If we received a dollar for every Bula greeting exchanged during our latest club dive trip to Fiji
I believe the trip would have paid for itself!
If we ignore the boring stuff – the flights, the waiting around in airports and the bus ride, then Beqa Lagoon was everything you could wish for in a relaxing diving holiday.
The staff were always friendly, welcoming and willing to go out of their way to assist. The resort itself was well laid out with some of the biggest rooms you have ever seen. The food was tasty and offered a great variety of options though I did choose to eat fresh fish every day! The resort offered a range of free activities including paddle boarding, local walks & talks and fire dancing! Along with paid options like Tapa cloth painting and a kayak through the mangroves. There was a lovely pool on site but an even better one just out front – with unlimited snorkelling and diving available on the home reef.
The main reason for our trip was to dive with sharks! & boy did we ever with 4 dives at the Cathedral and plenty of Bull, Nurse & Lemon Sharks to be seen. We were also very lucky to see Tiger Sharks on all 4 dives – they are very impressive and come in so close you think you could reach up and pat them – we didn’t of course and still have all limbs intact.
We also had 3 fun boat days exploring the local reefs and a couple of wrecks as well. This may not be the best reef diving in Fiji but we enjoyed every dive and they all had something different to off from colourful soft corals at the Golden Arches, to a leaf scorpion fish, whitetip reef sharks, a range of anemone fish, triggerfish, hawkfish and a couple of Blue Ribbon Eels.
I don’t think the resort has ever had divers so keen on diving the local house reef, day and night, but when they realised that we were from Wellington and that these conditions, with 26 degrees in the water, are better than our summer they insisted that we “needed to go diving” again!
I have been fortunate to work and travel as a diver all around the world and I would have to say this is one of, if not the best dive destination for our Dive Club. It was relaxing and yet we still logged 15+ dives, our non-divers enjoyed the resort and we all enjoyed the activities on offer.
I would thoroughly recommend that you join Paddy in 2025.
Claire