Two Great Dives with Ocean Ventures Fiji in Natewa Bay September 9, 2024

Donna and I got out for a second great day of diving with Ocean Ventures Fiji, in Natewa Bay, for a pair of very enjoyable dives, my 781 and 782 dives, post retirement. Matthew and Sara were excellent, very helpful hosts for our outing on their boat. We enjoyed excellent visibility, over 80 ft, 79 F temperature, and an incredible mix of healthy hard corals and a few of Fiji's famous soft corals, which prefer higher currents, too. The drive to their boat on Natewa Bay took an hour from our vrbo and the last couple of miles were on a pretty rough dirt road, but it sure was worth the beautiful drive. The boat ride out to our first dive site was about 30 minutes out towads the mouth of the bay, about 2/3 of the length of it. The Bay is very deep in the center near where it joins the ocean, over 4000 ft. I bet it would be an excellent site to try black water diving! Our first dive site was called "The Zoo", I'd call it Zoo Station after the wonderful U2 song, for the pelagics and turtles that frequently happen by. They actually named it Zoo for the incredible psychedelic zooanthids, which are from the same Order as Sea Anemones and Corals, and are found on a shallow coral ridge at the site, see below, the individual zooanthids range between 1/4 and 1/2 inch across:

The site has some beautiful, huge sea fans, below:

I'm a sea fan, she's a sea fan, we're all fans of Sea Fans!

The site has an endless variety of beautiful hard corals, below:

Donna swims over a huge expanse of fragile, beautiful, Lettuce Coral, below:

Matthew, our dive guide, pointed out a Giant Clam, below:

We found a beautiful Sea Anemone with Three Spot Damselfish which live with sea anemones, and Anemone Fish below:

Pelagics come through the site, here's one of the Rainbow Runners that sped past us, below:

Our second dive was just a few minutes away from the first at another beautiful site called Sleeping Beauty. More huge expanses of beautiful, healthy hard corals, below:

Matthew pointed out this really cool grouper, type tbd, back in the dark under a pinnacle, below:

Donna with another big, beautiful sea fan:

Below: Donna with some beautiful yellow soft coral

Some great coral heads at this site, very richly populated with invertebrates and fish, below:

Below: Love these Tomato Clownfish nestling in their Sea Anemone

The top of the coral heads were at a perfect depth to do our safety stop before ending a fantastic dive, below: