What Is Your Favorite Subject?

Subject being the main focus of your photo. 

Welcome Blue Water Travel; Photography edition!

Leading this charter, Mr. Mark Strickland, professed photographer and Fiji lover! 

We love these kinds of trips: not only because we get a real “dumbed down" insight into the complexity of photography through the many workshops, but we also get to enjoy the amazing creations at the end of it.

I love starting with anemone fish ~pink anemonefish ~ Richard

“I was not expecting a hard coral garden like that!” - Bryan after diving The Bay. Can I say, this man is one of the happiest persons we have met in the world, both under and over water. 

Female leopard blenny ~ Craig

Scorpionfish, Randall’s shrimp gobies, nudibranch eggs, blue dragons, hawk anthias, fat hammer head shark dilly dallying in the shallows; all surrounded by soft and hard corals. 

Lemon coral goby ~ Craig

Baby grey reef sharks, groupers in courtship behavior, long nose hawkfishes; so many many-spotted sweetlips and even diagonal sweetlips, huge napoleon wrasse, and a saravati shrimp in bubble coral. 

Chris at rainbow wall ~ Bryan

Craig was incredibly excited about photographing a piano fangblenny! “And what song was he playing on the keys?” - Liz, Craig’s wife, who speaks “Craig”. 

The before mentioned piano fangblenny ~ Craig

Massive huge moray eel with a lot of its body out of his crevice, and next to him, the elusive NAI’A pipefish!

Big eye barracuda traveling the Nigali Passage ~ Richard

We thought our resident blue ribbon eels were gone but they seemed to have moved home to a deeper hole, and are as hissy as ever. 

Juvenile ribbon eel ~ Rachel

Juvenile lyretail; miniature Morrison’s dragonets; blennies all around; schools of surgeonfish chilling with fusiliers and trevallies chasing all the rest of the fish around. 

Les ~ Anthias and lonely damsel

While exploring the Wall, a super excited Kim basked in the apparition of an eagle ray (her favorite ray); grey reef sharks; groupers; snappers: “That was a spectacular dive!”- Mike

Presumed juvenile sharp nose pygmy wrasse ~ crazy catch from Craig 

Ornate ghost pipe fish on a night dive! And a big octopus. 

Amazing cheek lined wrasse with background ~ Bryan

Wakaya had some sweet encounters with Mickey Manta, and then big Shirley had a bit of a clean up. Apart from that we had several close fly bys by both chevron and melanistic mantas all around the reef.  

Melanistic manta ~ Bryan

Mark, Craig and myself tried to scour the area for Helfrich’s dartfish. No success. We found three decorated dartfish way too deep so God only knows at what depth these Helfrich’s are at. 

Not a Helfrich's, a decorated dartfish... but soooo cute anyways ~ Bryan

“That was absolutely wonderful! The manta (Mickey) just kept on coming back; it felt like it was swimming with me!”- Rachel 

Mickey manta ~ Mike

Findings all around: three black juvenile ribbon eels, feet apart from each other; adorable yellow nosed shrimp gobies; decorator dartfish; flasher wrasses; huge hawksbill turtle, barnacles covering her shell. 

Hello Coral grouper ~ Bryan

Ahhhh, two-spined pygmy angelfish ~ Fletcher

“A lot of your common suspects but they were so camera photogenic on this dive!” - Mark (after Cliff Jump)

A pair of longnose hawkfish ~ Fletcher

Shot of our kiddies at Somo Somo village with Rachel (who was besotted with these & Clau) ~ Chris

Sharks at Nigali Passage, as well as our famous cabbage patch. On our way there we could slow down in the shallows to enjoy both a flame hawkfish AND leopard blenny living in their own pocillora. 

Famous Gau cabbage patch ~ Bryan

“This dive had all the colors!”- Mark (Maytag)

Hawksbill turtle ~ Richard

Huge blue dragons; blennies of all sorts; hawksbill turtle; so many types of unicorn fish; Spanish mackerel hunting; and fusiliers all around. 

Beautiful crevice ~ Fletcher

As we expected, Vatu-I-Ra and her amazing underwater life left all divers happy and wanting for repeats!

Richard ~Soft corals and anthias

Dolphins, waves and sun on our way back to Lautoka; such a lovely end of the charter.

Vinaka vakalevu everyone!