Not every hike goes smoothly. But when you do everything yourself, it's not as disappointing. This time though, I have someone to blame (:

Despite my dislike of large group outings, I fell for the local hiking club's offer of a night ascent to Suva Mountain (1810m above sea level; starting from ~900m). "I'd never go climbing an unfamiliar mountain in the dark alone, but these folks know what they're doing," I thought, and signed up. I was also curious how organized tourism works here.

funfact: You can pay for the trip either at the hiking club office or with an "electronic" payment at the nearest post office. Why it's called electronic isn't entirely clear (:

The plan was simple: arrive around midnight at the trailhead, climb to the top, catch the sunrise, and head back. The description really oversold the difficulty of the climb and the winter cold at the summit. In reality, everything was the opposite: the trail was comfortable, the top was fresh but not cold.

The place is fantastic, definitely worth going. But the organization fell short: there were too many people, and part of the group with the main guide rushed ahead and then agonizingly waited for the second half to catch up. Then the rested, faster folks waited for the tired, slow ones to recover. In the end, I spent half the hike in painful waiting (:

But while you can come to terms with waiting, you can't with missing out on beauty. Well, actually there were beautiful views, but we barely got to see them. During the night climb, the starry sky was magnificent—I hadn't seen anything like it in ages. As dawn approached, we got engulfed in clouds and watched the sunrise from inside them. Early morning in such places, that's usually the story—you often need to wait a bit to see something interesting. But the guide decided to head back through the curtain of water. About an hour later, I looked back and the summit was almost completely cleared. Well, so be it. Maybe next time.

At least we walked through the fog. It was amusing to suddenly encounter a herd of cows in it. All the beauty ended up being shown well below the summit, but even there it was lovely.