| So after a momouth 33 hour flight from London to Fiji with a stop over in hong kong. I had made it!! Joe met me at Nadi airport and took me back to his friend and boss ryan's house which was about 15 minute drive from the airport. We stopped off at a little road side supermarket to get some milk for the resort on the way. To be honest... Fiji at first glance looked a bit of a dump! But I wasn't going to judge in the first 10 minutes of my experience! Joe told me that Fiji is a third world country and can be a bit dodgy on the main land! To get to ryan's house we had to go through security gates. His house is pretty plush, really modern looking with a nice sized pool in the back garden. We chilled there for a bit while Ryan got himself together then we went down to the marina where we had a full English fry up!! Lovely! After all scoffing our faces we loaded up the boat and headed to manta ray island. It took us about 2 hours to get there. Ryan owns his own small game fishing boat that they had just used in a fishing competition which they had won!! They caught two large sail fish! As we headed out of the marina I noticed a couple of fairly large super yachts. One of which I know a couple of crew!! Small world!!!! 2 hours and 40 nautical miles into our pretty rough and pretty bouncy ride we had made it to manta ray island!!!! WOW!! paradise is a word that doesn't even come close to describe the beauty of this island! I couldn't believe how spectacular the serenity of this place is! So relaxed and laid back. Just the vibe i was looking for! Pretty much the whole island is surrounded by coral reef! As we moored up the boat we were met by one of the workers on the island in the dive boat. We transferred all our gear in to the dive boat and went ashore! We arrived about 2.30 pm so Joe showed me around the resort which is stunning! The maximum capacity of the resort is 65 people. There are about 30 staff that work on the island. On the afternoon of our arrival we went spear fishing. We didn't use scuba gear so we were just free diving. Joe showed me a technique on how to hold my breath. When I first tried I managed to hold my breath for about 1 minute. But after a few attempts using joes technique I was managing to hold my breath for around 3 minutes. We got the dive boat to take us out to the spot where we were going to fish and in we went. Armed with a spear gun each. Wearing only boardies, a weight belt with 2kg weight, fins and a snorkel. It ws time to go fishing! We were in the water for around two hours but didn't manage to see any fish big enough to spear! It was pretty amazing being under water, it felt good being back in the water, I was loving it! When I was under water I could hear clicking in the distance. Instantly I knew the noise was coming from a pod of dolphins talking to each other. We continued to hear the high pitch squealing and the clicking for about 20 mins. Then out of no where there were 3 dolphins swimming towards us! At first I panicked because all I could see was 3 dark shadow objets coming towards us! I know there are sharks in the area so I thought maybe it was sharks but as they came closer we realized they were dolphins!! They were just coming over to check us out! Absolutely amazed!! They swam up to Joe and they came so close that he had to back away a bit! Unfortunately they didn't hang around for long and within seconds they were gone! Clicking off into the distance! We carried on swimming around trying to find some fish but didn't have much luck! As we were heading back to the beach I grew bored of not catching any large fish so when I saw a small colorful reef fish I gave him the good news with the spear! Had a little chuckle to myself when the spear went all the way through it! I didn't realize quite how powerful the spear guns were and it wasn't until we got back to the dive shop that Joe told me that the spear leaves the gun at 200 mph!! That night we just chilled out at the beach bar and had a couple of drinks. I was feeling pretty knackered after my long flight so I called it a day at about 9 pm and went to bed! The next morning I woke up about 8 am to the sound of a drum being beaten. I discovered that it was the call for breakfast! The kitchen staff play the drum every meal time so that the guests know that food is ready! Pretty cool! I helped out in the kitchen for the morning showed the guys how to make a proper beef bolognaise and a proper tomato sauce. Ryan spoke to me and said that if I can help out in the kitchen and show them how to do things properly then I could get free food and accommodation, so help out I did!!! After helping the guys in the morning, Ryan, Joe and myself went out in the game fishing boat to do some deep sea fishing! The spot that we went to was about 20 miles SW of the island. We loaded the boat up with a large esky, some beers, some bait and two automatic reel rods and off we went! once we got to the spot baited up the rods with some fish and dropped it to the bottom! The depth that we were fishing at was around 350-400 metres. It took about 2 minutes for the bait to reach the bottom and once it did it took. Less than I minute for us to get a bite! Then it was a case of pressing the automatic reel in button on the rod and letting it reel in the fish by itself! The easiest fishing I have ever done!!! One beer and a cigarette later the fish had reached the top! We had caught a pretty lathered fish! Aparenty the most expensive table fish in the world!! So we un hooked it! Chucked it in the esky, re baited and dropped again! Low and behold we had caught two this time! We had 3 hooks on the line. A beer and cigarette and the fish had surfaced again!! We continued to Catch 7 of these red fish. Then on our second to last drop Joe caught a massive rock cod! It was huge!! Even the motor on the reel was struggling to bring it to the surface so we had to reel at the same time so not to burn out the motor! After bout 10 minutes we saw aloud of bubbles come to the surface followed shortly by the fish! It took all of us to get it on board the boat!! The esky was too full with the other fish that we'd caught and this fish was way too big for the esky! We dropped the lines for a final time and caught another red fish then headed back to the island! We weighed the monster when we got back and it weighed 93kg!!! Record catch for the island!! Later that evening we filleted it, we kept a bit out for dinnervthevnext day and froze the rest!! It was sushi and sashimi night so I showed the boys how to cook the rice properly and showed them how to slice the sashimi!! Chilled out in the evening with a couple of rum and cokes. 19/09/2011 Again I've left it a little while since I wrote and because I have done so much since arriving on manta ray I'm again struggling with what to write... I did my open water advanced course and all in all I did 14 dives. Definitely the best diving I have ever done! Beats the great barrier reef, costa rice and Malta by far. There is just so much to see and the Coral reefs are just immaculate. The array of fish is spectacular I saw white tip reef sharks, octopus and so many different types of fish I can't even begin to explain what they were! There was so many different colours of coral both soft and hard coral. To get certified for the advanced you have to do several types of dive... Drift, deep, night, adventure, there were about 60 different dive spots that they use on manta ray so depending on the weather would depend on where we would go. Manta rays... Every day there is the chance to go and see manta rays. Depending on the time of high tide depends on when the manta rays are swimming the channel. For a while it was high tide around 7am so I would get woken up by the ferocious banging of the drum on the beach with on of the locals screaming MANTA RAYS! this would have everyone that wanted to go and see the manta rays on the beach with their snorkel gear, primed and ready to go and swim with them. However.... 7am was too early for me to get out of bed let alone get in the water and swim with them! Although on my time on manta ray I managed to see them several times just not at 7 am!! Being in the water with the rays was absolutely breath taking! The mantas can grow to have have a wing Span of up to 7 meters, they are completely harmless and the way they move through the water is just so gracious! They just move so effortlessly using so little energy truly amazing creatures! When you have the chance to share the water with such amazing creatures you feel so lucky! Paddle boarding... So Joe and Justin bought paddle boards shortly before I arrived so they were the new craze when I arrived! Pretty hard to get the hang of when you first have a go. But it's all about balance! They are basically a large surf board that you stand on and use a paddle to propel you forward! Needless to say, when I first had a go I could stay up for more than a few paddles! But after a bit of practice I got the hang of them! And before long Joe and I were going on little missions over to the other island where he had a make shift chin up bar where we would do a little work out then head back to the island. After a while we had gained so much confidence we decided to take them to where the waves break on the reef and used them as surf boards! VERY COOL! I took my camera out with me and Joe got some photos of me strutting my stuff having a good old paddle. Not are they good fun but they are a great work out and really work your core! So plus plus!! What I did find while on manta ray island is the longer I stayed on the island the harder it was to leave! I loved it there, I love the way of life, I loved the chilled out vibe, I loved the fact that everyone is smiling all the time! The quality of life simply doesn't get much better than island life! Being in the middle of no where with great weather, happy people and the sit back and chill out atmosphere. I truly envy Joe for what he has on Mantra Ray Island. He really is living the dream! I thought my job was cool but fuck... His job beats mine a million times over! I am glad that I had the opportunity to experience true island life, diving every day seeing amazing sea life, seeing the tropical fish that you only see in fish tanks in pet shops, swimming around in their natural environment. Snorkeling just off the island, paddle boarding around the island, deep sea fishing and game fishing in the pacific ocean the biggest ocean in the world, spear fishing, free diving, partying, meeting new people that come and go from the island, getting to know the locals, drinking, not waking up to an alarm clock!! The list goes on...... On my last evening on manta ray Joe, Justin and myself went over to the other side of the island where the local workers live to celebrate the birth of one of the guys new born, we all sat around in a circle and drank the traditional Fijian drink known as kava!! What an experience this was. The is a ritual you do before you drink. Once we were in a circle all crossed legged. Livi- the man who invited us over and the man who was welcoming his new born to the family said a few words blessing his baby daughter. We welcomed joe, Justin and myself. He greeted us by saying welcome brother Joe, brother Nick and brother Justin! He thanked us for coming and I could see by the look in his eye that he was truly grateful for our presence! For which I was very touched! I felt honored to be invited to such a ceremony, I felt like I had been accepted as one of the islanders! So.... Because livi was the man holding the ceremony it was his job to make the kava!! He filled the wooden bowl with fresh water, then he emptied 5 sachets of ground down kava root in to a cloth bag, sealed it by tying a knot After 14 days of living the life that only one can dream of it was time to say good bye to Joe, to all the locals, and to the most beautiful place i have ever been to in the world. When it was time to leave and to board to boat to take me to my next part of my Fiji experience all the locals sang me and all the other guests a good bye song! Which was amazing! A great way to finish a great experience in a great place. I have to say that when I got on the boat to leave I had a little lump in my throat. There and then I made 2 silent promises to myself. 1- I will go back to Manta Ray Island on my next rotation in march 2012 and 2- I WILL give myself the chance of living the island life, and I'll me mKing the second promise very very soon!! I need and more importantly I WANT that life! Not once did I wish I was somewhere else! I've seen some pretty amazing places in my life so far namely.. Australia, central America, most of the mediterranean, south of France, USA and many more but none of them have come close to manta ray! It was a great in site to how good life really can be!!!! TRULY MIND BLOWINGLY STUNNING!!! BEACH COMER ISLAND. so after a 2 and a half boat ride south from manta ray I arrived on beachcomber. Myself and about 6 other guys and girls were greeted by the workers who were playing guitars and singing us a welcome song. I checked in and was shown to my bure! I dumped my stuff and had a look around the resort. It was about 5pm when I arrived and not much was going on. The weather wasn't great so there weren't many people on the beach. The resort is much bigger than manta ray but still lovely all the same! Apparently due to the lonely planet guide this is the party island so I guess I will Check out what's going on after dinner, when I was on manta ray I met a couple of girls from Australia that left manta ray yesterday to come here so glad there is at least a couple of people that I know! Let the party commense!!!!!!! these are just a few of the activities that i did whilst on the best holiday on my life!!! Spear fishing Deep sea fishing Free diving Snorkeling Advanced open water Bridesmaids movie Wake boarding Manta ray snorkel |