Imeri's Funtastic Village Homestay

The outer Yasawa Islands at the northern end of the chain present the traveller with a choice that sharpens with each island passed on the Yasawa Flyer ferry: stop at the next resort, or keep going to something less managed, less predictable, and more genuinely Fijian. Wayasewa Island — the small island at the southern end of the Waya island group, also known as Waya Lailai — is the kind of destination that rewards the decision to keep going. The island is dominated by the dramatic volcanic peak that rises from its centre, accessible by a hiking trail with views that justify the climb entirely. The reef that rings the western shore holds white-tip reef sharks in numbers that make snorkelling a genuinely remarkable experience. The mantas that pass through the adjacent waters are among the reasons the Yasawas attract serious divers and snorkellers from around the world. And in Namara Village, on the island’s western coast, Imeri and her husband Waisale run the homestay that puts all of these experiences within reach of guests who choose to live in the village for a few days rather than observe it from a resort deck.

Imeri’s Funtastic Village Homestay is the specific kind of accommodation that travellers who have been to Fiji multiple times describe as the experience they were looking for on earlier trips and finally found. The reviews are consistent in their testimony: a guest from one part of the world describes the food as the best they ate on the island, the sharks as the most extraordinary underwater experience of their visit, the village community as warmer and more genuinely welcoming than they had anticipated. A couple who went during a significant village event — the death of the chief, which brought ritual restrictions across the community — found that even in those circumstances, Imeri made them feel welcomed and the local rugby team stepped in to include them in village activities. These are not resort reviews; they are descriptions of hospitality encountered in a home.

Imeri’s Funtastic Village Homestay is in Namara Village on Wayasewa Island (Waya Lailai) in the southern Yasawa Islands, Fiji. Accommodation is in basic rooms with mosquito nets and shared bathroom facilities. All meals are included — prepared by Imeri from fresh-caught fish and chemical-free farm produce. Activities available from the homestay include shark snorkelling on the house reef, mountain hiking with panoramic views, manta ray encounters, spear fishing with the family, kava ceremonies with village elders, basket weaving, coconut milk preparation, and boat trips to nearby reefs and the Sawa-i-Lau Caves. Access is by boat from Lautoka Fisheries Wharf, arranged through Imeri, approximately one hour’s journey. Local bus from Nadi to Lautoka takes approximately two hours. Alternatively, the Yasawa Flyer ferry stops at Waya Lailai Ecohaven, from which the village is accessible.

Wayasewa Island

Wayasewa Island — the name means Waya Lailai in Fijian, distinguishing it from the larger Waya Island to the north — is one of the islands of the inner Yasawa chain at the point where the character of the group shifts from the more touristically developed southern cluster toward the quieter, more remote northern islands. The island’s topography is the dramatic volcanic geology that the Yasawas share: a peak rising steeply from the coastline, forested on its upper slopes, with views from the summit ridge that encompass the full reach of the island group to the north and the Bligh Water to the east. The shoreline alternates between sandy beaches, coral-fronted bays, and the rocky margins of a reef-encircled island that has not seen the visitor pressure that has depleted the reefs of more accessible locations in the chain.

The reef on the western side of Wayasewa — the side where Namara Village sits — holds marine life that multiple experienced divers and snorkellers describe as extraordinary by the standards of anywhere in the Pacific. The white-tip reef sharks that inhabit the shallower sections of the reef are accessible from the beach without significant snorkelling expertise. The mantas that pass through the adjacent blue water are encountered on short boat trips from the village. The spear fishing that Waisale practices for the family’s meals takes guests through reef sections where the fish populations have not been reduced by the decades of snorkelling excursion traffic that the southern Yasawa reefs have absorbed.

Imeri and Waisale

Imeri is the homestay’s host, cook, and the primary social presence that guests describe in their accounts. Her warmth, her cooking, and her capacity to make guests feel genuinely at home — rather than accommodated for commercial purposes — are the features that appear in every account of a stay at the homestay. She cooks from the family’s chemical-free farm and from the fish that Waisale and the village men catch. Her meals are not approximations of resort food: they are the food that this family eats, prepared with the specific knowledge of a cook who has learned from the island’s ingredients rather than from a hotel kitchen’s standard list. The surwa — a Fijian fish and vegetable preparation that one guest describes as something they ate repeatedly and could not stop eating — is the signature dish that guests return to in their accounts years after the stay.

Waisale, Imeri’s husband, is the practical and social complement to Imeri’s domestic and culinary focus. He is warm and engaged with guests in a way that multiple accounts specifically note — not performing welcome but genuinely interested in the conversations and the activities that bring visitors to the island. He is the guide for the shark snorkelling and spear fishing, the boat driver for excursions to the Blue Lagoon and other nearby reefs, and the local knowledge holder whose understanding of the island’s marine environment transforms a snorkel into an informed encounter rather than a random swim.

The extended family and the village community that surrounds the homestay contribute to the experience in ways that cannot be planned or scheduled. The village rugby team, who stepped up to include visiting guests during a period of community mourning, represent the specific spontaneous generosity of a Fijian village community — something that no excursion programme can replicate because it requires the genuine social fabric of people who live on this island and who naturally extend that fabric to include visitors who make the effort to come.

The Food

Imeri’s cooking is, in the unanimous assessment of the guests who have experienced it, the outstanding feature of a stay at the homestay. The claim deserves unpacking because it is extraordinary: guests describe her cooking as superior to the food at the island resorts, as something they could not get enough of, as the specific thing they would return to Wayasewa to experience again. This is the food of a family that eats from what the island and the sea provide, prepared daily by a woman who has been cooking this food for her own family for years and who brings the same care to guests’ meals that she brings to her household’s.

Meals are served in the dining space with the sea view — the specific combination of good food and a beautiful outlook that the homestay’s position on the western coast of Wayasewa provides. The communal meal table, where guests and family gather together, is the social centrepiece of the day’s rhythm: breakfast before activities, the return meal after snorkelling or hiking, and the evening dinner where the day’s experiences are shared across the table.

The chemical-free farm that provides the vegetables, herbs, and tropical fruits for Imeri’s cooking is a practical expression of the lifestyle that the homestay represents: the family grows what they eat, without the chemical inputs that commercial agriculture requires, in the specific relationship with the land that island families have maintained for generations. Guests who visit the farm as part of their stay see the source of what they have been eating and understand the connection that makes the food taste different from what a restaurant kitchen can produce.

Snorkelling with Sharks

The shark snorkelling on the house reef at Wayasewa is the activity that guests describe most vividly and most enthusiastically. White-tip reef sharks — the elegant, reef-associated species that inhabits Fiji’s outer island reefs in healthy populations — are present on the reef in front of the village in numbers that make encounters reliable rather than hoped for. Waisale uses speared fish as bait to draw the sharks close enough for genuine observation, and the result — watching these animals at arm’s distance in the clear water of the outer Yasawa reef — is the kind of experience that guests carry as a specific, permanent memory of their Fiji visit.

The snorkelling beyond the shark zone includes the coral formations and reef fish populations that the pristine Wayasewa reef supports. The Blue Lagoon is accessible by a short boat transfer — a 15 Fijian dollar journey that adds the famous bay’s specific turquoise water quality to the range of marine environments available from the homestay base.

Hiking the Mountain

The hike to the summit ridge of Wayasewa Island takes approximately ninety minutes to two hours for the round trip — a demanding hill walk through the island’s forested interior that delivers guests to a viewpoint that multiple accounts describe as justifying every step of the climb. The panorama from the ridge encompasses the full sweep of the Yasawa Islands to the north, the Bligh Water to the east, and the outer islands visible on clear mornings to the west. The guide who leads the climb — Nathan, specifically praised in one account — provides the natural history and local context that transforms a walk into an interpretation.

The walk departs from the village, passes through the forest cover of the island’s slopes, and climbs to the ridge through terrain that is steep enough to require physical effort but not technical enough to exclude hikers of moderate fitness. The views from the top are the specific reward that guests describe as worth the walk even on days when the heat of the lower slopes made the ascent demanding.

Cultural Activities

The cultural activities that the homestay facilitates are expressions of village life rather than scheduled performances: kava ceremonies with the village elders are the actual evening ritual of the community, not a demonstration prepared for visitors; the basket weaving workshop uses materials gathered from the island’s vegetation and produces skills that the village women pass between generations; the coconut milk preparation that Imeri demonstrates is the cooking technique that underlies the island’s cuisine.

The village visits that guests make with Imeri’s facilitation include the school, the community meeting house, and the homes of families who welcome visitors with the generous hospitality that Fijian village culture produces at its most natural. The invitation into people’s homes that multiple guests describe — the spontaneous conversation with families encountered on walks, the community members who engage visitors in genuinely curious exchange — is the specific social experience that distinguishes a village homestay from any managed encounter with Fijian culture.

Getting to Wayasewa Island

The most practical access to Wayasewa from Nadi is by local bus from Nadi to Lautoka (approximately two hours) and then by boat from the Lautoka Fisheries Wharf, arranged in advance through Imeri. The boat journey takes approximately one hour across the outer water to the island. Imeri’s coordination of the boat transfer is the logistical element that makes the access straightforward: she arranges the pickup, the timing, and the return journey to ensure guests arrive and depart without the uncertainty that would otherwise attend getting to and from a small outer island.

The Yasawa Flyer ferry from Port Denarau Marina serves the Yasawa Islands daily and stops at Waya Lailai Ecohaven — the resort on the island — from which the village is accessible. For travellers who want to include Imeri’s homestay in a broader Yasawa itinerary using the Bula Pass, this access is practicable.

Final Thoughts

Imeri’s Funtastic Village Homestay on Wayasewa Island is the outer Yasawa experience that travellers who push past the organised resorts of the southern chain discover when they go further and find somewhere that operates on a different principle entirely: not the principle of hospitality as a service product but of hospitality as a natural expression of who Imeri and Waisale and the village of Namara are. The sharks, the mountain, the food, the kava with the elders, the village children, the rugby team who took visitors in during a period of community grief — these are the experiences that the guests who find Imeri’s carry back with them as the specific, unrepeatable memory of what Fiji can be when encountered at its most genuine.

Frequently Asked Questions

Where is Imeri’s Funtastic Village Homestay?

In Namara Village on Wayasewa Island (Waya Lailai) in the Yasawa Islands — accessible by boat from Lautoka Fisheries Wharf, approximately one hour’s journey. The Yasawa Flyer ferry also serves the island.

How do I book the boat transfer?

Contact Imeri directly to arrange boat transfers from Lautoka Fisheries Wharf. She coordinates both arrival and departure transfers. The journey takes approximately one hour.

Is food included?

Yes — all meals are included. Imeri cooks from the family’s chemical-free farm and from fresh-caught fish. The cooking is consistently described by guests as outstanding.

What activities are available?

Shark snorkelling on the house reef, mountain hiking with panoramic views, manta ray encounters, spear fishing, kava ceremonies with village elders, basket weaving, coconut milk making, village walks, and boat trips to nearby reefs and the Blue Lagoon.

What is the accommodation like?

Basic rooms with mosquito nets and shared bathroom facilities. The focus of the homestay is on the village experience, the cooking, and the outdoor activities rather than room amenities.

Is it suitable for solo travellers?

Yes — most guests arrive solo and describe the village social environment as welcoming and engaging. The communal meals and the activity programme make solo stays socially comfortable.

What should I bring?

Snorkel equipment is available from the homestay. Bring Fijian dollars for activities, a sarong or sulu, sunscreen, and a waterproof bag for boat transfers. Good walking shoes for the mountain hike. Rain gear for wet season visits.

By: Sarika Nand