Will Be Open

New Ba Hotel

In February

Fiji’s newest hotel, the Ba Hotel, in north-western Viti

Levu, just completed for

Northern Hotels Ltd., will open

to the public in early February.

It replaces the old hotel which

the Ragg family acquired in

1922 and which became part of the Northern Hotels chain in 1938.

THE new hotel, built adjacent to the old site, has a public bar, lounge bar, bottle shop, coffee shop and a large function room, which will be available for dancing or for con version into a beer-garden as required.

Guest facilities will include a din ing-room, private lounge and house bar on the ground floor; and, on the bedroom floor, another small lounge.

All bedroom accommodation is in dividually air-conditioned. There is one suite, with bath, shower and toilet (£FS double, £F4 single per day); five double rooms with bath, shower and toilet (£F4 double, £F3 single per day); and seven single rooms with shower and toilet (£F2/15/- per day).

A fresh water swimming pool is being built and will be open at the end of February.

The new hotel was built by Narain Construction Co. Ltd.

The licensee and manager is Mr, G, S. Bourke who is assisted by Mrs.

Bourke.

The hotel will provide Ba with facilities to suit the most discerning visitor, although Ba itself remains a sugar town and not a tourist town.

However, the Ragg family has been anxious to give Ba a first-class hotel for sentimental reasons as well as an investment. It was there, in 1922, that the founder of the firm, the late Sir Hugh Ragg, acquired his first hotel.

Korolevu Accommodation

Two new units of eight rooms each, to replace bures destroyed in the fire at the Korolevu Beach Hotel in August, were completed early in January and handed over to the owners, Northern Hotels Ltd.

The units were built by Reddy Con structions Co. Ltd., who are building two further units of eight rooms at the same site, which are expected to be completed soon.

When all four units are completed, Korolevu will have accommodation for 64 more guests, as all 32 rooms will be doubles. All have a view of the beach and have their own lanai (patio). Two are large enough for family use.

Work has also been in progress re cently enlarging and improving other hotels in Fiji owned by Northern Hotels.

In a statement issued in late De cember, the managing director, Mr.

David P. Ragg, said that when the current work programme was com pleted in February, his company would have 80 more beds available for tourists than it had before the Korolevu fire.

Sixteen of these would be at Koro levu, 24 at Nadi, 20 at Ba, and 20 at Lautoka.

Nadi Hotel

Mr. Ragg said: “To bring the Nadi Hotel up to a standard to accommo date overseas travellers, we have spent a considerable amount of money on updating our original accommodation and providing three other first-class rooms, one of which includes a garden flat overlooking the swimming pool, while there is a unit of eight bed rooms which has just been completed.

“Like the Korolevu units, they will be doubles. However, the eight new rooms in this unit at Nadi will have air-conditioning and this also goes for the three new rooms which have been added.

“A fresh water swimming pool has also been provided, while the recep tion and dining room areas have been updated.

“The accommodation at Lautoka has been extended by the provision of air-conditioning of the Namoli House. Hitherto there were 10 bed sitting rooms, but with air-condition ing, these have been changed into 20 doubles, each with its own shower and toilet.

“Tavua Hotel has been improved to cater for overseas travellers. A fresh water swimming pool will be operating early in the new year. This hotel serves the Tavua district in which is located the Vatukoula gold mines,”

IN the first ten months of last year Fiji had 32,312 visitors—more than the total for the whole of 1964.

October visitors numbered 3,458 which was 33 per cent more than in October, 1964.

THEY'RE READY NOW: The people of the island of Malaita, Solomon Islands, need no preparation for the tourist boom— they're ready now, according to Captain Stan Brown, of Suva, who took these pictures recently when he visited Malaita with members of a Royal Society ex pedition. "The pictures do not portray warriors readying themselves for battle," he says, "but vendors showing off their goods to members of the Royal Society expedition. Soon after the pictures were taken, all trinkets and ornaments had changed hands for cash".