Hope that helps!

Spent a little time wandering around a year ago.
I suggest there is a big difference in “feel” between Polynesian & Melanesian populations.
For the latter Vanuatu is very pleasant, wonderful close to the surface snorkelling/ diving if you want it, lots of resorts, good food, reasonably happy populace. I tried the snorkelling at Hideaway, and loved it. Take rock boots.
For the former, Western Samoa (haven’t been to American Samoa). Lovely climate, lovely people.

Stay away from New Guinea, no matter what you are told. Solomon Islands is also risky (haven’t been there, but talked to cosuins who have been there with the peace-keeping forces).

Theroux’s book, definitely! Really funny, but what a sourpuss!

Palau (http://redstroke.com/galleries/palau2004/) allegedly has some of the best snorkeling and diving in the world. I was there for work and did some snorkeling for a day, but I’m not the best to speak from first-hand experience. Most of the tourism there comes from the Japanese, and you’ll find everything written in both English and Japanese.

The hotel I stayed in, the Palau Pacific Resort (http://palau.panpacific.com/), I’m told was actually built by U.S. Marines after we and the Japanese bombed the country away during WWII. I was very satisfied with it, though I can’t speak for the accommodations at other hotels on the island.

And if you fly there via Guam, you have the fun experience of stopping off in Yap on the way and being locked in a jail cell with all the other passengers while the Yap government searches the plane for “contraband.”

Palau has a very developed infrastructure, standard American road signs, and even uses American dollars as their official currency. The selection of restaurants and such is more than wide enough for your stay, but not extremely spectacular. You certainly won’t spend $1000/day, but it won’t be near hostel prices either.

It has been some time since I was in the South Pacific, but I recall with great pleasure the excursion we took to the coral reefs off of Tahiti. Tahiti is probably worth a day or two – it’s a good place to recover from West-bound jetlag. New Zealand and Australia, while not necessarily on your itinerary, would nevertheless be quite lovely in their summer. Just the name – Surfer’s Paradise (in Queensland) – suggests that it might be a good place to learn.

Fiji is also worth a visit – again, a nice intermediate stop on the way back.

If you’re interested in taking in small sovereign countries, then Vanuatu and Nauru could be worth a stop. Nauru’s environmental situation is quite dire, however.

A cursory glance at Michener’s “Tales of the South Pacific” (a rare multi-word title from him) may suggest some other ideas.

Bon voyage,

- Claiborne Booker -

Tsk tsk. James sounds like he has some unresolved issues. Maybe he’ll elucidate some beyond nothing?

I can also highly recommend New Zealand for most of the listed activities. I spent a month there in Dec 1997 and biked, flew, hiked, hiked, hiked, ate, swam, met glowworms, bungee-jumped, etc. I stayed in excellent places at reasonable prices. I *think* I visited every aviation museum in the country, but I intend to return to make sure This was all before the Lord of the Rings boom, but I imagine that can’t have spoiled the place *too* bad.

If you only have two weeks might I suggest the following:

I did the EC tour and was quite happy with it:

http://www.globusjourneys.com/Default.aspx?tabid=401

2.5 days on each island: one days has planned activities (part of the tour), one day is free (but they give you a list of optional things you can sign up for), and half a day is spent traveling to the next island.

Once you’re done you can spend a couple of days extra there (the tour ends on Maui) to use up a full two weeks of vacation.

Very well organized (my tour leader way Julie), good food (if you care about that) and the accommidations were excellent (stayed at Sheratons).

If you want more info plug my full name into Google to get my contact information.

Philip,

How about New Zealand? It covers most of what you want (drop into Aussie for the reefs, tho we DO have good diving up here – just very few coral reefs)

You can surf and stay near the beach at Raglan, which is around 2 hours drive from Auckland (largest city) – more info here: http://www.raglan.net.nz/ – as well as learn to surf – http://www.raglansurfingschool.co.nz/ – or just google for “raglan site:nz”. I’d expect a place to rent out there – assuming you can get one – is around $750-1000 / week, $NZD (70c US = $1NZ at the moment – http://www.holidayhouses.co.nz/raglan.asp). We have a lot of mountain biking here to – Rotorua has very good single track. I’ve used these people (http://www.planetbike.co.nz/) and they are very good – guided and unguided. You can also do it around 45 mins drive north of Auckland: (http://www.bikepark.co.nz) tho it’s not guided, or as close to town as the Rotarua one is

I beleive you can fly (private, small planes) from the Ardmore airfield (http://www.ardmore.co.nz/) which is NOT Auckland’s international airport It is the busiest airport in NZ tho, in take off’s / landings per hour. (the site may not be suitable, but they should be able to put you in contact with someone who can help )

Fiji might also be a good idea, or maybe the Whitsunday’s in Australia, tho I’ve not been to either of them. Personally, I LOVE Bali, and you should be able to do pretty much everything except the flying – tho I’ve never looked into it, as I can’t fly

Cheers

Nic.

When I was in HS in the Marshall Islands the place to go diving was Pohnpei. I never did it myself – but I heard amazing things about the island.