In October 2010 I returned to the island of Viti Levu in Fiji, this time with my fiancée, Mary Royal and Mary’s daughter Hannah. We stayed at the Pearl South Pacific in Pacific Harbour near Suva and once again I dived with Beqa Adventure Divers. Mary and I's undefinedundefinedaccommodation was the French Provincial Penthouse – a luxurious suite which I doubt had ever before been adorned with dripping dive gear!

Our first morning’s diving was two shark dives at the Shark Reef Marine Reserve which also formed part of Hannah’s PADI Advanced Open Water diver’s course. Underwater Hannah, Mary and I split up. Hannah’s instructor Andrew Cumming kept a careful eye on her while I had been given permission to go a little deeper than the other divers into “the arena”. That is closer to where the bull sharks were being fed.  Fortunately Mary was quite happy without us as this is a very well run and safe shark feed. I immediately realised that there were far fewer bull sharks than in March and that those still present were comparatively very skittish. It was mating time and the bull sharks had other priorities! With generally overcast weather and disappointing underwater visibility, taking good shots of relatively distant bull sharks at a typical depth of 30 metres proved impossible. I had better luck in shallower water with Blacktip Reef, Grey Reef and Whitetip Reef sharks. Certainly the BAD crew gave me every opportunity to get some good images and my Blacktip Reef sharks images were my best to date. 

During our week in Fiji, I enjoyed eight dives at the Shark Reef Marine Reserve, my dives 1780 to 1787, diving off BAD’s MV Predator while Hannah and Mary also did some coral reef dives from BAD’s MV Hunter. Taking a day off from diving, Mary and I took a Jewel of Fiji day tour, canoeing up River Navua where we visited Koromakawa Village , a Fijian village established by a lone Englishman John Humphrey Danford in the 1800s. Just as in March I was chosen as our party’s token Tribal Chief. How did that happen again?! Fortunately the Carva was not strong. Afterwards we visited a large waterfall and then drifted back down river on a bamboo raft but unfortunately the sunshine then gave way to torrential rain - Mary and I got rather wet!

On our final full day in Fiji, Hannah, Mary and I went on a group trek, Mary bravely wearing her “sailing shoes”. Fiji mud is not ideal for sailing shoes which as a result never graced a yacht again. But it was a lovely day to finish our trip which we ended canoeing down a Fijian river in the sunshine.