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Wakaya Club & Spa, Fiji: This 12-person private island resort lets you disappear

By Craig Tansley

Updated August 12, 2022 — 10.14am

This article is part of Traveller’s Holiday Guide to the best of the Pacific.See all stories.

Wakaya Island was once the home of eccentric American millionaire David Gilmour.Credit: Alamy Stock Photo

In the early '70s an eccentric American millionaire flew over Wakaya Island and liked what he saw below. He was searching for a place far from the world, somewhere he could disappear for weeks at a time.

Wakaya Island had been uninhabited for over a century by then: ever since the island's chief and his loyal warriors leapt to their deaths to avoid capture by a war party from a neighbouring island.

David Gilmour built an 1100-square-metre villa overlooking the sea and the island's longest white-sand beach. He called it Vale O – or House in the Clouds – and lived here with his wife.

Ocean view suite: rooms are designed to feel like you're the only one there.

In 1990, he opened one of the South Pacific's most exclusive resorts, Wakaya Club & Spa, with room for only six couples, bunked down in enormous thatch-roofed bures beside a private beach with double hammocks tied between coconut trees.

I arrive three decades-or-so later, one of few Australians to set foot on Wakaya Island where Americans are the target market. Russell Crowe beat me here but his nationality is contentious. In a country famous for its private island resorts, Wakaya Island has flown completely under our collective travel radars.

Located in the Lomaiviti Archipelago east of Fiji's main island, Viti Levu, the only way to get to Wakaya Island is on board a 60-minute propeller plane transfer from Nadi Airport.

While this hardly makes the resort as convenient as one located on Denarau Island, it sure makes for a hell of an entrance. I touch down at what the pilot jokingly refers to as Wakaya International Airport, a gravel airstrip cut between the thick forest which covers the majority of the island.

The island is barely 900 hectares in size. It's 10 kilometres long, and no more than a-kilometre-and-a-half wide. Most of the island is protected within a nature preserve, while the sea that surrounds it is part of a marine protection area, famous for its coral and marine life.

I'm met by a local host and driven through the forest to a resort set beside the ocean where flamboyant trees blossom between hedges and meticulously trimmed lawn. I order a welcome drink – a Hibiscus Margarita seems appropriate – at a bar sunken to beach level within an open-plan restaurant built a few metres from a long white sand beach. Beyond that, the sea glows blue and as I stare across it, something huge – a manta ray, perhaps, this part of Fiji is famous for them – jumps clean out of the water.

I'm led to a room set beside the beach, the lush landscaping around it makes me feel like I'm the only one here. Though, I soon suspect: that's the whole point of this place. There are two restaurants and beside-the-pool dining despite there being a maximum of 12 guests. Even then, many guests prefer to picnic on their own section of a beach across the bay from the resort, where two chaise lounges are set beneath an umbrella and they're given a two-way radio to call in on when they want a pick-up.

There's plenty to do on the island, another reason why I won't see another guest in three days. It's one of Fiji's best dive resorts, for one. Room rates include dives each day, with 11 of Fiji's best dive locations a few minutes away by boat. Through the winter months, manta rays are frequent visitors. Humpback whales also pass close by. Fishing charters are also available and sail boats I can take out beyond the bay for a better look at Gilmour's private universe. There are hikes through the forests, where fallow deer (this is the only Fijian island you'll find them on) dart about with trepidation, probably due to the fact they feature regularly on the resort's farm-to-plate/sea-to-plate menu.

At least I have staff to talk to. During Fiji's pandemic-induced lockdown, locals returned to a semi-subsistence lifestyle in the village next door to the resort. Paid to maintain the resort, they spent their down time hunting deer, and catching fish. On Sunday, I visit their tiny wooden church to hear them sing.

I leave the island with four guests I've not laid eyes on during my stay. Two sets of couples, they hadn't seen each other either. David Gilmour sold Wakaya Club & Spa years ago, but he'd be satisfied knowing guests still come here to disappear for a while.