The Jean Michel Cousteau Resort is a well known eco resort on Fiji's second major island of Vanua Levu. It is near the small city of Savusavu which is not really a tourist town, but fun to visit nonetheless.

I think that this is the best place on the planet for diving parent who have young children through teens who might be learning to dive. I got certified when I was here with my family a year prior and have now accumulated about 700 dives so the hobby stuck. They have nannies to take care of your children (up to 12 I think), so every morning after breakfast, they get swept away and spend the next 10 or 12 hours with a Fijian nanny while you get to be a couple.

My then 8 year old son said it was the best vacation ever because they only gave him food that he loved. Simple view of life. He also got to go out into the ocean on a bubble marker which to him was like diving. He got certified 3 years later when he was 11, so it had a profound impact on him too. My oldest daughter who was then 15 got certified along with me and has now been on over a dozen liveaboards, so their formula for hooking divers is amazing. She came home wanting to be a marine biologist which didn't happen, but her love for the ocean has never left her.

Every night the resort would have a resident marine biologist give a talk on what they saw during the dives of the day, so there was very strong focus on diving.

The resort really caters to people learning how to dive or have family learning how to dive. The divemasters were all very good at persuading the snorkelers to become divers and regular divers to become advanced divers which I did in my return to the resort this time.

They had two very nice boats that held about a dozen folks each. Very comfortable and pleasant.

The resort went diving in three locations: inside the reef, outside, and Namena. The outside reefs were anywhere from 45 to 90 minutes away. One special dive was Dreamhouse which was a nice pinnacle at about 90 minutes. We saw a hammerhead there and sometimes they saw tiger sharks which we did not see. All of these dives were classic wall dives and some had swim throughs down at about 100 feet. We saw mantas and an eagle ray or two on most dives.

The food was fantastic with incredible variety. We had a combination of buffets and single entres. A lot of fish and chicken with an occasional piece of beef. Deserts were a stand out as well.

The inner reef dives were also good with some nice pinnacles and a good variety of hard and soft corals, but they were affected by the sediment of runoff so they were OK.

The twice a week trips to Namena were the highlight for divers. They were about a two hour boat ride away and thus left early in the afternoon and returned at about 5PM. Chimneys were my favorite dive site although most patrons who had been there multiple times like Grand Central Station (I was not able to go there until 5 years later on the Nai'a Liveaboard boat--it is very good.

Fiji has a lot of seasonal weather patterns. April is the end of summer and we had some pretty nasty storms but rarely missed some diving. This area can get hit by some pretty strong tropical storms in February and March. Water temperature was in the low 80s but drops pretty rapidly as you get into May and June.

We also went on a few night dives and they were very good as well.

We stayed here twice and my wife cried both times when we left because she liked it so much. She does not dive, but had plenty of activities and enjoyed her time sans small children. The Fijian people are loving and kind and have a great heritage. We got to visit a native chief's home and shared in a kava ceremony which was quite unique as well.

I do not think of the Kona as a true destination for diving. But it is a great multi-purpose family vacation spot with many things to do.

By far and away the best diving is the manta night dive. It is very good for divers and for snorkelers. The diving is about 30 feet deep and you all sit down in a circle around the projector which brings in plankton which brings int he mantas. The arrival rate is very high. We had one female show up and she was a show animal. She swooped and danced for as long as we had air in our tanks. At one point she swooped over my daughter and looked like she was going to crash right into her but then belly rolled on top of her instead. My wife, who does not dive, saw the whole show from right overhead. I have talked with others who have been there recently and they have seen up to 30 mantas on a night. For divers and snorkelers, this is just fantastic.

The diving topography is kind of boring, even compared to the Caribbean. Because of the remoteness of the islands, they do not get many eggs to setup shop. But we did see a lot of interesting animals. We saw lots of eels and several of them were quite interesting and unusual. We saw a half dozen turtles in 4 days of diving. We saw a leaffish, a frogfish at about 100 feet, and several interesting snail like creatures. I was surprised to see just how many things we saw in a few days.

The water is very clear-- up to about 100 feet of visibility in places. It was probably in the 75 to 78 degree range which is not real warm if you are diving more than a few dives a day.

We dove with one of the local dive operators and they were great. My two teens both got their advanced PADI certs while here. They were very comfortable with young and inexperienced divers. This is a great place to get certified. The only negative is that the logistics are a bit painful. You have to drive a harbor where you meet the boat and then have a 20 to 45 minute boat ride to the dive sites. The dive masters were great with my children and I was pretty much left by myself to snap photos and find little fishes.

We stayed in a two bedroom condo on the edge of town which was right on the water. We even were able to do a couple of shore dives which were pretty boring. We made steaks and fish on the grill most nights which we bought at the local Costco. It was every bit as good as a restaurant for about 1/3 the price.

Of course, there are so many things to see and do on the big island of Hawaii. My kids went parasailing which was a highlight. We had a luau at a local resort. We drove around the island to see the volcano on the other side. This is a full day adventure and you are best to leave at around 6am so you have plenty of time to stop and do things. I have not been diving anywhere else in the islands, but I believe that this is one of the best spots on the islands.

We were here with our family of five for a week. Many people come here for 3 or 4 days which is fine, but there is plenty to see and do in a week. I would suggest 2 or 3 days of diving together with lots of other rainforest activities. Getting there is a bit of an adventure in a small plane from San Jose that has to go up over the mountains. The air currents have fun and my children were white when we got there.

The lodge is reached after a 20 minute boat ride from the airstrip to dock. It's a good walk up the hill to get there. This is a place that requires a bit of fitness. The central lodge is where you eat and gather. It was very nice and had a beautiful view of the ocean to the west. The food was from a menu for dinner and buffet for breakfast. Very good lodge food, but not fantastic. Everyone was happy, but we didn't leave thinking food was the outstanding feature of the trip.

The resort has a small beach that is a bit of a hike down to the ocean. It was OK, but the pool was a lot better. Monkeys would also come to the pool and visit us which was pretty cool. You are definitely in the rainforest.

We went to the rainforest twice--once by boat and once by horse. Those were incredible days. We saw so many monkeys and other animals of the tropics. It was outstanding. On several occassions, we saw the great scarlet maccaws which was a trip highlight. We even saw them right at the lodge at one point. Very memorable.

The diving is primarily around the island of Cano which is about an hour boat ride away from the resort. Most of the people that go there are snorkelers but the staff really likes to go in with divers because it is more fun for them. The diving is pretty wild. There some very strong thermoclines, the strongest that I have ever experienced. The water was upper 70s above about 50 feet and 70 below the thermocline. You can actually see the layer in the water. Visibility was average, probably about 50 to 70 feet.

The dive landscape is primarily is boulders with algae, not much coral to be seen. But lots of bigger fish. We saw a big school of barracuda, trevaly and jacks. Saw several mantas and a mobulla ray which I had not seen before. We also saw LOTS of eels. Maybe a dozen on one dive.

The Bajo del Diablo is a stone pinnacle that rises to within 30 feet of the surface. This dive site was great, similar to some of the dive sites in the Galapagos Islands. We dove here twice and the second time we saw about 25 white tips which were very active. It was almost a little intimidating because there were so many of them.

The dive operation was small but very capable. They were well prepared for helping divers who were novice to more experienced. Because most went snorkeling, we had a divemaster for two of us and he was great at finding things of interest for us.

Cozumel is where many Americans go to dive. It is easy to get to, relatively inexpensive, and the diving is very good. Although I like Little Cayman and The Belizean atolls a bit better, it ranks right up there with the best diving in the Caribbean.

I have been here a half dozen times, so this review is a bit of an amalgam of several trips. The weather varies a lot from season to season. June and July are my favorite times to dive here when the water is very warm and seas are flat as glass. Hurricanes are an issue here in August (it seems to attract early ones) and we were there once in August a week or so after a medium sized one, so the threat is real. It is perfect in early summer. Was there in late fall and it was very rough and we were quite restricted in where we went. Spring break was good as well, kind of in between.

Our family has stayed in a condo or two in the north part of the island which was great and good value. If you have a couple of kids and want a mixed activity vacation, this worked great. Diving requires a bit of a drive, so you kind of need a car to commute. If you want an all in dive holiday, this is probably not so good. I have stayed at the Presidente which is right by the best dive sites. The boat picked us up right by the hotel peer and you are diving in 10 minutes. You also are south of the cruise ship parking lot.

There are a lot of options in dive operators as well. We have avoided the hotel operators ard selected those that cater to more serious divers. We stay away from those that focus on the cruise trade and fill in with divers when they can't fill up there scuba buses.