Levuka

Fiji’s first capital, on the east coast of Ovalau, built by traders and beachcombers around a harbour rather than laid out by planners. Seru Epenisa Cakobau was crowned king here when the Kingdom of Fiji was established in 1871, and on 10 October 1874, at Nasova just along the shore, he signed the Deed of Cession that handed the islands to Britain. The capital did not stay. Levuka sits under hills 600 metres high, several of them cliffs, with nowhere to grow, so the administration moved to Suva in 1877 and the change was formalised in 1882. Being passed over is what preserved it: the colonial waterfront was never redeveloped, and UNESCO listed the town in June 2013 as exceptional testimony to the late colonial port towns of the Pacific.