Monuriki Island is a small island maintained and operated by the chief of a neighboring island called Yanuya. Monuriki is uninhabited and a nature preserve. As an added bonus, this is also where the movie Cast Away was filmed in 1999 and 2000. Tom Hanks as Chuck and his companion Wilson were the leading characters.
We wanted to visit Monuriki, but first we had to do sevusevu with the chief on Yanuya and pay a small fee of $20FJ which goes to the “maintenance of the island.” After our sevusevu ceremony, we grabbed our friends Thomas and Mareike from Scooter and we dinghied the 1.2nm to the small island.
I took snap shots from the movie….to compare to the real thing.
The left corner of the island is where Chuck washed to shore on his inflatable life raft. The highest peak (on the left) is where he attempted to kill himself.
Of course, the director removed all surrounding islands in the movie…
The corner of Cast Away island is also where he wrote “Help Me” in the sand. Unfortunately for him it washed away with the tide, so the locals wrote it using coconuts. My friends changed it a little to Help Me Tom and you can guess as to whether they meant Tom Hanks or Thomas from Scooter.
Hike to the Summit
The island is a nature preserve. Hikers have to stay on the marked trails (no off the trail exploring). We wanted to go to the highest peak, but alas there was no trail. So, we climbed to the 2nd highest summit and were rewarded with a beautiful view of Cast Away island and her reefs.
On the way down, we found the famous rock where Chuck wrote his farewell after being on the island for 4 years!
We found Wilson! After being lost at sea, he returned to Monuriki island. One of the guides happened to be walking by with a tour group and we were able to borrow one of his props!
We had a great time visiting Monuriki (aka Cast Away island) which had the softest sand, a picnic table in the shade, a lovely hike to the summit, and lots of Hollywood history.
We made lots of little friends who were the best tour guides you could ask for on Yanuya.
The events from this blog occurred in early October. Our blog posts run 6-8 weeks behind actual events. We attempt to rescue a stranded boat on the reef in our last blog.