To say that the Fijians are a friendly, loving people is an understatement! Within the first day we were there, the staff had all of our names memorized, including the gardening staff. The island was beautiful and totally secluded. This was definitely not your typical tourist trap.
The diving was handled very professionally by Bamboo Beach Divers (formerly Crystal Divers). We had three large dive boats which although they dove in the same general area, were able to take us to three different dive sites, so that we weren’t diving on top of each other. Fiji diving is an amazing experience. Known as the soft coral capital of the world, Fiji offers a bit of something for everyone. Even though we had a wide variety of diving experience amongst the group, we were all able to find diving suitable for every skill level. The amazing sights included forests of soft and hard corals, numerous nudibranchs, flat worms, bright blue colored starfish, crinoids, lion fish, gigantic puffers, sea snakes, eels, white tip, black tip, and oceanic white tip sharks, wahloo, rainbow runners, tuna, jacks, schooling barracuda, and more colorful reef fish then I have ever seen anywhere on the planet! At dive sites called Golden Dreams, Maytag, Circus, Black Magic Mountain, Mellow Yellow, Zig Zag, Cannibal Caves, Instant Replay, Pot Luck and others we did drift dives, deep dives, shallow relaxed dives, night dives, wreck dives, and a few people even managed to fit a little training in during the week. Kennon Sandlin, Steve Tripp and Scott Olcott finished up their Advanced Open Water by the last day there. A few people had to stretch out of their comfort zones, but I think that all will agree that they had a wonderful time both above and below the water.
While at the resort, we got used to being called to meals by one of the resort staff beating on a large wooden drum carved from a log, and having incredible personal service by the staff. All of the meals included our choice of two different entrees, one of which was usually some type of fish and the other usually chicken or beef. A special vegetarian meal was available by request. We ate as a group with all 34 of us in the same dining hall. We were the only people at the resort until midweek when a lone gentleman named Bob joined us, and we made him an honorary Dive Addict! He enjoyed getting to know everyone so much that he asked to be put on our email list so he could join us on another trip! (I guess he didn’t get to know us all that well!)
The flight over and back was not too bad. We flew out of Los Angeles directly to Nadi, which was an 11 hour flight. Flying to Fiji overnight allowed most of usto sleep on the plane most of the way. We left SLC on a Thursday night at 8:30 PM and arrived in Fiji on Saturday morning about 6 AM. (It sounds worse than itwas, since we lost a day due to the international date line.) On the trip back home, we left Fiji at 10:00PM Saturday night and arriving in Salt Lake City at 6:00 PM Saturday night. Who says time travel doesn’t work! Overall the trip included world class diving, and non-stop fun!
