Bula!

More radio silence from me as I snuck away for a week of diving with two of our daughters in Fiji. It was a last minute quickie, and fortunately I was able to bag decent airfares from Air Pacific (which flies non-stop out of LAX to Nadi, Fiji several days a week) and Wananavu Resort came back to me with a very attractive package deal for our accommodations, transfers, meals and diving.

We had a fantastic time exploring (anew) the drop dead gorgeous reefs of the Bligh/Vatu-i-Ra waters, which is the area between the large south island of Viti Levu and the large north island of Vanua Levu. Conditions were for the most part benign for this trip – calm surface conditions on 5 of our 6 dive days, and gentle currents on all dives. Added bonus – the mellow conditions allowed me to finally do some shore diving in front of the resort. I really grooved on it, and will be writing about that in a future blog instalment.

Unfortunately, there had been some heavy rains in the weeks prior to our trip (February is still technically in the “wet” season of Fiji, although this part of Fiji suffers much less rainfall than the east coast at this time), so the water clarity was not as epic as I’ve seen it. They also suffered a very severe typhoon in December that devastated some of the windward reefs (and hit hard on the west coast of the islands), but fortunately there are still huge swathes of healthy reef that we enjoyed, and hopefully out of what damage there was, new reef will grow in the years to come.

I am still working on processing my images – although I took significantly less than I have on past trips (I really tried to limit my shots, both so I could keep a close eye on the girls, and also so I would not have weeks of work when I got home), I still managed to bag a significant number of keepers.

I am planning on writing a full-fleshed trip report/story about our adventure. I have written about Fiji, and Wananavu Resort, in the past, but there are many changes to report, most especially the very welcome addition of a very good on-site dive op at the resort (Dive Wananavu Fiji) run by very professional management (Chris & Vicky Liles), so I am going to find some time to write up and share all that info.

In the meantime, here are a few teasers of what is to come. I should have my Fiji piece up on this blog within a couple of days.

The Girls at Mount Mutiny. No colour correction in this image – the hanging soft corals truly are these amazing hues.

Things that make you go aaaaah. Colourful hard coral gardens in the shallows at Mount Mutiny.

Did I mention the colours? This was taken at Mellow Yellow dive site (one of my all-time favourite sites) – Anthias and soft corals abound…

I didn’t shoot much macro on this trip – this location begs for wide angles :^) This is a little Glossodoris Cinta nudibranch that I captured (with the camera) on a shore dive from the resort.

Reef Scenic at E6 – a signature Fiji dive site.