Samoa Complete Guide 2026: Upolu, Savai'i, Robert Louis Stevenson & Polynesian Heritage
Browse more guides: Samoa travel | Oceania destinations Samoa Complete Guide 2026: Upolu, Savai'i, Robert Louis Stevenson & Polynesian Heritage I came to Samoa the long way, on a red-eye from Auckland with a paperback copy of "Treasure Island" jammed in the seat pocket. I had wanted to walk up Mt Vaea ever since I read that Robert Louis Stevenson, the Scottish novelist the Samoans called Tusitala (teller of tales), was buried on its 472-metre summit. Four days later I was on that summit, soaked with sweat, looking down at Vailima, the house he built in 1890, with the lagoon of Apia glinting beyond. By the time I left I had walked across two islands, swum at the bottom of a 30-metre lava-collapse swimming hole, and watched a Samoan tatau ceremony practised the same way since long before the first European saw these shores. This guide is the one I wish I had been handed before I flew in. It pulls together what I learned about Upolu and Savai'i, the costs in Sam...