The friendly isles: Kiwis visiting the Solomons can meet locals speaking up to 70 different languages with some of the world’s most colourful and intriguing cultures.
The friendly isles: Kiwis visiting the Solomons can meet locals speaking up to 70 different languages with some of the world’s most colourful and intriguing cultures.
Dive World War II shipwrecks, come face-to-face with headhunter skulls, and discover the diverse cultures of Solomon Islanders - some of the Pacific’s friendliest people, writes Ben Leahy
There is a problem – and it’s me.
Clay-painted warriors have been eyeing my boat as it approaches Rendova Island in thewestern Solomon Islands and now blow a conch shell in a hornlike alarm.
Two warriors rush forward with raised axes shouting challenges. My stomach knots.
After all, it wasn’t so long ago that headhunters paddled these waters.
Luckily, there is bakiha – ornate clamshell rings that were traditionally used as currency - to prove I come in peace.
Gifting it wins me permission to step foot into Titiru Eco Lodge, and the greetings of its young owner, Pana Paza.
He guides me through demonstrations showing how locals once fished with seashell hooks and boiled ginger-flavoured coconut with heated rocks, before smiling and telling me why Kiwis should visit the Solomon Islands.
“Number one is just to meet the people, share stories, laugh, learn their culture and make new friends,” he says.
Days later, I fully agree.
The Solomon Islands are a safe holiday destination for Kiwis. Photo / Getty Images
Apart from the warrior’s scowls, I have seen nothing but beaming smiles and warm welcomes during my time in the archipelago of about 1000 islands that sit a seven-hour flight northwest of New Zealand.
Maybe it’s due to the country spending three years isolated behind closed borders during Covid, but if I had to bet on one place where you’re guaranteed to feel welcome as a tourist in 2024, it would be the Solomons.
Granted you won’t get Fiji or Hawaii’s five-star comforts, but you will get all their tropical beauty and more.
There’s crystal water, bungalows over stunning coral reefs and world-class fishing and dive spots. If you’re a surfer, think spectacular breaks where you’ll have the waves to yourself.
Even more inviting are the country’s diverse cultures and history.
Solomon Islanders speak as many as 70 languages. In some villages, tribal chiefs still hold ceremonies in long rooms adorned with the skulls of their ancestors.
World War II buffs will also find it a dream destination with shipwrecks and rusting planes from some of the Pacific’s key battlefields waiting to be explored.
Equally fascinating is the return of superpower politics to the strategically important and climate change-affected islands.
China is elbowing for influence in the country by building a flashy 13,000-seat soccer stadium, while Japan has donated an international airport terminal.
It’s a kaleidoscope of attractions that all add to a sense of being in a country on the move.
Titiru Eco Lodge: A window in Solomon Islands culture
Back at Titiru Eco Lodge, I learn more secrets of traditional life as the village ladies show me the recipe for preparing betel nut for chiefs.
Paza’s family started Titiru in 2012 aiming to build a new source of income once money from logging on Rendova Island dried up.
Guests stay beneath towering mangroves in bungalows that jut over waters where sharks can sometimes be seen gliding below.
They can snorkel straight into the ocean or take boat rides to fishing and a host of other activities.
She makes just a handful of dollars each week selling vegetables to a passing ship that on-sells them hundreds of kilometres away in Honiara, the Solomons’ capital city.
But her family now face expensive medical bills.
“My teeth are already out, I am very old now and money is not available here,” Basu says, albeit with a big smile.
Brisbane tourist and Titiru guest Kym Morris regrets not visiting sooner, saying these candid talks with locals are touching and eye-opening.
“It’s close, yet it’s so different, it feels a million miles away,” she says.
Titiru Eco Lodge on Rendova Island in the western Solomons is one of the country’s best spots to get to know the locals – even if some of them come armed with axes. Photo / Ben Leahy
Skull Island: Final resting place of headhunters
Life on the water is one of the joys of my trip to the western Solomons.
Boat rides over azure waters are the transport of choice, and car journeys few and far between.
One trip takes us to Skull Island – a tiny tropic islet, ringed by coral and the webs of giant orb spiders.
Here moss-covered human skulls are lain out reverently.
It harks back to the pre-Christian Solomons when some tribes kept the skulls of chiefs and ancestors.
My guide and Castaway Island Resort owner Peter Tipala Paulsen believes one of the island’s skulls is that of famous headhunter chief Ingava, who lived near modern Munda town.
Paulsen said his English great-grandfather, Frank Wickham, met Ingava at the turn of the last century.
I also hear how fierce fighting raged just across the water, near Munda town, and that the Peter Joseph WWII Museum contains fascinating artefacts collected from the battlefield by owner Barney Paulsen.
The next day we cross to Munda and rattle over potholed roads built during the war by US soldiers.
Inside the museum lie rusted bombs, an old plane engine, lost GI dog tags, and a dagger with vicious knuckle dusters.
Barney’s uncle had been a scout helping US soldiers during the war. He often crept close to Japanese lines to gather intelligence.
After the war, he showed Barney where all the artefacts and battle sites lay.
It’s time to Top Gun pose so I grab a rusted Thompson submachine gun, while Barney takes a rifle and bayonet.
Fat Boys Resort: Gateway to Gizo’s world-class diving and fishing
Then we’re back on the water - next stop is the famous Fat Boys Resort.
It’s further west, close to Gizo town and many of the Solomons’ best-known fishing, surfing and diving spots.
Guests stay in rustic but gorgeous overwater bungalows, while its restaurant rests on the end of a pier projecting over a coral reef.
Guests stay in rustic but gorgeous overwater bungalows at Fat Boys Resort. Photo / Supplied
I plunge into the water, straight from the restaurant decking, to snorkel among rainbow-coloured fish and past giant clam shells.
While I skip that evening’s fishing trip, my guide Brenden Mautoa returns with a huge Spanish mackerel.
Later, we eat barbequed lobster at nearby Kennedy Island – the island where former US president John F Kennedy was shipwrecked during World War II – and visit Dive Gizo owner Danny Kennedy (no relation).
He backpacked into the Solomons 39 years ago and never left.
He takes divers to a Japanese wartime shipwreck Toa Maru, complete with sake bottles still onboard, and a reef named Grand Central Station, which has one of the world’s highest fish counts.
He’s trying to turn the area into a marine reserve, employing locals as rangers.
Our boat ride to Grand Central Station is escorted by 30-40 dolphins and when I later snorkel over the rainbow a reef shark circles in the blue below.
At Fat Boys, I also hear concerns about climate change.
One recent king tide rose far higher than anyone had ever seen before, damaging properties and sweeping bungalows away right across the western Solomons.
Fat Boys Resort is your gateway to Gizo’s world-class diving and fishing. Photo / Supplied
Honiara: A city on the move
I end my time in the Solomons back in the dusty capital of Honiara for one of the trip’s most moving moments.
Michael Ben Walahula, from Iumi Tours, has taken me to the top of Bloody Ridge where one of the Pacific war’s most important battles took place and where three US Marines won the Medal of Honour for extreme valour.
His wealth of knowledge brings the battlefield back to life and the horrors faced by the soldiers.
Fascinatingly, the Solomons is once again attracting superpower interest.
While I’m in the country, a new Chinese-built athletics stadium opens to the public in Honiara.
It’s been built for the 2023 Pacific Games but has its opening night hosting the final of the local soccer competition.
One soccer-mad local tells me how excited he is to attend the game in a country where very little new infrastructure has been built in recent decades.
Yet he also wonders what the Chinese Government’s intentions are in the country.
Luckily, he assures me there are no such reservations for Kiwis and Australians.
The more tourists who follow in my path the better, he says.
Checklist
Solomon Islands
GETTING THERE
Honiara International Airport is in the capital city of Honiara. Fly from Auckland to Honiara with Qantas (operated by Alliance Airlines) or with Fiji Airways and Solomon Airlines with one stopover.
