Especially flying with people on their way to a vacation I could sense the huge difference we are experiencing.

There is an island just in front of Savusavu that probably best represents what we are after and what we get.

We all share the picture of a blue lagoon with some palm trees on a white beach...

The island in question is bought by a Canadian investor that is now turning it to some kind of "dream island".

To do that he has to remove mangrove and the intense vegetation on the island, because that is the "real thing". In this humid air and heat it grows like mad.

Trees grow and other greeneries grow on the trees and on top of them, well you get the picture...

It is full of crabs, mosquitos, flies and birds (who feed on the other).

Since we were here the first time in August we have seen how they have teared down the vegetation and build a beautiful traditional Fijian house that you do not see anywhere on the islands.

Then they shipped new beautiful plants to design the island accordingly to the "picture" we all have, and so it will go.

Believe me, I have no critical opinion on what they are doing, it just works well to help us to accomplish the vacation picture.

So as many of my fellow passengers embarked the plane to Savusavu they had something like 6 days to relax and enjoy Fiji.

When they land on the airport, the resort knows that their time is precious so they are picked up by the resort van and swoooooped right to the reception where they will check in,

admire the beautiful view, jump in a bathing suite and into the pool.

So it goes, they live in their little "bubble" and Im sure they will be really happy when they go home.

A family on the plane asked me, when realizing I´ve been here a while if I had any suggestions on what to do. I told them that if they wanted to experience "India light" they should go to Lambasa. "India light?" they asked, "aren't we in Fiji?", well I explained that a big part of the population etc... and also I told them about the wonderful Indian restaurants were you can eat for 6 dollars (Fijian, is half of US), I could tell they were astonished, maybe even to much--- India? - 6 dollars? what kind of places can that be? But they asked politely if there were any tours to Lambasa and I responded that I don't know but you just take the local bus for 4 dollars and then you get to ride with local people, chickens etc...

Well they withdrew with some "sounds interesting". Im sure they pay 100 dollars a meal on the resort and sadly I do not think they will even make it to town.

I remembered when Ellinor and I were in Bali 13 years ago and we just went in to some american hotel to use their toilets, when we were leaving the premises a sign said:

WARNING!!! YOU ARE LEAVING A SAFE AREA. YOU ARE NOW ON YOUR OWN RISK!

So what Im saying is that as humans we form some kind of reality, a "bubble" that suits us. As cruisers we have our own bubble, our reality.

But I think our bubble forces us to interact more with the local business and people. We are definitely not in the resort bubble, we get to know the people in the market, Ellinor and Erika is just now dancing with a local woman that is setting up a performance the 17th of December  etc.etc.

Different boats will interact on different levels of course.

So where am I getting?

I think we all have glass bubbles= comfort zones. I think that it is good to be brave and go outside the bubble sometimes- to leave the safe area on your own risk.

I think our project has been forcing us to do so since June 2012 and that's probably why we do not consider it a vacation, even though we are privileged to live our life's the way we want...