Got up about 7:00, showered, had breakfast (free breakfast at the hostel), and waited for the van to pick me up from Inner Space Adventures. It got there about 8:10, and hopped on. The guy who picked me up is an older English guy, he and his wife own the dive centre. He doesn't even dive! He fun dived years ago, but hasn't dived at all in more recent years. Go figure.
Got the shop, got fitted with all the equipment. I was the only certified diver diving today. There were four others doing their last day of their open-water, and another guy starting his open-water that day. I didn't realize it at first, but the owner had planned on sending me with the open-water group. One of the DM (Dive Master's) suggested I ask Frank (owner) if I could see sharks. So I asked him, and Frank replied, "well, we always dive where there could be sharks...", and that didn't anywhere. Later, one of the other DM's (the one that would take me out) was talking to him about me, and told Frank that he can't send me out with open-water students, that I'm an experienced diver, and should be treated as such and taking to "good" dive sites. I guess Frank was against it at the time (it would mean a 2nd boat just for myself), but finally Frank came over to me and asked me if a wreck dive would be satisfactory for me. I was ecstatic, yes, it definately way. So, I got my own boat (me, the DM, and the captain, who was the brother of the DM), and we went to the Salamanda wreck, a cruise ship that was put at the bottom (depth of 26 metres) specifically for diving (and to create an artifical reef). It was really cool, even though everything had been stripped from the ship before sinking it (except one toilet). The ship had 3 levels, we swam around the engine rooms (no engines in it anymore), and through windows and doorways and up to higher levels and stuff. It was an easy wreck dive, lots of room to swim through everything, no chance of really get tangled up or caught up on anything. Enjoyed it very much. Oh, the cruise ship was sank in 1995 (or 1997, DM couldn't remember) and is 90 metres long.
After that, we stopped off to where the students were doing their skills, and dropped off some more oxygen tanks for them, then went to a coral reef and did a 2nd dive, saw lots of coral and small fishes and stuff. Very good dive as well. Visibility was excellent on both dives.
We went back to the open-water students, picked up their used oxygen tanks, and took off back to shore.
I got my very own boat to dive from. It was the boat they usually do for all their dives (the one the trainees used yesterday), instead I got it all by myself today, and the open-water students got a smaller, crappy aluminum boat. Hahahaha!!!
After that, I paid my bill, and got driven back to the hostel. Did a little bit of laundry, then walked downtown, stopping at McDonalds for a late lunch (soooo hungry!), then hit the internet.
Just wanted to mention, there are TONS of American's travelling Fiji. I could've counted the number of American travellers se met through SE Asia on two hands (i.e. less than 10). I've easily met more than twice than many here in Fiji in the 1 week I've been here. More Americans that any other nationality. Many of them are students studying in Australia and New Zealand heading home, and stopping over in Fiji for a couple of weeks.
That's all. No updates for a while, off to a remote island with no internet for four days, then the next I fly to NZ (Thursday), so probably won't have internet until I get back to NZ on Thursday.
Take care.
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