Dr. Pygmy and Lady Fishface

Another successful trip completed. This time with Our Beloved Seas: Dr Richard Pygmy and Wendy Fishface travel with the nerdiest underwater enthusiasts and fish counters we have ever come across during our time on NAI’A. All appreciation for our marine environment brought about great luck and we had rare sightings such as an enormous tiger shark and a huge blotched stingray. Our guests, however, were in search of Fiji’s endemic fish species and good weather.

Some unstable weather loomed around Bligh, so we had a long first crossing to Makogai, an island with easy dives, low current and plenty of shelter. The checkout dive (or muppet dive, as Wendy likes to call it) was without incidents and our guests strolled the bommie sites appreciating the several species of shrimpgobies (including whitecap, randall’s and some randoms), a few scorpionfish, sea spiders and nudibranchs. Richard then educated the group on some of his favorite Fiji endemic species so they could recognize them as the trip went on.

Photo by Pam: A very special sighting of a blackbar filefish

Photo by Janet Eyre: Another very special sighting, a waxy filefish. They are not listed as being anywhere near Fiji!

We moved to Gau and started the day exploring Jim’s and Anthia’s, where we saw a few pipefish, piano fangblennies, fiji anemonefish on neon red anemones and some wormfish. Fusiliers surrounded us during our safety stop, and a few large groupers circled the bommies keeping the fish on edge. Our second dive was on the outer ridge where we saw a sea krait, mimic surgeonfish, a thecacera nudi and bluehead tilefish. We finished the day diving Nigali with a crazy amount of snappers (especially the humpback, red, blacktail, black and midnight), a healthy number of grey reef sharks (including juveniles) and yet another sea krait. We finished the day with a heartwarming village visit in Somosomo, and the villagers had a new song and dance for our guests. What they lacked in moves, they made up for in enthusiasm.

The following day we woke up at Wakaya to celebrate Pam’s birthday. It was a slow day for the mantas, but the fish nerds didn’t mind it too much. Django, Johnny and Tuks made appearances at the cleaning station, Tuks showing new shark bites (small ones, thankfully) and fresh mating scars. We also saw more grey reef sharks, a few white tips, a blacktip, oblique dottyback, blueline damsels, orangebarred garden eels, humphead wrasses, rockmover wrasses, golden mantis shrimp and dragonets. Lucky Lefty did their third dive in the bay where they searched for muck and special fish in a different habitat.

Photo by Maria: A boxer crab, another very special sighting!

Photo by Mike: Good fun during our village visit

Mantacam photo at Wakaya: Not only mantas visit those!

Mantacam: Distinguished comes by during our surface interval for a quick clean

The crossing to Namena was a little rocky, but the dives were stunning. Grand Central Station overwhelmed some of the fish counters and excited everyone. We saw several grey reef sharks, a couple of hammerheads (11 if you are to believe David), schooling barracudas, zebra dartfish, scads and trevallies. A huge grouper, a tiny decorated dartfish. What a start to the day. The other 2 dives were on the south passage with spadefish, more barracudas, golden mantis shrimp, squarespot anthias and more decorated dartfish. Richard even found some redtailed flasher wrasses!

The diving was grand, but conditions on the surface were less than ideal, so we moved to Taveuni to shelter from the wind and rain. It was the right move, and once there, it was hard to leave! We ended up spending three days there and we explored the area more than ever before. We had many great sightings such as giant trevallies, reef sharks (blacktip, whitetip and grey), more decorated dartfish, whitecap shrimpgobies, several octopuses, schooling yellowtail scads, scorpionfish, peacock mantis shrimp and fairy wrasses. The wind was calm, the sun was mostly out, the views were breathtaking. Three nights, nine dives and a kava party later, we had to start heading back towards Lautoka.

Photo by Maria: Hammer time!

Photo by Wendy: They loved our juvenile damsels!

Photo by Mike: Our home in Taveuni, Viani Bay, from above

Photo by Mike: Taveuni from above

Photo by David: A VERY beat-up moray eel

Photo by David: Decorated dartfish

Namena Marine Reserve welcomed us back with open arms and fabulous dives. Not to mention better surface conditions! We had more octopus fun at the Thumbs, as well as barracudas and a turtle. Our Schoolhouse dive was more challenging then planned, but our guests were plenty happy with the abundance around them. Snappers, trevallies, triggers, reef sharks, barracudas, rainbow runners. We had to work for our dive, but it paid up! We finished with a light dive at Kansas where Dr Pygmy found three pontoh’s pygmy seahorses and a hairy shrimp. Everything was just right and we finished the day enjoying a beautiful sunset.

We spent our last day at Vatu-i-ra Marine Reserve where our guests were happy to see not only incredibly healthy corals but also a much higher concentration of our endemic fish. Blue velvet angelfish, Marjorie fairy wrasses and bicolor rabbitfish were the favorite ones. But yet another octopus entertained several guests with its friendliness, juvenile rockmover wrasses posed for pictures and the big sightings marked our final day: an enormous tiger shark and a huge blotched stingray. We headed back to Lautoka more knowledgeable about out fish and looking forward to head out to the Lau Group with 6 of our current guests. If we could, we would take them all!

Photo by David: Pygmy time!

Photo by Wendy: Leopard wrasse

Photo by David: Dotted fairy wrasse, wearing fancy colors!

Photo by David: Esquisite fairy wrasse

Photo by David: Marjorie's fairy wrasse. He really is a wrasse man!

Our nerds!