We’re gonna need a bigger boat…

Bula Bula Boatblog® Fans,

The most exciting thing about this blog is not that we went diving with bullsharks – though that is pretty exciting, more of that later – but that we had a visitor from back home.

Our very old friend Sally came to stay for a few weeks.

Among other things, Sally is a keen diver, which gave Ju a great excuse to do lots and lots of diving.

She is also a keen underwater photographer with a very fancy camera. You will be pleased to know that we have edited her photos down from four thousand and seventy two, to just three hundred and six.

We even did a freediving course, which is amazing. Ju went from being able to hold his breath from just 40 seconds, to almost two minutes, and got down to 16m. Which comes in very handy when you are snorkelling with mantas, who can hold their breath for a lot longer than that.

But the highlight has to be the dive with the bullsharks.

Sorry about the camera shake. Actually, it’s not camera shake. It’s cameraman shake. Those sharks are BIG.

You swim down to about 20 meters and then a kamikaze diver starts feeding the sharks. Not by hand of course, but on a large pole. He wears metal gloves, but these amazing creatures have mouths bigger than your head so that’s not going to help much. I asked him how long he had been doing this, and he said he started on Saturday which was a bit worrying.

They use these little poles to keep the sharks from eating the customers, while you sit behind a protective safety wall that they’ve built, 

….though you can’t help thinking, “What if they come from behind?”

At least you don’t have to pay until after the dive, so if you do get eaten you haven’t lost anything.

Sadly, lots of them had been injured by fishing hooks, which you could see dangling out of their mouths with the wire still attached.

They are very big, very aggressive and they come very close. You could easily reach out and touch them if you didn’t mind losing an arm.

They are absolutely magnificent.

But as well as being a diver, Sally also likes fishing. We have to confess that the good ship Domini’s fish catching record has not been great; so far we’ve only managed to catch one size 12 wellie. But Sally is an expert. She was taught by her brother Paul who is a fly fishing champion. At least, he’s got all the right gear and talks a good game, even if he doesn’t catch much. So were looking forward to a fantastic fish supper.

And here we are, enjoying a fantastic hog roast.

The fishing could have gone better.

This is the one that got away.

One evening we were invited to an Indo-Fijian religious festival by our new friends Ravi and Anjani. There was a fantastic band, 

…though they didn’t do much in the way of blues so Ju couldn’t really join in.

And Sally tried the Kava.

Very nice. Though she thinks she’ll stick with the Sauvignon Blanc. And lots of it.

Just time for our arty farty competition. First entry is from Sally called “Giant Clam.”

Pretty amazing. Next up is Ju with his “Cool Cave.”

And finally, Sally’s “Jaws.”

Or should that be “Gums?”

And the winner is….

“Jaws.” Well done Sally.

You can come again.

Bula Vinaka, and Moce for now.

Ju & Lyn