Help concerning traveling in South Pacific?

skip Fiji... it's overrun with tourists and so not very pleasant.

I highly recommend going to the Federated States of Micronesia.... skip Chuuck unless you are really into wreck diving. Kosrae is beautiful and quiet.... there are nice waterfalls and ruins. Pohnpei is a bit bigger with bigger waterfalls and bigger ruins. Yap is very friendly and is the place with the stone money. All three have good scuba diving and snorkeling. There's an "island hopper" flight that goes from Guam to Chuuk to Pohnpei to Kosrae to the Marshall Islands (a separate country) and then on to Hawaii. Go to the Marshall Islands if you make arrangements to get off of Majuro.... The Marshalls are quite different from the high islands I mentioned above because the Marshalls are atolls.... small flat sand islands in a ring.

If you go to Yap, the flight continues on to Palau... which I think is heaven on earth. Spend some time in the Rock Islands... absolutely stunning. Again... there is great scuba diving and snorkeling here.

All of these places are in the Northern Hemisphere.

Fiji is in the Southern Hemisphere... and, like I said, skip it. New Caledonia is really special... it's a French island with incredible food, very interesting Pacific culture, friendly people and gorgeous scenery. Vanautu is also stunning.

I spent some time in New Britain and New Ireland which are islands that are part of Papua New Guinea. I highly recommend both for places to really spend time in Melanesia. The friendliest people in all of the Pacific were in New Ireland and they are really doing a nice job at just starting to welcome tourists. It was stunningly beautiful and remote. In New Britain there are great volcanoes, intneresting history, and stunning scenery. PNG has a bad reputation ... and I wouldn't be foolish about traveling there nor would I hang out for long in Port Moresby.... but the island provinces were really fabulous and off the beaten track.