My wife and I are recently back from our Fiji diving vacation and it was a great time.
Our first four nights were spent at the Pacific Lagoon Resort. We arrived from the 2.5 hour transfer from Nadi to be told we were being upgraded to their deluxe suite, not one to argue we took this stoically and went upstairs to a beautiful room overlooking the lagoon. We found out we were the only guests in the resort. It was very strange to have the whole place to ourselves. We had booked originally to be close to Beqa Adventure Divers (BAD) who run their operation on the premises. This package was arranged thru the Nai'a with the help of Joeli who can arrange 3 day add on packages to either side of your trip. The manager of B.A.D. is Andrew who was extremely helpful and fantastic for any questions or advice that comes up. We had come primarily for the shark dives and Andrew had arranged back to back shark dive days vs the normal soft coral/shark itinerary of the 3 day add on package. Those dives were outstanding and we have been on a number of shark dives. We would highly recommend them. The meals were included in the package and I will say it was a little strange to enter the spacious dining area to see just two table settings at our favorite spot each meal. The staff and indeed almost all the Fijian people we encountered were very friendly and happy. The general economy and the Australian drop in tourism since the "coup" has resulted in most places in Pacific Harbor being nearly empty from what we were told. The exception being the shark dives where it could vary from just a few people to a full boat depending on the day. We (mostly me) left wishing we had arranged more dives as the shark wranglers Papa and Rusi consistently put us in the "sweet spot" for great video and the Bull Sharks were huge.
We took a shuttle back to Nadi where we met the pick up for the main attraction adventure on the Nai'a. She is docked at the Lautoka Wharf about a half hour from the city and we met a few other guests on the ride there. One diver was on his second trip and after our first trip I can understand why they get a lot of repeat customers. When we arrived and were welcomed aboard we were told by the cruise director Sam Campbell that there were only seven guests due to some last minute cancellations. In fact, even his partner and fellow cruise director Brigitte had also had to leave on a family emergency. We assumed on a boat for 18 with less than half the guests he would go it alone, but the Nai'a is a boat of exciting surprises and this was no exception.
After our checkout dive we returned and picked up none other than Cat Holloway, original Nai'a Pro come straight from Oz and the kids to help Sam out.
Cat and Sam proved fantastic hosts, both with a wealth of knowledge from diving exotic locales and grand adventures.
Their stories left me wondering why I hadn't traveled/dove all over Asia and the Red Sea before I had turned 30 (next time around for sure).
The diving was phenomenal even if a little overcast some days. The typical routine: an early morning dive, breakfast, another great dive, lunch, yet an even better dive, change tapes, batteries eat more snacks go on the "dusk dive" that as the sun went down that morphs into a full on night dive that is even better, then a excellent dinner, good conversation or unconsciousness depending.....
Sam said a 5th dive was available but by the end of most days unlike other places we've been we were just wiped. Some people had skipped the dusk/night dives altogether till we came back hi-fiving over 3 pygmy seahorses and countless other cool discoveries on one dive thanks to Richard, Joeji and Ben; master spotters of the sub macro. While on the subject, unlike many liveaboards we have been on the Nai'a really is like a family with many of the crew going back to the start. I swear it seemed they knew every golden mantis home and could always lead you back to the same tiny spot they had observed something two weeks (years?) earlier. These guys and ladies were the some of the best folks it has been our chance to adventure with.
Special mention has to go to Richard who clearly delighted in showing everyone the magical creatures hidden amongst the wonders of soft and hard corals.
Speaking of magic, diving with Cat was an adventure in itself. I have never dove with with someone of her experience that took such sheer unbridled joy in what she did.
The huge smile visible around her reg as she frantically waved us over to video the coveted sea snake in soft corals shot or the prolonged whale song I ignored in my obsession (to get that perfect Randell goby and rare double shrimp shot) that turned out to be Cat yelling for my attention 60 ft above so we could chase Mantas off the sea-mount into the blue. Long out of air, we snorkeled overhead while 10-14 Mantas executed an incredible ballet around her as she videoed their graceful dance. Sam had his macro lens on his huge Gates housing that dive but still captured some great footage he called macro mantas.
Sam would give his detailed briefing and dive plan with a caution to the exact timing of currents and next thing I knew we would follow Cat off on some tangent that would lead to impossible walls of purple and gold soft corals finishing with not one but three rare Nai'a red banded pipefish.
We couldn't properly review the Nai'a without mentioning how much help Sam was above and below the surface. We had never had more video related repair challenges than this trip and Sam always helped out. He also gave me some excellent video tips that worked much better on the local subjects than my normal preference for large sharks. Not that we missed out totally, Nigali Pass had nice Reef shark action as well as cooperative Malabar groupers, only downside was we did two days there and the second day we saw many sharks seen from the previous day now with hooks and one pregnant female wrapped badly in line from a boat we saw during the night that was gone in the morning. Cat pointed out the need for an official marine sanctuary protection many of these areas are lacking, not to mention an enforcement branch.
Our village visit lovo (feast) and Kava ceremony was in some persistent overcast and drizzle as some of the week had been but the diving had been so great we couldn't complain. The tribal elders when told about the recent multiple manta encounters said "they bring bad weather". They weren't kidding. It got so rough we were unable to do our planned stops at Mount Mutiny and E-6 on our return. However, with Nai'a's two zodiac arrangement they are made to deploy in just such seas (if you are) and we were! More dives at Mellow Yellow and Howard's Diner yielded vacation gold as we were slightly less overwhelmed and could explore more of the bommies to round out the bucket list of fish and critters we hadn't checked off.
The Nai'a is hands down one of the most best liveaboards we have experienced and the crew made the outstanding marine life even better. We will be back!
Sorry if this is so long, but it was an exceptional trip with an exceptional outfit. We couldn't even begin to cover all the great things we experienced.
John and Kelly Casey
