Scuba-tastic at Walu Beach
September 5th, 2006
23 August 2006 to 28 August 2006
After Nananu-I-RA and a couple of days in Nadi we said our farewells to Laurie and Suzie who were moving on to LA/Chicago/New York and we headed to our next Island in the sun – Malolo. Malolo is the biggest Island in the Mamanucas (the group of Islands of the west coast of the mainland Vitu Levu) and it was at Walu Beach resort where our love affair with Fiji began to blossom.
The resort was excellent….the people were friendly, the room was great (we had been upgraded to a double with our own bathroom which for backpackers is bliss), the food was good (and all you can eat – I need not say any more!) and the Malolo Slide cocktail was fantastic!
The only real activity we had planned for Fiji was to learn to Scuba dive because Fiji is renowned to have some of the best diving sites in the world. We enrolled on a Padi course whilst at Walu Beach with the luxury of being the only two poeple on the course) and began to study the dive manual. Our first dive was in the swimming pool. Now if we were forced, arm -twisted behind our backs, to provide costructive criticism about the resort it would be centered on the pool (mosquitos aside). The pool has to be the murkiest pool I have ever seen (and as you all know I have seen a fair few pools in my time!). When sat at the bottom of the pool at the deep end we had to be sat within 1m to be able to see the instructor and should anyone decided to dive in the pool whilst we were down there then the best you could have hoped for was a few bruises!
The first dive was not very successful as Chris was shivering from sitting around so long in the water (I must have more bodyfat I guess!) and getting used to breathing under water was not as simple as we had hoped. The skills that need to be mastered include mask removal and running out of air …neither which are particularly pleasant experiences. After the first dive Chris was not enjoying the whole experience and decided to knock the course on the head.
I continued with the course and passed the pool skills and proceeded to my first open water dive. The site was called castaway passage which is desribed by the companies website as follows:
“A gap in the outer Barrier Reef that allows large volumes of ocean water to enter the lagoon. Diving in this passage almost always produces fantastic visibility (30 metres plus). Like a number of our other dives, this site will frequently produce the unexpected. Manta Rays, Sharks, Marlin, and other pelagic species are frequently sited here.”
If a little nervous when entering the water (as a Leopard shark had been sited there the day before) my fears were alleviated as soon as I was under the water. The reef forms a coral wall which is about 10m or so in height. The coral and fish residing on the wall were fantastic…..I did not know that fish came in so many shapes and colours! To top it all the visibility was about 30m.
I came up from the dive exstatic but a little disapointed that Chris had not been there to see it with me as he would have loved it just as much if not more.
My second dive at the same site was just as amazing. When we boarded the boat following the dive I learned that another group of divers which had followed us along the reef had seen two white tipped reef sharks. To my surprise I felt a little disapointed I had not seen them.
When I returned from my fourth open water swim Chris was waiting for me on the jetty with a beer in each hand to help celebrate my certification and was already talking about giving diving another shot.
After five nights at Walu Beach we decided it was time to move on and see some more of what Fiji has to offer. We returned back to Nadi on the mainland to speak to Elenor, the travel agent who had helped us find Walu Beach and to get some more cash in order to avoid credit card charges that some resorts impose.
Next stop was a trip to the remoter Yasawa Islands, more specifically Mantaray Island.
Tags: Fiji
Chris and Charl
Leave a Reply