Tonga National Museum / Chill City Day

Had a relatively slow last morning at the backpackers, packed everything up, showered and got out by about 11:20, even though checkout was at 10 haha. Island time!

As my last day in the city, I wanted to check out the museum, which was closed on the weekend. A cute little one-room exhibit that only cost $5 TOP. Nice air conditioned room where I could put down my heavy bags haha. Mostly artefacts from the museums collections, with some information. And pictures of the past royalty of Tonga. Nice map of the highlights of the island to see as well, which I took note of, for my day exploring the island.

My next stop was going to be to rent a car, that way I could spend the day exploring the island and drive it to Lupe’s, and drop it off the next morning for a 24h rental. But unfortunately I texted and there were no more cars available today.

But I went to the car rental place anyway, as the lady said she could rent me a car for tomorrow! She said she would give me a more expensive car at the cheaper price. So I walked over there, and figured it out with her. I probably should have gotten food first as I had barely eaten anything at this point but oh well.

I figured out that Lupe would come pick me up from town later today, and drive me to the car rental place tomorrow around 11am. Talking to the car rental lady was funny. I was hungry and so didn’t totally have my energy or wits about me, but she’s a funny Russian lady who runs this service, and was talking to me in a way that made it seem like she thought I wasn’t that bright lol. But after some back and forth and reading the fine print and whatnot, I got the rental for what was advertised as NZ$60 a day plus NZ$40 for insurance, but with the conversion to Tongan Pa’anga and then to CAD w my card, ended up being CA$100 total. So not too bad for a 24h rental, and nice to have my own car. The plan is to pick it up tomorrow at 11:30am and drop it off on Wednesday, so I have all of Tuesday to explore the island of Tongatapu!

Next stop was definitely getting food, so I went back to the Chinese restaurant to get some beef fried rice for only TOP$6.90 (like CA$4.50)! Had a nice little lunch by the water. Also discovered the tourism centre, which had AC and free wifi! Stopped by the post office to mail a letter to Sophie, and made my way back to where Lupe would pick me up at the backpackers. Waited under the awning of the ANZ bank as it was pouring rainRead more