Follow the trail marked out by Captain Cook. Meet the smiling people of Polynesia and Melanesia. Wander through lush, flower-filled landscapes that you thought were the stuff of fiction. Little wonder. Most of us have only dreamt about such places, leafing through the pages of Daniel Defoe’s Robinson Crusoe, or gazing at portraits by the celebrated impressionist Paul Gauguin. This is where Robert Louis Stevenson and W. Somerset Maugham came for their inspiration. Where movie makers borrowed Fiji for the Blue Lagoon, and more recently, asked the mountains of New Zealand to pose as Middle Earth. The reality is more striking still. Imprinted on the landscape are lively cities by the sea, colonial outposts that mimic the styles their settlers left behind. And from statues as old as time to modern relics of America’s war in the Pacific, you’ll find yourself utterly captivated by these magical, storied isles.
|
