Swing by Korotogo, Fiji (March 7, 2026)
Elena and I enjoyed our time at The Pearl so much that we decided to take Will and Violet to The Outrigger resort about 90 minutes away in the town of Korotogo, Fiji. This is where we were originally planning on staying when we booked our original AirBnb that ended up being flooded when we arrived (see related post).
When we woke up this morning, there was no water in our current AirBnb. The water pump stopped working during the night and at 6am, the taps were dry. No showers, no sink water, and a single flush left on each toilet. That’s one way to start your day — in total gratitude that the water flows so automatically that we rarely question if it will be there when we need it. What a great reminder of how blessed we are!
Thankfully, the host called a plumber and could address the problem while we’re away for the day. Ah, the “joys” of home ownership! And living in a less developed country. Fiji is so beautiful because it’s mostly natural. This is what nature looks like when there is minimal intervention from humans. That also means the infrastructure is equally minimal. There’s one major road around the island (and that sometimes gets flooded), the water runs periodically to help locals fill up their water tanks, and the storms often shut down the electricity.
Will and Violet having a swing on the beach in front of Outrigger
So, while the owner of our AirBnb worked on our water issue, we drove 90 minutes away to spend the day at the Outrigger resort. We kicked off our experience walking through the covered walkways to get to lunch. I love these covered walkways. Just having shade significantly reduces the level of heat vs. directly under the sun.
Themed and beautiful covered walkways to get around the sun
Alongside these covered walkways is a well constructed stream that is both calming and beautiful. There are fish in this stream as well as a few bull frogs and tons of birds using it as their bathing area. Hey, I can’t blame them, that’s what WE are here to do too!
Calming water flowing besides us as we head to lunch
One of the attractions of purchasing a day pass is that $50 of the $70 fjd per person is allocated to food and beverage. True, you are limited to specific “a la cart” restaurants (as this is an all inclusive resort and most eating is done at the buffets). Between the meals and the drinks, it’s easy to spend $200 fjd across 4 people (about $95 usd).
After lunch, we took a dip in the nearby pool which had a single water slide (designed for kids) and a climbing inflatable gym (aptly called the “splash zone”) which Violet immediately climbed to the top of impressing the much younger customers.
Splash zone (pictured here with zero kids). Imagine 35 to 40 kids here
This resort is definitely “family friendly” with many young couples with babies or toddlers. What dawned on both Elena and I as we were here today is how truly lucky we were that our first AirBnb flooded and we ended up up in Pacific Harbour instead. Where we’re staying there is a vibrant local community including all sorts of activities, beautiful beaches and three resorts that cater to more adults than families.
This was made particularly clear when we attempted to “walk the beach” and do some swimming. It’s entirely possible we hit the beach at “the wrong time” as the low tide was incredibly low with a depth of about 1 foot (i.e. up to your knees) as far as you could see in all directions. The dead coral was sharp so even if you braved the water, you were likely to cut up your feet. That’s why we had the beach to ourselves and all the families were in the pools.
Then again, there were two swings that were inviting Will and Violet to come and play on. And play they did. While Elena enjoyed the shaded lounge chair for a few peaceful moments before we decided to head back towards our AirBnb.
Elena shade hunting while Will and Violet enjoy the swings
Before we took off, we checked out one of the adults only pools and I instantly fell in love with the lap pool design. In this approach, Outrigger separated the lap pool from the pool bar with in-pool social club. Two very different objectives (i.e. exercise vs. lounge) can be accomplished in the same area. Brilliant!
Lap pool up top with the lounge bar pool down below. Love it!
I told Elena that I wanted to add this pool design to our “magic house list” which seems to keep growing as we travel the world and experience all these really cool features.
The ride home was quite enjoyable as we listened to podcasts — headlines, news, and our new favorite podcast, Crimeless. It’s about the hilarious “crimes” that people attempt to pull off such as catfishing local governments for proclamations and/or partnership PR with a fake country (in order to avoid extradition), flight attendants gone wild, or the many adventures of famous prison breaks. The dumber the crime, the better.
The only “bad” news was that we wouldn’t be able to shower when we got home as the water in our AirBnb still isn’t fixed. Hopefully we get it sorted out tomorrow. We only have a few more days in Fiji. Making the best of all of it. Still better than being in the snowy blizzards of New York. I’ll take the heat and humidity (as long as there’s AC)!
