Dive Review of Paradise Taveuni in
Fiji and Tuvalu/Taveuni, Fiji

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Paradise Taveuni: "Fiji Bucket List Trip Part 1 – Paradise Taveuni", Aug, 2022, by Rene Cote, VA, US ( Sr. Reviewer 11 reports with 14 Helpful votes). Report 12042 has 2 Helpful votes.
No photos available at this time
Ratings and Overall Comments 1 (worst) - 5 (best):
Accommodations		Food
Service and Attitude		Environmental Sensitivity	N/A
Dive Operation		Shore Diving
Snorkeling	N/A
Overall Rating
Value for $$	N/A
Beginners
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Comments	Two years ago, Covid paused my quest to get through my diving bucket list. I’ve ramped up quickly in 2022 and FINALLY I was able to book a trip to Fiji. Since travel was going to be long and painful, I wanted to get the most from this long journey and therefore wanted to experience diving in different locations. I contacted Bluewater Dive Travel, with whom I have used for some trips, and asked them to create an “epic” trip, comprised of 2 resorts and a liveaboard. Tim from Bluewater was my travel agent for this trip and came up with the following itinerary: 5 nights at Paradise Taveuni, 5 nights at Matava on Kadavu island, and then a week on the Nai’a liveaboard. It looked great, so in January 2022, I booked it. Unfortunately, when I started looking for domestic flights a few weeks later, Fiji Airways was still operating on a limited schedule and we had to cut out the 5th night in Matava, as no flights were available to get me to Nadi the following day in time to catch the liveaboard. So, I opted for only 3 diving days on Kadavu and to fly back to Nadi one day sooner and to stay at a hotel near the airport for one night. Getting to Fiji: As many have experienced, long trips with multiple legs has its perils. Initially everything was running smoothly on my first flight to Charlotte, even getting there ahead of schedule. My next flight to LAX was also on time, and even running early……. BUT, as I kept checking for status of my bags, I did not see they had made it onto the plane. It wasn’t until I landed at LAX did I receive that dreaded email… “your bags have been delayed” …. I guess that’s a nice way of saying “we didn’t put your bags on your flight”. Fortunately, I had a 5-hour layover in LAX during which time I learned that the bags had been loaded onto the next flight out of Charlotte and they appeared to be inbound. I made my way to the lounge, and anxiously waited for confirmation as to whether the bags had made it to LAX. A couple of stressful hours later I was able to retrieve my bags, and then checked in to my Fiji Airways flight! YAY!!! The LAX to NAN flight was an uneventful but a long 10 hours of flying. We landed around 5:30am. Clearing Immigration and Customs was a breeze, and I retrieved my bags and shuffled over to the Domestic terminal for the final flight to start part one of my itinerary – Taveuni. Paradise Taveuni. My flight escapades were something that I’ve experienced now and then, so I was somewhat prepared for that kind of ‘turbulence’; but I was not prepared for the spine jarring, sometimes white-knuckled and teeth clenching drive from the airport to Paradise Taveuni. The resort is roughly an hour from the airport – though frankly, that’s based on our ‘speed racer’ driver dodging and weaving on these sometimes pot-hole riddled dirt road segments and barely squeezing by oncoming vehicles at speeds that felt a wee bit fast for the road conditions. To put it mildly, I was stressed out most of the ride……. But I made it without chipping a tooth – a silver lining, I guess. Flo, the guest services manager, provided us a good orientation of the resort shortly after our arrival. The resort has a main building which houses the restaurant, bar, offices and small store; the dive shop is attached to the building just a few steps away. Though they offer several non-diving activities, I didn’t really pay attention to what was offered, as I was selfishly just interested in the diving. I had booked an oceanfront bure and was very pleased with my selection – it had an outside sitting area, a hammock, and views of the ocean. The interior had plenty of space with a bedroom, living room with coffee station and refrigerator, a large bathroom and even an exterior shower and soaking tub… and once in a while, I even had an internet connection from my bure (but not always). The daily routine was breakfast round 06:30, with plentiful choices and a daily breakfast special. During breakfast you select your lunch and dinner. I was on a full meal plan with 2 course lunches and 3 course dinners. Had I to do it over, I would have paired that down to 1 course lunch and 2 course dinners - the meals were too much food for me. Lunches were after the diving and one day we did a beach picnic after dive #2 out near Rainbow Reef. Dinners were at 6:30pm. There is a small bar with various liquors and a couple of beer selections, and some New Zealand wines to pick from. I was a little disappointed in the meals; this is a highly rated resort and everything else was wonderful, but the food was just so-so. Dive Shop: They offer air and nitrox, have a small retail shop, and plenty of space to hang gear to dry. Nitrox divers check their next-day tanks after lunch and fill out a nitrox log (rare in some places); the operation works rather smoothly. Nitrox fills were very consistent at 32%. A big plus for the dive shop is that there is a separate room for dive cameras, and lots of charging outlets. Just outside that room are two camera rinse tanks – the place is very dive camera friendly. The Diving: Shortly after my arrival, I went over to the dive shop to find out if I could do a shore dive – I was able to join 2 other divers who were doing a checkout dive. I was totally blown away by the house reef – I had not seen corals in such great condition in 30 years. I expected damaged corals and some limited clusters. Instead, I was diving on a very healthy, colorful and beautiful reef, and it just steps away from the dive shop! The next day was my first full day of diving. I boarded the boat, found where my gear had been placed by the staff and began to set up. The dive deck is somewhat cramped; when seated you are knee to knee with divers sitting across. The cockpit area of the boat has a small table, room for a few divers and places to put dry bags. The upper deck offered views and space to spread out during our rides out, and during surface intervals. I was surprised when we left the pier and that no one had offered to give a boat safety briefing, and at least 3 of us were on this dive boat for the first time. We even got to the point of getting in the water, but no one had informed me which dive group I was in – it was a pretty laid-back atmosphere. Entry was by giant stride, and the crew was very helpful with handing down my large camera rig. This first day was a bit windy and the boat skirted the shoreline north for 20 minutes or so for our first dive. Though visibility was slightly diminished, I found the corals to be amazing. It’s easy to see why Fiji is considered the coral capital of the world. I captured some stunning colorful corals, and as bonus we came across a Spanish Dancer. We did our first 2 dives along this section of reef, headed back to the shop to exchange tanks, and then headed out for our 3rd dive. Since the day before I had dived the house reef, I did not expect our 3rd dive to be a 1-minute ride out, and to again dive the house reef; but that’s what we did. The second dive day was similar to the first, winds and sea conditions forced us to stay along the coast of Taveuni, and again we did our 3rd dive close to the house reef. They were good dives with layers upon layers of hard, colorful corals; it was a real treat. The next 2 days the weather had become much more favorable and we were able to go out to Rainbow Reef, the location of The Great White Wall. The Great White Wall is named for the abundance of white soft corals that fully expose themselves when there is good current. It’s a rather short section of wall, perhaps less than 100 meters, but it is a sheer drop to greater than 130 feet and is covered in these white corals. With good lighting and viz, it makes for impressive images. In the 2 days we dived that site twice, once going through a swim thru that exits at the wall around 90 feet. On rainbow reef the shallows offer stunning coral views. The lighting is good, and the corals cover everything; it’s alive, healthy and colorful. I really enjoyed rainbow reef. Paradise Taveuni is an excellent resort, the diving operation is very well run (minus the couple minor exceptions I noted); all the staff is friendly, cheerful and helpful. From the house reef to rainbow reef, the corals did not disappoint. Here is my trip video: [youtu.be link]
Websites	Paradise Taveuni
Reporter and Travel
Dive Experience	501-1000 dives
Where else diving	Most of the Caribbean, FL, Morehead City NC, Okinawa, Socorro, La Pax, Cenotes MX, Yap, Palau, Komodo Islands, Bali, Maldives, Hawaii, and now Fiji
Closest Airport	TVU	Getting There	International LAX to NAN Domestic NAN to TVU
Dive Conditions
Weather	sunny	Seas	calm
Water Temp	76-79°F / 24-26°C	Wetsuit Thickness
Water Visibility	40-75 Ft/ 12-23 M
Dive Policy
Dive own profile	yes
Enforced diving restrictions	I was able to wander around and go deeper based on my experience.
Liveaboard?	no	Nitrox Available?	yes
What I Saw
Sharks	1 or 2	Mantas	None
Dolphins	None	Whale Sharks	None
Turtles	None	Whales	None
Ratings 1(worst) - 5 (best):
Corals		Tropical Fish
Small Critters		Large Fish
Large Pelagics
Underwater Photography 1 (worst) - 5 (best):
Subject Matter		Boat Facilities
Overall rating for UWP's		Shore Facilities
UW Photo Comments	EXCELLENT camera room at the dive shop; they have a camera bucket on the boat.

Report currently has 2 Helpful votes

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Dive Review of Paradise Taveuni in Fiji and Tuvalu/Taveuni, Fiji

Paradise Taveuni: "Fiji Bucket List Trip Part 1 – Paradise Taveuni", Aug, 2022,

Ratings and Overall Comments 1 (worst) - 5 (best):

Overall Rating

Reporter and Travel

Dive Conditions

Dive Policy

What I Saw

Ratings 1(worst) - 5 (best):

Underwater Photography 1 (worst) - 5 (best):

Dive Review of Paradise Taveuni in
Fiji and Tuvalu/Taveuni, Fiji