Still off-limits: Why I can’t wait to visit Samoa

What’s your idea of true, no-room-for-improvement heaven? For me, it’s waking to the sounds of gentle waves under a beach fale – a small thatched bungalow on stilts, open to the elements. Or, more specifically, it’s stepping out of that fale and straight on to the sands of Vavau Beach, lapped by one of Samoa’s many tropical lagoons, and devouring pineapple slices for breakfast before snorkelling in an aquamarine ocean trench. Is that so much to ask?

For more than two years, it has been. Following a firm closure as the Covid pandemic darted around the globe – punctuated by a short-lived travel corridor with New Zealand – my dream cluster of Pacific islands are reopening to Brits on 1 August for the first time in 28 months. My desperate wait for Samoa to roll out the welcome mat is a familiar tale: it’s the place I’d planned a big adventure to in 2020, foiled by events known all too well. It should have been a research trip to meet local artists keeping the ancient tradition of tatau alive. Tatau, or tattooing as it’s come to be known across the world, originates in Samoa, which has archivists, curators and renowned artists I was ready and raring to meet.

Tattooing isn’t the only unique tradition these Polynesian islanders are keeping alive. “Fa’a Samoa’’ or “the Samoan way”, is a 3,000-year-old culture that has withstood colonisation by Germany and Britain, and still takes pride of place in day-to-day life. It’s a reverence towards nature, elders, faith and family that is visible daily in Samoans’ careful, considered approach to food, traditions and the arts.

Like most visitors to Samoa, when the country lets me in I’ll likely stick to the two main islands – Upolu and Savai’i. Upolu is home to over 70 per cent of Samoa’s population as well as the charmingly low-rise capital city, Apia; Savai’i is the slightly larger, yet less touristy, of the two. International flights – usually from New Zealand, Fiji or Australia – land at Apia’s Faleolo International Airport, so Upolu is the natural starting point. That’s where I’ll begin, grabbing an all important local SIM card, learning some of the language and letting my jet lag settle, before juggling tattoo-culture research with waterfall chasing.