Up in the Air and Under the Sea

(written by Megan)

We really wanted to go scuba diving since we had heard Fiji had great soft coral dives and luckily we had found a company that does hot air balloon rides and that sounded interesting as well. We convinced the dive trip to wait for us to get back from our balloon ride and we were able to fit both into one day.

We woke up at 3:30 am (yes, that is not a mistype) to get ready to be picked up for our balloon ride at 4:30 am. Once we met up with the crew and pilot they had us pile into a van and follow the balloon truck around as they deployed test balloon (helium balloons with a LCD light that they watch to see air patterns as it floats up into the air) from a couple places to determine our take off point. Since the direction the balloon floats is only controlled by the direction the air is flowing, the pilot has to pick a take off point that will allow us to land in a reasonable location (not the mountains that were to the west or the sea that is in the other directions). Our pilot quickly figured out the best option and had his crew start setting up the balloon.



We’ve all seen hot air balloons in the sky. What I didn’t realize is how massive they are, which we quickly figured out when they stretched it out on a soccer field, and it took up almost the whole thing. Once they got everything attached we piled into the balloon and they started filling it up. Being scared of heights, I was feeling pretty nervous getting into the basket. I was scared that we’d loose control and be blown out to sea and be lost forever or just drop out of the sky. However, once we took off the ride was unbelievably smooth. (Warren : I was surprised by how hot it was. Whenever he shot the fire it was ridiculously hot. The captain was wearing a cowboy hat and after being up in the air for a while I understood why)

Talking to the pilot (who is from a town 1 hr away from where I grew up in Ohio) he was saying that there is no motion in the balloon. He also had amazing control of how high we were – at one point he dropped us down between two hills into a ravine with a river, dropped the balloon so it just kissed the top of the river, and lifted us out of the ravine over the hill on the other side. Once I saw how much control he had and how smooth the trip was, I was feeling much more relaxed and confident.

We floated around and enjoyed the rising sun. People would wave from the ground as we passed over them and livestock were a little unsure what to make of us. After about 30 minutes I heard a commotion from the other side of the basket and realized a girl was freaking out saying “I need to get down now”. The pilot stayed calm and was like “well, that’s a little difficult right now”. It ends up that she partied a little too hard the night before, didn’t get enough sleep, and freaked out from the heat of the flame and height. Once she chucked over the side of the basket she started to feel better and stopped freaking out. The pilot had no pity and didn’t make much effort to accommodate her. He told us that one time he stopped, dropped off a passenger, kicking him off the balloon, and took back off because the passenger did the same thing (partied too hard and started getting sick in the balloon) and was ruining everyone else’s ride. The pilot didn’t kid around.

As far as landing goes, that’s kind of up in the air pending where the wind takes the balloon. There is a balloon caravan of a van and a truck carrying the trailer for the basket that follows us around on the crazy local roads and tries to meet the balloon where ever it lands. The problem in Fiji is that the road infrastructure isn’t as established as a lot of places, and if the caravan is on the wrong side of a river it could take them an hour to drive around to a bridge and get to the other side to meet the balloon. Luckily we were able to land on the same side as the caravan when the pilot finally found a field that didn’t have crops in it. The pilot purposely crashed the balloon basket into a tree to stop our forward momentum and dropped us down in a 10 by 10 grass patch. After loading the basket onto the trailer they drove us (in the basket with the balloon inflated) to a larger field so they could drop the balloon down onto the grass without ruining it. The whole operation was pretty amazing.

We were dropped off, ate a bite of breakfast (included in the balloon ride) and ran off to the dive place. After getting our gear we jumped into a boat and went off to our first dive spot, about 45 minutes off the shore of the main island (45 minutes going 40 knots which is pretty freaking fast). (Warren : We thought this was fast but going back was another story)

We were diving with 2 other people and the master diver. The water was amazing – super warm and the visibility was great. We saw a ton of cool fish and a couple sea turtles. It was about a 45 minute dive after which we hopped back into the boat and moved over to our next dive spot.





During our surface interval we were talking about favorite dive places and sharing dive stories. Our dive instructor didn’t really explain the next dive, other than we’d be down for 35 minutes which seemed short to me. I asked if we could stay down longer if our air was ok, but he said it’s hard to coordinate with the boat if we don’t stick with the time. That didn’t make sense to me but he is the expert so I was like, eh – whatever.


It ends up we were on a drift dive (where you drop down into a current and just float along without having to swim). It was my first drift dive ever and it was amazing. There were so many fish and stuff just flying by. We saw four or five sea turtles, and as we were coming out of the current we found a group of white tipped reef sharks under some coral (my first sharks ever!). I get excited thinking about how AWESOME the dive was. When our dive instructor gave us a thumbs up, telling us it was time to surface, we all got up and everyone was like “THAT WAS AMAZING – MY NEW BEST DIVE EVER”! If you are unsure about diving, once you go on one like that you’re hooked.

Unfortunately we only had 2 dives, so we headed back to our resort for a quick shower. The boat driver was flying on the way back. It took us 35 minutes to get back and we were bouncing like crazy. I think he was up to 50 knots on the return. He had the biggest grin the whole time while he watched all the tourists lurch back and forth. A few days ago, we had met a Australian guy who retired to Fiji and brought the shoe company he owns over to manufacture there and he offered to have us come to the manufacturing location for a tour.

At this company they make UGGs. It ends up that there are hundreds of little mom and pop places in Australia that make sheep skin shoes that are known as Uggs (short for ugly). The company in the US has copyrighted the name, which is considered generic in Australia (think clogs or flip flops) and therefore cause a lot of companies to go out business because they can’t ship to the US or sell on Ebay because the US company is huge and strong arms them with lawsuits, etc. The ironic part of it is the US Uggs are made with lower quality sheep skin and manufactured in China.

They took us around the manufacturing shop, where everything is done by hand. We then picked out our shoes. It ended up that we had to special order my shoes and Warren’s slippers. We also wanted to get my brother’s girlfriend a pair for Christmas. When I was deciding on style and colors I saw they had grey and red died sheep skin. I was like “light bulb”. I then ordered my mom a pair of classic uggs and my brother slippers in red and grey leather, where the different panels are opposite colors, figuring they’d be perfect to wear during an Ohio State game. They would have made them for us while we waited but they had to order grey leather, so guy was nice and guaranteed they’d arrive before we left for Christmas so we’d have our gifts in hand.

We were satisfied with our day, so we went back to our resort, swam in the pool for an hour or so and made dinner. We knew we had to get to bed at a relatively good time since we had another 3:30 am wake up day tomorrow.