When I arrived in Fiji, I had only booked one night at Octopus. They said I could just let them know each morning whether I wanted to stay another night, which was nice flexibility to have. Also, when I arrived in Fiji, I hadn't yet booked a flight out of Fiji. My original plan was to be in Fiji about a week, spending 1-3 nights at each of 2 or 3 islands. Based on reviews, I knew that Octopus Resort and Blue Lagoon Resort were both well reviewed and seemed like good options. Both offered dorm beds for about $25 US per night, plus compulsory meal plans of about $40 US per day. I was contemplating doing one other island as well, if i heard great things from other travelers. As it turned out, all the travelers I talked to that had spent time at other islands agreed that Blue Lagoon and Octopus were best and didn't have great things to say about any of the other places in the Yasawas. Also, when I looked at flights out of Fiji, the cheapest day to fly the following week was Thursday, the 2nd, so I booked that flight, giving me a little longer to stay in Fiji than expected. So rather than leaving Octopus after a couple of days, I decided to stay a few more to at least experience it with some nicer weather, and then spent 4 nights after that in Blue Lagoon, before heading back to the mainland for my flight to New Zealand.
Day 5 - Friday, January 27
Friday I hopped back on the ferry and rode to the northern most stop in the Yasawas, Nacula Island, home of
Blue Lagoon Resort. The weather friday was great and the water was very smooth, making for a much nicer ferry ride than the last one. Some photos from the ferry ride...
Looking back at Waya Island:
Nacula Island, where I was headed:
When I arrived, I was pleasantly surprised to find that once again there were a lot of backpackers staying there, many around my same age, who had either recently been to the next stops on my list or were planning to go there next, meaning they could either provide helpful info on what was good and what to avoid, or they were potential familiar faces I might run into again as I traveled onward. It seems quite a few people do Fiji as part of a larger trip to Oz and NZ. Dinner was a traditional Fijian feast, which included some dancing and singing, and they handed out leis made with real flowers, which was pretty neat.
Day 6 - Saturday, January 28
Day 6 started with a shark dive. I had spoken to someone else a few days earlier who had done the shark dive at the same sight we were going to, and had described it as including 3-4 meter (9-13ft) bull sharks among many other smaller sharks. I was surprised because bulls are among the most aggressive towards humans and considered quite dangerous. But I figured they wouldn't let us go if it was too dangerous, so on we went. Sure enough there was a huge bull shark down there along with lemon sharks, reef sharks, white tips and black tips. It was pretty neat having a 300-400-lb bull shark coming right at me only to be turned away when he got about 3 feet away by the dive master who used some sort of shark safety stick to steer him away. Here's essentially the view over my shoulder as the bull shark would come in and turn, though occasionally he did get a bit closer.
The bull shark was so aggressive that it started to attack one of the smaller sharks right in front of us. I think he was trying to take the large piece of fish from this lemon shark's mouth that it was struggling to swallow:
And here's one of yours truly from the line we held onto to ensure we didn't float out into the middle of the shark food.
All of the above photos were taken by Josh Childress of the Vertical Blue Dive Shop. You can check out a few more of the photos from the dive on Facebook in
this photo album. If that doesn't work, just search for Vertical Blue Dive Shop on Facebook - and then check out the album titled "diving around yasawa"
Day 7 - Sunday, January 29
I went to church. Yep, you read that right - probably the first time I was in church for an actual church service in about a decade. It was part of trip to the local village of Nacula and was quite interesting, but it was all in the native Fijian language, so i didn't understand a word that was said. The church with a few local kids:
After church, the weather was nice out, so I took the opportunity to soak up some rays and do some snorkeling. Both here and the last place the snorkeling just off the shore is great, with hundreds of different types of fish and coral of all sorts of amazing colors. But I did have some trouble keeping water out of my mask, an issue that I eventually discovered was attributable to the mustache I was sporting after not shaving for a week. Perhaps I need to reconsider my plan not to shave while traveling.
Here's what it looks like when the sun comes out:
Day 8 - Monday January 30
The weather took a turn for the worse again today. It was raining in the morning and apparently, due to another nearby tropical depression, rain is in the forecast for a while. But a little rain and some rough seas could not keep us from venturing out to the limestone caves at a nearby island that were used many years ago to film some of the movie
Blue Lagoon. The caves were filled with rather cold fresh water. From the main cave, pictured below, we then went to a second cave that could only be accessed by an underwater swim beneath one of the walls in the main cave. Definitely a pretty neat spot. Here's a pic of the caves from the outside:
And one from inside the main cave:
Monday ended with some more crab racing. This time I actually had a racer, but he was 11th in the first heat and only the top 10 make the finals, and at Blue Lagoon, there was no option to buy him back into the finals.
Again, the rest of my Fiji pics can be accessed by clicking on any of the links that say "Fiji" below my pictures above.
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