NAI’A thru Friday, 08FEB08…..
After a day at Namena Marine Park, it became apparent that weather conditions there were not optimal for the best diving, so we pulled anchor and headed closer to Vanua Levu and all the Nai’a dives sites there…
We dove Rob’s Knobs, Ron’s Rocks, Rick’s Delights, UndeNaiable, Humann Nature, Cat’s Meow, E-6 and many other beautiful sites. Currents ranged from mild to medium, visibility wasn’t the best – maybe 60’, but we saw lots and lots of sharks, blue-spotted stingrays, giant grouper, schools of many spotted sweetlips & different types of fusilers. The hard corals on some sites were heavily damaged on the tops of the reefs but the staghorn & table corals are the fastest growing, so they will recover quickly. The deeper hard corals had minimum storm damage and the sea fans and soft corals everywhere were unaffected.
The swim-thrus on some of the sites were amazing…full of giant sea fans and soft corals of every color. One of the swim-thrus contained a 300 lb + grouper! Lionfish were tucked under overhangs and swimming out in the blue. Several blue ribbon eels were seen and photographed, many nudibranch varieties were spotted and the usual Pacific marine life was vibrantly beautiful.
My favorite site of the whole trip was Cat’s Meow, named after Cat Holloway. Cat is an underwater photographer and wife of Rob Barrel who’s one of the Nai’a owners and who, incidentally, joined us on this trip. It was great fun seeing the video of evolution of the Nai’a from a booze cruise party boat into the beautiful Fijian sailing vessel she is today..and seeing Rob in shoulder-length blonde curly hair at a slightly younger age!
Back to Cat’s Meow…..what a gorgeous dive site! A huge swim-thru full of amazing colors, a gorgeous bommie totally encrusted in hard corals from the sea floor up to the top with lots of leather corals, black coral bushes, other soft corals and tons & tons fish life swarming it. The top 1/3 of the bommie is covered in fluorescent red anemones full of tomato clownfish skipping about…the rest of the bommie is covered in table corals and other hard and soft corals with anthias of every color skimming over the top, schools of trevally and fusiliers crusing by and hawkfish jumping from coral head to coral head!
This was a fabulous trip, in spite of the weather! We all know that you can’t predict when things like cyclones will decide to appear but the Captain and crew did their darndest to give us high quality diving. Safety is paramount so some of the dive sites they wanted to dive were not available to us, they found us more than suitable replacements. The tender drivers were there with “Bulas” the moment our heads broke the surface and handled our gear as if it were their own. Peni, the chef, and Suli & Seri were fabulous in taking good care of our non-diving needs.
One of our fellow passengers, Debbie Lathrop, wrote us a trip poem and has given me permission to share it with you….enjoy! It was, indeed, a trip of a lifetime!
Six divers out
Six divers in
With tales to tell…
About their swim.
Bubbles & bullshit…
Were bantered & braved
And the underwater antics…
Leaned towards the depraved.
Frantic poking & pointing…
And peering into the dark
All in hopes of a peek
At a white tip reef shark.
And rewarded they were…
For their dive guides knew best
Where the nudibranchs hang out…
And the trigger fish nest
The lights went out….
It rained like heck,
Even the squid left the ocean…
And littered the deck!
But the girls kept us fed
And kava filled the boat
We sang silly love songs
And made sounds like a goat
The seas were not calm
And the sun did not shine
But the trip will be remembered…
As ONE in a lifetime!
Debbie Lathrop
After a day at Namena Marine Park, it became apparent that weather conditions there were not optimal for the best diving, so we pulled anchor and headed closer to Vanua Levu and all the Nai’a dives sites there…
We dove Rob’s Knobs, Ron’s Rocks, Rick’s Delights, UndeNaiable, Humann Nature, Cat’s Meow, E-6 and many other beautiful sites. Currents ranged from mild to medium, visibility wasn’t the best – maybe 60’, but we saw lots and lots of sharks, blue-spotted stingrays, giant grouper, schools of many spotted sweetlips & different types of fusilers. The hard corals on some sites were heavily damaged on the tops of the reefs but the staghorn & table corals are the fastest growing, so they will recover quickly. The deeper hard corals had minimum storm damage and the sea fans and soft corals everywhere were unaffected.
The swim-thrus on some of the sites were amazing…full of giant sea fans and soft corals of every color. One of the swim-thrus contained a 300 lb + grouper! Lionfish were tucked under overhangs and swimming out in the blue. Several blue ribbon eels were seen and photographed, many nudibranch varieties were spotted and the usual Pacific marine life was vibrantly beautiful.
My favorite site of the whole trip was Cat’s Meow, named after Cat Holloway. Cat is an underwater photographer and wife of Rob Barrel who’s one of the Nai’a owners and who, incidentally, joined us on this trip. It was great fun seeing the video of evolution of the Nai’a from a booze cruise party boat into the beautiful Fijian sailing vessel she is today..and seeing Rob in shoulder-length blonde curly hair at a slightly younger age!
Back to Cat’s Meow…..what a gorgeous dive site! A huge swim-thru full of amazing colors, a gorgeous bommie totally encrusted in hard corals from the sea floor up to the top with lots of leather corals, black coral bushes, other soft corals and tons & tons fish life swarming it. The top 1/3 of the bommie is covered in fluorescent red anemones full of tomato clownfish skipping about…the rest of the bommie is covered in table corals and other hard and soft corals with anthias of every color skimming over the top, schools of trevally and fusiliers crusing by and hawkfish jumping from coral head to coral head!
This was a fabulous trip, in spite of the weather! We all know that you can’t predict when things like cyclones will decide to appear but the Captain and crew did their darndest to give us high quality diving. Safety is paramount so some of the dive sites they wanted to dive were not available to us, they found us more than suitable replacements. The tender drivers were there with “Bulas” the moment our heads broke the surface and handled our gear as if it were their own. Peni, the chef, and Suli & Seri were fabulous in taking good care of our non-diving needs.
One of our fellow passengers, Debbie Lathrop, wrote us a trip poem and has given me permission to share it with you….enjoy! It was, indeed, a trip of a lifetime!
Six divers out
Six divers in
With tales to tell…
About their swim.
Bubbles & bullshit…
Were bantered & braved
And the underwater antics…
Leaned towards the depraved.
Frantic poking & pointing…
And peering into the dark
All in hopes of a peek
At a white tip reef shark.
And rewarded they were…
For their dive guides knew best
Where the nudibranchs hang out…
And the trigger fish nest
The lights went out….
It rained like heck,
Even the squid left the ocean…
And littered the deck!
But the girls kept us fed
And kava filled the boat
We sang silly love songs
And made sounds like a goat
The seas were not calm
And the sun did not shine
But the trip will be remembered…
As ONE in a lifetime!
Debbie Lathrop
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