Would I recommend someone travel all the way to Pago Pago (pronounced Pahngo Pahngo) for some R & R? Absolutely not. Why? Let me list the reasons:

1. There are maybe three restaurants on the island. And one of the places the hotel concierge recommended had an inside joke about diarrhea associated with it. No thank you.

2. Speaking of threes, there are only three hotels on the island and Sadie’s By The Sea, where we stayed, was the best option. It had a beach, a great restaurant, a friendly concierge, but the rooms reminded me of our sterile Holiday Inn hotel rooms in the bad part of Mexico City. Oh, and one of the crew members had their cell phone stolen.

3. There’s not much to do. There’s no shopping, there are barely any restaurants, and the only beach side restaurant we came across- Tisa’s Barefoot Bar- was closed. With that said, when our Crown Princess cruise ship came into port, the whole island changed: shops came out of nowhere, our hotel suddenly had stand up paddle boarding and drink specials, and there were street side vendors with fruit! Whaaaaaaa???

So, with all these reasons, why do I find myself yearning for my time in Pago Pago, American Samoa? Well, it’s a classic example of the question: is it the destination or the people that make the experience?

When it comes to American Samoa, it was a little bit of both, but mostly the latter. The people I was with were amazing. We had the island to ourselves! It was unreal. We rented a cheap car from the hotel and let the one road takes us for as long as we could explore. Every single beach was deserted with these gorgeous huts. It’s an instagrammer’s dream and truly one of the most magical places I’ve been to in this world.

I want to go back, get away from it all, and, of course, bring my DSLR.

The episode where we filmed in Pago Pago airs this Saturday on Vacation Creation (ABC).

To see more of my pictures from Pago Pago, follow my instagram @AndreaFeczko