By Harriet & Lily
19 volunteers arrived at Nadi Bay Hotel all very tired, sweaty & pasty, but very excited!
On arrival everyone jumped into the pool and enjoyed a nice shower. After a night of very little sleep we were put on a bus pilled high with everyone’s luggage and headed off for Lautoka. From there we bought our rations & Bula shirts for the lads & Bula dresses for the girls; all beautifully colourful & flowery! The next evening we boarded the 12hr night ferry from Lautoka to Savusavu. This provided chance to bond. A few brave volunteers even experimented with the local drink of choice; KAVA!!!
From Savusavu we got on 2 trucks and had a journey of a lifetime controlling flying mattresses and getting a bruised everything while taking in the amazing views offered by Venua Levu.
The final leg of our journey was a short but sweet boat journey to camp. The dawn of realisation occurred as we approached a small but unique Island, and this would be our home for the next 10 weeks. After setting up our beds and spending hours putting up our mosquito nets we settled down to our first meal on camp. Luckily this was made by staff members and was thus edible and enjoyable, a rarity......!
Saturday evening is where we let our hair down! Our first will be hard to beat but I’m sure we’ll give it a go! After around 3 hours of playing ‘I have never’ and drinking copious amounts of the local Bounty Rum, I feel it would be safe to say that everyone felt that they knew one another a little or in some cases A LOT better! Yes James we know everything!!
Sunday involved chilling out on the beach, with little activity from us volunteers for the rest of the day.
The following day was our first visit to the village of Navatu where we met our adopted families and had our welcoming Sevusevu ceremony aka. Grog time! This was a great way to meet the Fijians and get to know more about the Fijian way of life.
Tuesday was spent by the non-divers reading huge PADI books, and a lot of sunbathing for the already qualified divers. Fortunately everybody passed their theory and diving will commence on Wednesday.
Week 2 - 28th Jan to 4th Feb
By Rachel
Beginning of week 2 on camp and all the non divers have completed their Theory.
Big thanks to Paul & Jade!
So for this week it’s mainly completing the Open water dives, sunbathing & digging trenches.
This week saw the arrival of Steve back at camp, our Assistant Scientist, as Debs heads off to Nadi for a week.
Steve was welcomed home on Saturday night with a themed night giving the lads a chance to cross dress (to which they felt waaaay too comfortable doing!) A good night was had by everyone. The normal gossip proceeded the next morning as more couples have formed!
Sunday was the first Church of the month, which brought about 2 other villages to Navatu (Namalata & Raviravi). Unfortunately the heat proved too much for one of the volunteers, Lily, as she had to escape, running past the reverend & village chiefs, looking for ‘some fresh air’!! Luckily, 5 minutes prior, Steve had apologised to the congregation for any mistakes we may make over the next 10 weeks. Good timing really!
The weather so far has been awesome. We have all managed to complete our Open Water dives and are starting to do our PADI Advanced Knowledge reviews. Good times!
Beginning of week 2 on camp and all the non divers have completed their Theory.
Big thanks to Paul & Jade!
So for this week it’s mainly completing the Open water dives, sunbathing & digging trenches.
This week saw the arrival of Steve back at camp, our Assistant Scientist, as Debs heads off to Nadi for a week.
Steve was welcomed home on Saturday night with a themed night giving the lads a chance to cross dress (to which they felt waaaay too comfortable doing!) A good night was had by everyone. The normal gossip proceeded the next morning as more couples have formed!
Sunday was the first Church of the month, which brought about 2 other villages to Navatu (Namalata & Raviravi). Unfortunately the heat proved too much for one of the volunteers, Lily, as she had to escape, running past the reverend & village chiefs, looking for ‘some fresh air’!! Luckily, 5 minutes prior, Steve had apologised to the congregation for any mistakes we may make over the next 10 weeks. Good timing really!
The weather so far has been awesome. We have all managed to complete our Open Water dives and are starting to do our PADI Advanced Knowledge reviews. Good times!
Week 3 - 4th to 11th Feb
By Imy
The first part of week three was spent focusing on getting the PADI Advance Open Water course completed which meant that whilst everyone was busy attempting to complete their knowledge reviews, the four already qualified divers had plenty of free time to top up their tans. Once the relevant knowledge reviews had been completed, the trainee divers had to complete five dives in order to qualify as Advanced. These were: Deep, Navigation, Boat, Drift & Night. Despite a few problems on the navigation, everyone managed to successfully complete the course meaning that everyone on camp is now Advanced and is able to dive to 30m!
Friday saw the first Ladies night of the phase and was our chance to give something back to our ‘Fijian mums’ who look after us sooo well in the village and ask for nothing in return. We spent the evening playing games with the ladies such as pass the parcel & bingo, as well as showing them some ‘traditional’ British dancing in the form of the YMCA! Of course it wouldn’t have been ladies night without cake, but luckily the ladies came prepared so we spent the first half an hour eating cake & drinking tea.
The next morning everyone got up at 6AM to say goodbye to Steve who had to go home earlier than expected. We all sat on the beach and took a group photo before the boat left camp.
That evening, Debs our Chief Scientist returned from Nadi. Steve sent some pizzas back which was such a nice change from camp food, even if Jon did manage to drop one of the Pizza’s, to which we still ate. The letters from home put everyone into a reflective mood, so our Saturday night was quieter than usual. Only a few games of ‘Ring of Fire’ and little gossip the following morning.
On Sunday, we went to a new village called Kiobo, where ewe met the Chief of Kubulau. Once again we were amazed by the warm welcome and wonderful standard of Fijian hospitality that we received. Church was outside this week, which was a nice change before having an amazing lunch and our much needed afternoon sleep. After waking, we drank Kava with the villagers and then left later that day to return home to camp, just before the rain.
Monday saw the start of our Science training. We’ve spent the past 3 days learning the difference between fish and how to identify them underwater.
Today (Wednesday) the sea was so still that Paul decided to reward us with all our hard work during the dive training by taking us to dive over at Namena, a protected site that plays host to a huge variety of fish and rated amongst one of the best reef sites in the world!
The dives at Namena were awesome, and we saw such an large array of marine life such as Big Sharks & Turtles of which has given us all the determination to learn our fish ASAP, and so we are going into week 4 frantically trying to learn fish using fish cards and points to help us. We hope that all this information stays!!
By Imy
The first part of week three was spent focusing on getting the PADI Advance Open Water course completed which meant that whilst everyone was busy attempting to complete their knowledge reviews, the four already qualified divers had plenty of free time to top up their tans. Once the relevant knowledge reviews had been completed, the trainee divers had to complete five dives in order to qualify as Advanced. These were: Deep, Navigation, Boat, Drift & Night. Despite a few problems on the navigation, everyone managed to successfully complete the course meaning that everyone on camp is now Advanced and is able to dive to 30m!
Friday saw the first Ladies night of the phase and was our chance to give something back to our ‘Fijian mums’ who look after us sooo well in the village and ask for nothing in return. We spent the evening playing games with the ladies such as pass the parcel & bingo, as well as showing them some ‘traditional’ British dancing in the form of the YMCA! Of course it wouldn’t have been ladies night without cake, but luckily the ladies came prepared so we spent the first half an hour eating cake & drinking tea.
The next morning everyone got up at 6AM to say goodbye to Steve who had to go home earlier than expected. We all sat on the beach and took a group photo before the boat left camp.
That evening, Debs our Chief Scientist returned from Nadi. Steve sent some pizzas back which was such a nice change from camp food, even if Jon did manage to drop one of the Pizza’s, to which we still ate. The letters from home put everyone into a reflective mood, so our Saturday night was quieter than usual. Only a few games of ‘Ring of Fire’ and little gossip the following morning.
On Sunday, we went to a new village called Kiobo, where ewe met the Chief of Kubulau. Once again we were amazed by the warm welcome and wonderful standard of Fijian hospitality that we received. Church was outside this week, which was a nice change before having an amazing lunch and our much needed afternoon sleep. After waking, we drank Kava with the villagers and then left later that day to return home to camp, just before the rain.
Monday saw the start of our Science training. We’ve spent the past 3 days learning the difference between fish and how to identify them underwater.
Today (Wednesday) the sea was so still that Paul decided to reward us with all our hard work during the dive training by taking us to dive over at Namena, a protected site that plays host to a huge variety of fish and rated amongst one of the best reef sites in the world!
The dives at Namena were awesome, and we saw such an large array of marine life such as Big Sharks & Turtles of which has given us all the determination to learn our fish ASAP, and so we are going into week 4 frantically trying to learn fish using fish cards and points to help us. We hope that all this information stays!!
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