Fiji

It turns out I was the only one leaving the island heading north on this particular day so I got the full force of half the staff singing the farewell song to me. It was delightful, endearing and incredibly awkward for someone of my personality, especially when almost everyone insisted on giving me a big hug afterwards. I still loved it though and will miss all those cheerful personalities. That said it was just as well I hadn’t tried to squeeze an extra dive in as the northward boat was fairly early (it seems to vary a reasonable amount depending on specific drop offs.)

Once back onboard the Yasawa Flyer (this time a different one called the Panther) we headed northward, this time with MUCH nicer weather and a proper view of the scenery. It continued to make excellent time as the boat was nearly empty and based on my brochure seemed to be skipping roughly half the stops. It still took a while though as my next stop was at the end of the chain at the Blue Lagoon beach resort.

The eponymous blue lagoon is actually the water between a number of islands up at the north end of the chain and is indeed the blue lagoon where most of both versions of the film were shot. It seemed as if the catamaran was taking a fairly circuitous route through the lagoon but as my travels over the coming days would show it’s a fairly shallow lagoon with lots of reefs and rock formations lurking. The resort itself was obviously a bit more of a traditional resort than my last digs and came out with a ~20 passenger excursion boat to pick us up. A fairly sizable group of us were disembarking and again as we came to shore a welcome part of the staff were singing a welcome and smiling ear to ear. This time however there was a delicious pineapple and berry smoothie in a champagne flute to add to the experience.

Side note on the film track of things, the island from Castaway is also in the chain and has a resort as well. How sick of Wilson jokes do you think they are?

My guidebook wasn’t wrong, the beachfront villas at the BLBR were indeed spectacular. Sadly I wasn’t in one of those. Because I’d gone a bit upmarket at this stop I was in the ‘lodge’ area which was essentially groups of side by side rooms which reminded me a bit of some of the old cabin motels you see in the backwoods of Wisconsin/Michigan etc. They were spotless, had small patios with a bench to relax on and a pretty garden area. The bathroom was shared with the two small dorms (male/female) but it was large and had extremely good water pressure for the showers. It was perfectly pleasant, just not as magical as the Barefoot Manta experience had been. Were I to return with someone I’d probably spring for at least one of the non-beach villas.

The food however… good lord… While I still maintain the first few nights food was tasty, the Blue Lagoon’s culinary team was top notch. After settling in the newcomers all straggled in to the beachfront restaurant and I found myself with a table overlooking the beach at mid tide. The lunch menu was a choice of about 10 different items, all of which sounded delicious but wanting to go for something very different than the previous nights I had a chicken schnitzel, which honestly turned out to be something that made me assume the chef had trained in the us at one point because while it was delicious and lightly fried… it was served with a peppery gravy very reminiscent of something you’d have with chicken fried chicken. There was always a pie of the day at lunch too which was always popular with the aussies/kiwis. Breakfasts were a full continental as well as your choice of various hot breakfasts including eggs benedict, pancakes in the usual or the asian way, full english breakfast and so on. All of this was great; however…

Dinners were at another level. I would have loved to experience the full cycle they no doubt have in place but while I was there we had a curry night where the tables of four got what seemed like half an east india company buffet dropped off at the their table. My solo dinner was a giant tray with 4 kinds of curry, naan, salad, fruit and pickle, and that was AFTER one of the best dal soups I’ve ever had. Another night was just a six course meal with multiple choice for each course because why not.

The vibe at this place was a strange but pleasant one. You definitely got a sense that some of the guests were high roller-ish, but at the same time they’re rubbing shoulders with backpackers (though admittedly not the absolute low budget backpackers.) There was also a more sizable Canadian contingent during my stay, half made up of one large extended family with three generations there. I’ll also admit to feeling like I stuck out a bit more at this resort as a solo traveller around 40. While I’m still happy to have a good chat with the backpacking crowd there’s definitely more of a gulf there than when I was doing my grand travels a decade ago. Anyway, after that first lunch I quickly went and changed into swim gear, grabbed my ebook and found a spot on the edge of the beach. It was a very hot afternoon that I spent in and out of the water, soaking up some rays and marvelling at the fact that I could see ten feet down in the water from well on shore. It’s really hard to convey just how magical the water is here… pictures are startling but still don’t do it justice.

Day two dawned early as I was catching the first dive boat out to a site that I’d heard was phenomenal. The dive shop at the BLBR actually serves a number of the surrounding resorts and I was buddied up with an older lady who was staying at the Turtle Island resort nearby. I remembered reading in my guidebook that it was the ultimate of fancy pants and also where a lot of blue lagoon stuff was filmed and she confirmed that it was completely over the top but her husband liked to travel fancy. Looking it up later I found that their smallest villa costs per night what my entire 7 day island trip cost… must be nice.

The dive site (BONZAI!) was surprisingly far out west given that there’s not much in that direction but Australia. I guess the shelf continues out a fair way because when we went under the surface I discovered a beautiful reef face, coral everywhere and an abundance of Anenomefish poking their noses out to fend off us intruders. It was a beautiful spot but honestly that first section of the reef was the highlight, especially with the lovely visibility. The others on the boat had been diving all week (this resort has a ‘dive all you can for a week’ package available that I am sorely tempted to return and do as it’s a ridiculous bargain) and had been dealing with less than great viz the previous few days due to all the rain so I guess my timing was good. My only annoyance was that my breath control wasn’t great on this particular dive and I had to surface a bit early but my companions assured me I’d caught the best of the views. I decided to skip the second dive that day and just snorkel as there were some other (paid) activities I wanted to catch as well during the trip so pacing my diving was best. Thinking back now I’m also glad I hadn’t chosen to do both when my breath control was bad on the first one just in case it was an asthma thing I wasn’t noticing and would have been as bad again.

One thing I haven’t mentioned about the place is the sheer volume of crabs everywhere. There are various types of fiddler crabs almost everywhere you look and spots where they’ve burrowed everywhere else. Tiny little white almost ghostly crabs are near impossible to see but scurry everywhere around the beach. Peak crab happened to me at dinner that night when as I was eating my seafood curry I noticed a little boy looking at my feet most intently but before I could look under the table something pointy scuttled across my foot and I jumped before I saw him cruise over to another table. The following night there was a shriek from the restaurant restroom and a woman ran out and said there were four of them around the ladies toilet snapping their claws. A bunch of them even ended up in the swimming pool one night until one of the staff pulled them out… I didn’t notice if they were set free or taken to the kitchen 😉

The following morning was another early start as the trip to the Saw-I-Lau caves set out from the dive shop at around 8:30 and I needed some Eggs Benedict first. I wasn’t the only one. Originally I’d been glad I signed up for the cave early but I guess interest was such that they decided to take two boats. We set out north to Sawa-I-Lau island and in the process got a view of Yasawa Island itself which is the northernmost in the chain and has a couple actual settlements, some roads and a tiny airport. The cave island is owned by the local tribes and visits are controlled, most of the caves are off limits but the spectacular flooded cave we visited is not.

The caves are tall and echoing limestone caverns filled with a mix of salt and fresh water. Formed underwater and thrust aboveground by tectonic movement they’re beyond picturesque though annoyingly my waterproof camera was acting up. We disembarked at a small beach and splashed through some absolutely gorgeous warm waves to reach a small staircase. I was honestly expecting a more substantial climb but the cave entrance was only about 30 feet up followed by an immediate drop down and some very low rocks over the steps. Leaving our sandals (and phones for most) behind we splashed down into the deep clear cave into water that while not at all cold by home standards was a bit of a shock after the warm seas we’d just left.

The first cavern is about 1/3 open to the sky but far far above which combined with the foliage makes for almost mystical streams of light descending to the water’s surface. There is something almost alien about the scene, the pitted and smooth rock walls shimmer in the reflections off the water and the sounds of human visitors echoing strangely over and over. The other neat part of the adventure came after as our guides showed us a swimthrough that the braver among us ducked under and swam 10 feet or so towards a waving flashlight and surfaced in a new dark section of the caves.

As we collected those brave enough to do the swim-through we eventually got to venture deeper into the blackness until we found the one spot of light, a narrow well apparently called the spitting cave because a drop of water from it will apparently echo throughout the cave. I can believe it after spending half an hour in the inky blackness and it was incredibly neat.

Less fun was the fact that it really felt like the guides should have been more forceful about making people who needed them wear life jackets. We were warned that you’d need to be comfortable treading water for quite a while but they weren’t what I’d call forceful about it. And while they eventually brought a pvc pipe floaty handhold thing through for people in the dark cave, there were a few people who were clinging to it with a forcefulness that kept submerging it. Several of the backpackers girls were very much not comfortable with the dark cave in general and probably should have just immediately returned to the light. One father there with his two kids was particularly moronic, not even being good enough at treading water to consistently keep his chin out of the water. Meanwhile myself and one of my diving companions from the day before alternated treading water or just floating on our backs and whistling for echoes.

Despite the iffy safety issues and my concern for the dumber folks it was a very neat little adventure, though I wish I’d been able to go with a smaller group. Once we’d returned to the bright side of the swim through we found the other guides had been climbing the cave walls and cliff diving for the other guests. Once of these guys was basically spiderman and had climbed almost to the roof of the cave before jackknifing down so far that it took him an absurdly long time to resurface. Eventually though we all started to get cold and made our way back to the steps where at least two people wanged their head badly on the low ceiling. At least getting warm again was as easy as throwing yourself back in the waves outside as the temps in the shallow bay were essentially bathwater.

Refueled by a tasty lunch I headed out on an afternoon dive and snorkel trip and had another gorgeous time. I saw a stingway literally the moment I put my head under the water. A massive collection of clownfish guarded one end of the reef and as we were finishing up a shark sleeping far below was startled by us and whooshed up for a closer look before high tailing it out of there. Breath control was better this time but it was also a shallower dive.

The trip ended with us killing some time snorkeling near one of the private beaches used by the cruising arm of the company that owns our resort where our guide fed some of the fish. This is ethically not the best 🙁 but honestly I think the fish in that area probably eat a ton of scraps off the boats that moor in the area anyway. There were swarms of Sergeant Majors and a whole bunch of Needlefish that arrived after and scared the former off. I’m fairly sure it was one of the latter that decided my right earlobe was a hunk of bread and repeatedly bit me until I was actually bleeding, a new experience for me. I’m going to go ahead and hope that’s the last time I’m fish food this trip.

Coincidentally my last night on the island was also the beach bbq and survivor night. The staff cooked up copious amounts of ribs, chicken, fish and beef skewers on a pit bbq on the beach. The guests mostly sat at larger tables and met new neighbours, I horrified some Brits and Australians by checking the weather back at home and finding a -45 windchill warning. As the night wound down we played survivor, which could more accurately be called ‘Fiji trivia.’ I did my best and probably personally kept us tied but the in the end it came down to drawing lots to break a tie with the other leaders and they won the free bottle of champagne. Alas… Still, as I sat on the beach watching one of the staff members spray gas onto the bonfire to get the damp logs started I looked back on my stay with incredible fondness.

The next morning was checkout time though thankfully once I got everything packed up I managed to have a little bit of snorkeling off the beach and a nice long read on the beach before the boat arrived. As previously mentioned we were at the end of the Yasawa Flyer route so we were the last stop before it turned around and headed back. The trip was mostly uneventful except for the fact that they decided to do a pickup for the day trippers at the first island rather than use their own boat as I imagine they do at busier times so they catamaran was absolutely packed to the gills for the last 20 mins of the trip. The only downside of a lovely trip otherwise.

I’d booked back into the same B&B for my one night stay back in Nadi before flying to my next destination the following morning. Unfortunately my excitement that evening was limited to finally doing laundry for the first time and grabbing one of my fave Aussie sodas from the corner store for a treat.

I am extremely thankful the weather turned for me, while the islands would have been beautiful whatever the weather the fact that the sun came out and made them the gorgeous turquoise paradise of the brochures took things to the next level. I can say without doubt that I’ll be back there some day.

Up next: Onto fiji’s other large island of Vanua Levu and Savusavu Town for more diving.

Diving and divine digs in the Yasawa Islands

(again, more pics to come once better internet)

The weather was wild for the first day or so on Drawaqa Island. As previously mentioned it’s more or less one fairly steep hill with a narrow spit of sand jutting off and surrounded by a sizable reef. My bure faced the windward side which on the day I arrived meant sizable waves pounding in and a heavy breeze into the front ‘door.’ Bure can apparently mean very different things at different resorts but at the barefoot manta it was a solid roof with thatched top and side enclosed by canvas very similar to the Manitoba parks yurts. My ensuite was more an ‘outsuite’ with a screen door at the back of the bure leading to an open air shower with trees growing through it and a toilet with a hint of a roof.

After being welcomed and given the brief intro I wandered the resort for a bit and found the dive shop where I made some provisional plans based on the weather and got the lay of the land for snorkeling. I decided to just borrow equipment as mine was still packed up and quickly threw on a suit and got in the water. The leeward side of the island was amazingly calm for being roughly 200 feet away from where I’d been before and even with a heavily overcast sky and not much sun the visibility was amazing. This resort is particularly focused on marine conservation and in between the existing reef you could see their various projects for reef extension and stabilization and a couple cages where they were trying to get giant clams re-established.

The reef itself was fantastic and teeming with life, tons of hard corals… bright yellow and transluscent gar, parrotfish, angelfish, a large wrasse, trevalley and a whole bunch of things I hadn’t seen since my days diving the great barrier reef. I’m reasonably certain I caught a hint of a small reef shark as well but it was right at the fringe of visibility so I can’t say for sure. The reef is so huge and protected that you can actually snorkel right around the point and come back in on the northward facing beach if you want making for a really nice long and mostly leisurely snorkel. I don’t think it’s really possible to convey just how much this put me into my ‘happy place’ but as I flopped down in my private hammock on my private beach access (la-di-da) I was more relaxed that I’ve been in years.

Unfortunately we were still getting the same system that was pounding the mainland so the wind was wild the rest of the day. Rain occasionally reared for a few minutes and the staff ended up closing a couple the shutters as we ate dinner. I admit despite the fact that I’d had a lovely snorkel I was starting to worry that the weather would be like this my whole stay and would curtail diving partially/completely. Overnight was worse. I’d left just the screen door shut on my bure wanting to watch the waves come in but got a rude awakening around 3 am when I realized my feet felt damp and the downpour I’d heard earlier had really been splashing inward to the point where the blanket on the edge of the bed had gotten rather soaked (along with some of my gear.) So after a frantic scurry and some reorg I managed to get back to sleep and thankfully the crashing downpour didn’t return and force me to actually close the canvas flap because…

I woke to glorious sunshine! It was still heckin’ windy but the sun was flitting in and out of clouds and the water was shining that crystal green blue that you normally only see in postcards. Getting out of bed and walking the ten steps or so to the beach I could easily see fish flitting in and out of the rocks and coral and then was startled to see a school of flying fish launch themselves repeatedly out of the water running from some form of predator. On the beach itself there were a few lizards playing and as I looked closer a number of hermit crabs emerging as well. It was a fantastic start to the day.

Unfortunately it was also still too windy for diving at any of the good sites. The dive shop woman flat out told me that the one place they could safely dive that day was basically a glorified snorkel and that there were marine warnings out that the wind could get much worse so they couldn’t safely do anything. Thankfully the forecast for the next day looked better and I still had two more nights before moving to the next island so I filled my morning and afternoon with another snorkel, a long read in my hammock and a long walk around the most accessible parts of the island. They’d unfortunately warned us that while they normally did a cliff walk/hike for sunrise/sunset they’d cancelled it for the time being as the rain had made it a bit dangerous.

The food at the Barefoot Manta was quite good. It’s an enforced meal plan thing which I’m normally never a fan of but with the restort being the only thing on the island it’s not like you can pop down to a mom and pop place instead. Meals varied between a buffet with a wide variety of choices or more often a selection of 4-5 dishes, usually a curry or stirfry, seafood and a couple vegetarian/vegan options. Portions were sizable especially for me as I’ve gone back into my usually walk around a bunch, don’t have a massive appetite travel mode that I really wish I could trigger back at home.

The end of that night was my first exposure to the Fijian kava ceremony. Once the domain of chiefs alone the sharing of kava is now a ceremony by which you’re welcomed to a village if you visit and politeness dictates that you quaff at least one bowl (usually a coco shell) though it keeps going around and around until all gone. The drink itself is created by soaking the pounded root of the plant and has numbing/sedative qualities. It has started to be exported and you can find kava bars/extracts elsewhere around the world now, but apparently the local stuff has more of an effect. After the first bowl my tongue had definitely numbed a bit… after the four or five more ‘high-tide’ bowls I was handed most of my mouth was tingly. I’m guessing it also had something to do with the fact that when I retired to my bure at about 8:30 as it had started raining again I failed spectacularly at staying awake to watch the show I fired up on my laptop. Based on life thus far I’m guessing early wakeups and dozy nights are going to be the norm though. I have yet to sleep past 7 or even need my alarm.

When the next morning dawned something seemed different as I opened my eyes. It took me a few moments to realize that the rhythmic pounding of the waves was now more of a gentle lapping. Ninety minutes later two young Swedish ladies had joined me and our crew was skimming us across the waves to my first ever wreck dive. The sea and sky were meeting in a union of just about every shade of blue you can imagine and steep coasted islands poked up here and there covered in lush greenery. You find yourself hoping you can trust in the encyclopedic reef knowledge of the staff that pilot the boats because as you sit there flying along you can very clearly see how narrow a channel you’re sometimes passing through. The whole archipelago is a maze of reefs and shelves with the occasional deep blue gap.

Once we arrived at the buoy about 300m offshore we started prepping then eventually rolled into the water. Unfortunately I didn’t have enough weight at first to get me down and while we were solving that problem the two ladies and the second staff member were not paying attention and drifted off with the current. Honestly it wasn’t a great job by the staff member there as there was clearly a mooring line to follow down but based on a subsequent dive he was probably more concerned with one of the two women who was not especially mobile underwater due to a disability. Still, after we patrolled for a bit looking for them we went back up and the dive lead had me wait while he searched for them where he thought the current had carried them. By the time they came back up they’d used their entire air supply circling around in a deep channel. At that point I assumed my dive curse had continued on from Portugal/Vietnam but nope, once he changed out his tank we went down alone together.

The wreck itself was an old fishing boat, sunk purposely to form the base of a new reef. This was only about ten years ago so while marine life is abundant it was still very clearly a wreck even from a distance. Known as ‘Glory Wreck’ it’s base was at about 25m (~80feet) in that tide and we started by swimming around the perimeter with Lai my divemaster showing me where it was moored down and how there were mantis shrmp all around the base. These ridiculous tiny shrimp can scoot around at high speed and wallop things with their claws with the force of a handgun bullet. At the same time we saw the slowly building clusters of marine life on the hull. A few clusters of fan coral, sea cucumbers moving along the edge and school after school of various small fish running about to and fro.

Swimming upward we snuck onto the deck amidships and started a number of large trevally feeding on something clinging to the base. The wreck was definitely already a fish garden and was amazing to explore, especially as we swam inside the upper deck and were surrounded by clouds of thousands and thousands of tiny fish (blanking on name.) It’s always been a bucket list item to do a wreck dive and while this was on the simpler side I’m definitely going to get my wreck diving certification some day and do one of the really cool ones like the scuttled WW2 ships or the like.

Once back on surface we scooted back to the resort on the windward side, the waves had risen a bit but we seemed to be within an outer barrier and outside the inner reef. My Swedish companions were heading out on that day’s south-ward departure but were sneaking in another dive (or a first real one I guess) before that departure. I was mildly torn. I wanted to do another dive that day but wasn’t super enthused about getting stuck with them if they were in trouble again my wreck dive having already been a few minutes longer than it should be. However the shop couldn’t tell me what exactly the 3pm dive was going to be and as they were a couple people certifying that day I worried I’d get stuck on a new certified (or about to be) person’s first real dive with the accompanying super fast air usage.

I should explain though. At most places you’d just stay out and do the two dives but here all the resorts seem to have only a couple boats they use for everything. That means a dive trip goes out at 9, makes sure it’s back at 11 so the boat can then be used to run out and ferry folks in from the catamaran that comes from the port as it does the northbound swing. Then we take another trip out and the boat is back for 2pm when the boat is coming back southbound. There’s only one boat a day so if you miss it you’re in trouble.

The divemaster for the lodge happened to have returned on the boat from his days off and was going to run the second dive so I stuck with the devil I knew. (The staff member who’d gotten lost with the girls was nowhere to be seen and I imagine was in trouble since he probably should have surfaced with them after getting detached from us)

The dive itself was gorgeous and trouble was at a minimum though the lady in question still ended up slower and Lai stayed with her alone while the dive master lead the rest of us. A pinnacle in somewhat more open water this time it was a spur of coral covered rock almost reaching the surface at the ebbing tide. Soft golden fan coral everywhere gave it the name golden gate as further down the pinnacle there was a gorgeous swimthrough with fans everywhere. Unfortunately we didn’t see any of the bigger species he’d suggested we might see but it was still a superb dive for the ground life.

If you’ve never done a dive but you’re one of those people that gets famished after swimming… let me just say that diving is 3x worse. Thankfully the kitchen still had some lunch left when we got back and I treated myself to a strawberry coconut smoothie in celebration. It had been 6? years since my last good dive and here I’d had two great ones in a day with most of my trip left to go.

The rest of the day passed in somewhat of a blur. I chatted with an Aussie doing his dive certification and was kinda shocked when I found out he was from Brisbane. I know Fiji is closer but man you have such good places to do it so close by. He was an interesting dude though, an engineer by trade now studying to be a science teacher and with a firm opinion on everything and everyone. I hope the weather holds for him and he gets to do some real dives after the boring certification go down/come up stuff. The rest of the time I spent either sitting by the beach or just enjoying some hammock time with my latest book.

This was an amazing three days but I was ready to check out my next home further north in the Yasawa chain where more diving and a cave adventure beckoned.