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Like the path to tourism-based prosperity, the road to Tavuni Hill Fort is bumpy.
As it winds into the highlands of Fiji's biggest island, Viti Levu, women wash clothes in a nearby creek. Other locals wave.
Outside the vehicle now parked, savvy tour guide Albert Kurivitu is aware of the opportunity standing before him.
"This is a good place for the tourists to come and see,'' he says. A picture of him in the newspaper would also be quite good, he suggests, just in case this hasn't been thought of already.
A character, clearly, Mr Kurivitu fidgets with his T-shirt regularly, then abandons his guests momentarily in the pursuit of green oranges. He hasn't had breakfast.
A subsequent sit-down, with oranges to devour, proves a welcome diversion for the party. Fiji, in March, ahead of the Australian and New Zealand school holidays, is hot and humid.
And the welcome mat is out.
As a driver for a tour transport company had explained earlier in a one-sentence synopsis, tourism is down, but it is gradually picking up.
For Fiji's sake, one would hope so. Tourism is Fiji's biggest earner, outstripping the sugar cane industry.
So, when visitors from the Pacific nation's two biggest tourism markets Australia and New Zealand stop coming, as they did late in 2006, the effect on the population is significant.
A military coup led by Commodore Voreqe Bainimarama resulted in travel warnings and sanctions by the governments of Fiji's influential trans-Tasman neighbours.
There is almost no sign of the frowned-upon regime in the tourism belt, however. The capital, Suva, has been left off the itinerary, admittedly, and the military is presumably more visible there, but safety concerns seem far from the minds of sun-drenched tourists.
Some of the realities of Fijian life cannot have escaped their attention, but at various resorts they appear determined to shut out the world's hassles and enjoy their idyll.
Away from the beach, Mr Kurivitu can't fail to grab the attention of his guests when he shows them a killing stone at the once heavily-fortified Tavuni settlement. A date with the killing stone was the fate that befell enemies of the occupying tribes.
The bluff was settled in the early 1800s by a Tongan chief escaping a civil war in his homeland. The chief and his followers intermarried with neighbours and they lived in relative peace, with some skirmishes, until a rebellion of the hill tribes against the new colonial government in 1876.
Believing a measles epidemic to be the wrath of their gods against the acceptance of Christianity by Fijians on the coast, or a plot by the British, the hill tribes swept down to kill and eat their victims.
The Government mobilised native troops, however, and the last chief at the fort was among the rebels fatally wounded. The fort was torched, rebel strongholds destroyed and the ringleaders hanged.
A century later, work began on opening up the site for visitors, according to Mr Kurivitu, and tourists had their first look at the fort in the 1990s. The experience includes a glimpse of 56 house mounds, burial grounds and cooking ovens, with a view over the Sigatoka River.
A more sedate tourism attraction is the Kula Eco Park, staffed by 24 people. Quietly-spoken director Ramesh Chand talks with a humble demeanour about how it was originally a bird park in the 1980s that went bankrupt, but in 1997 he reopened it as a wildlife park. It includes a walkway, various birds and native and rare iguana.
In 2005, the park attracted 40,000 people, including 15,000 schoolchildren, Mr Chand says.
What happened after 2005 isn't clearly stated. That, presumably, has something to do with Fiji's political climate.
For an international gateway, Nadi is underwhelming. Food at the airport, prepared casually, comes at a stunningly expensive price.
Avoidance of pot holes on the fringes of town is a sport for motorists.
Fiji is coming out of the wet season, our driver explains. He doesn't add any comment about Fiji's lack of funds to invest in infrastructure, though that is inferred.
The contrast between Resort Fiji and the rest of the nation is stark.
The super-flash and beautifully set-up Warwick Resort and Spa on the Coral Coast is a 90-minute drive from Nadi. The journey there provides some clues on the nation's dynamics.
Vodafone's "Make the Most of Now'' slogan, which dominates bus stops, is surely there for irony and is probably mis-aimed in Fiji, where "Fiji time'' is a more familiar value.
Adidas and Nokia also have their billboards up and McDonald's welcomes customers with the oft-repeated "bula'' greeting. Rugby sevens legend Waisale Serevi promotes Pepsi.
Housing is often basic.
Litter on the roadside is common. It must annoy someone as "do not litter'' is emblazoned across a sports stadium grandstand in a televised soccer match where the Solomon Islands, even without Benjamin Totori and Alick Maemae, defeat Fiji 3-2.
The Warwick Resort is 92 percent occupied and appears to be doing well. The resort has its own rugby sevens team in the national league.
Weddings at the resort are increasingly popular. A conference there based on double/twin share accommodation costs about $280 a person a day.
Set up in the right location for tourists to enjoy sunsets, or electrical storms, the Warwick is a 250-room deluxe resort boasting several restaurants, swimming pools, tennis courts, squash courts, mini golf, massage facilities and a lagoon.
It must be unreal for the people who work there on about $2 an hour.
Resort manager Jack Stark says, over a delicious Italian meal, that the interim government imposed after the coup has some good points. It is trying to introduce reforms that will be positive for the Fijian people, he says.
An example he cites is labour relations legislation.
Employees at the resort are looking at a 7 percent increase, he says, as well as better job security.
In some ways, the Government doesn't matter much, Mr Stark says. Many New Zealanders have been to Fiji enough times that they know it isn't dangerous. Some come in spite of the New Zealand government's stance, or because of it.
Fiji Islands Visitors' Bureau senior marketing officer Thomas Valentine comments that elections are planned for the first quarter of next year.
Fijian media consistently refer to the military regime as the interim government and Commodore Bainimarama as the interim prime minister.
They refer to the coup as "the events of December 2006''.
But the reporting looks frank and fearless.
The Fiji Times incorporates Commodore Bainimarama's promise to "uphold media freedom'' in its masthead.
A court case involving deposed prime minister Laisenia Qarase has full coverage on television.
It seems that Fijians and tourists have grown used to political strife.
In 1987, the year of Sitiveni Rabuka's military coup, the total number of visitor arrivals was 189,996 dropping from 257,824 the previous year. The industry had recovered its momentum by the end of 1989, when there were 250,565 visitors.
Visitor numbers plummeted in 2000 when George Speight led a coup that ultimately flopped. The number of arrivals slumped from 409,955 in 1999 to 294,070 in 2000, before recovering to soar above 430,000 in 2003.
Tourism earnings before 2000 were hitting more than $500 million a year, according to the Fiji Bureau of Statistics. But in 2000 earnings slid to $387.2 million.
Provisional figures suggest the effect of the 2006 military coup is not nearly as pronounced.
Mr Valentine says last year finished with about 540,000 visitors, not far off the 2006 figure of 545,168 and 2005 figure of 549,911. There was still a slide, however, masked in part by the coup's end-of-year timing and by the fact it was signalled months before it happened.
The visitors' bureau is aiming for 570,000 visitors this year, including 100,000 New Zealanders.
Fiji's political problems appear to be back on the backburner as far as tourists are concerned.
"We're now 15 months down the line. We're slowly getting more families,'' Mr Valentine says.
"Time is a healer.''