleep in the car!

My Spot tracker continues to fail.

I am in Ushuaia now but have just found out that there is a national park 24km away which is more south and decided to run there tomorrow, I thought I was finished. I am treating this as an optional as some people start and finish from the ocean side here, just incase I sleep for 3 or 4 days! To be honest I knew of this national park but kinda ignored it as I was more intent on getting to Ushuaia!

Am staying in Cruz del Sur backpackers hostel for 4 nights and will update you on the plan going forward very soon.

Sat: 50km,Fri 49km, Thurs 50 Wed 34km Today 28km. Total circa 25,125km need to update log book later. Talk soon and thanks for support.

For help in sleeping  press HERE

The wind was very strong but I managed to get a few words in at the end!

Hi All. I am finished running through Chile and crossed back into southern Argentina. I see the Spot did not update this afternoon, Tuesday. I am in Rio Grande, about 220km to go. Just before Tolhuin on more than likely on Thursday or Friday morning I will have run my 25,000km of the run I am at km 24,908km -  Tolhuin is about 110km away.
I am now thinking about splashing into the south Atlantic ocean on Sunday afternoon the 9th Dec. That is weather permitting. The wind has been very tough on me with a lot of slow progress days. At time it was even difficult to breath and Nirvana was blowing all over the place.

The road in Chile was brutal, gravel, rocks and potholes for about 120km. But I still managed to get my countrywide 50km in the day before the asphalt ran out!
Ushuaia and the end of the world (most southern city in the world) has been my biggest dream of the run, well after the finish in Dublin obviously! From there it’s north and west towards home Ushuaia is also roughly half way on the run.

The day I left Rio Gallegos I only managed 15km as the wind was like a wild animal. Alexander tells me he is going to hold up for a while in Commdt Luis Piedra Buena till it blows over! I think he will have a long wait as it is always like this. Some of the travel books I have date back 40 years and it is exactly the same! This is the summer and even here in town its colder than an Irish Decembers day! Yes I know… Moan, moan, moan

Thanks for all your support.

Many thanks to Clare O’Connell for sponsoring tonights delicious meal!