Fiji Aggressor Recent Experiences?

[svana]

Hi Everyone,
I tried searching and most recent I found was a route change from 2016 due to weather. Has anybody been on the Fiji Aggressor recently? We're looking at taking a trip in July and was hoping to hear from folks. While I'm admittedly more of a wreck diver than a reef diver, my understanding is the marine life is great and I've always wanted to visit.

 

[Pedro Burrito]

My friend posted on his Facebook page that the trip he organized has been cancelled because the boat was just condemned. I don’t have independent verification, however.

 

[LiveaboardCom]

Hi Everyone,
I tried searching and most recent I found was a route change from 2016 due to weather. Has anybody been on the Fiji Aggressor recently? We're looking at taking a trip in July and was hoping to hear from folks. While I'm admittedly more of a wreck diver than a reef diver, my understanding is the marine life is great and I've always wanted to visit.

Hi there,

Pedro is right. The Fiji Aggressor is ceasing operations as of 12th March 2019 and all upcoming charters are going to be cancelled.

If you're interested in scuba diving Fiji, the Nai'a liveaboard has some availability in 2019. It is very popular but there are a small handful of spaces left in May and October. If you can only go in July, they have 2 spaces left on their humpback whale swimming trip to Tonga (they dive at Fiji outside of Tonga whale season).

Fiji is great for scuba diving - very colourful! I've linked to the different Fiji dive areas the Nai'a visits, so you can see the full lists of dive sites/highlights to check they meet your interests:

Bligh Waters
Namena
Wakaya
Gau

If you go to Fiji, be sure to add a trip to Beqa lagoon afterwards for bull shark diving. It's an amazing dive.

Thanks,

Kathryn

 

[Scuba Beast]

I am not too happy with Aggressor at all. I booked the Fiji Aggressor back in July for January and they told me 3 weeks prior to the trip that it had a problem in drydock and it would be extended. They gave me a $1000 voucher for another trip and offered to pay the cancellation fees for my airline. The only issue was that I had booked a hotel stay for a week prior before going on the Fiji Aggressor, which they would not cover. I also could not rearrange the vacation time for my job. To sum up, I ended up diving in Beqa Lagoon for almost 2 weeks. While the bull shark diving was good, it did get repetitive after a few days and I was very unimpressed with the reef diving around Beqa Lagoon as the visibility was only 20-40 feet with rather limited things to see compared to diving the bligh waters or Taveuni - not world class by any means. The number of dives was also far less than what would be offered by a liveaboard normally. During my stay I also met a solo woman who was also booked on the Fiji Aggressor and it had got cancelled, then she rebooked in March....only to find out on her current unavoidable Fiji trip that her March charter got cancelled too. She stated that aggressor said the boat was condemned and she would only be offered a $500 voucher now. She also stated she talked to her travel agent and aggressor is looking for a new yacht owner in Fiji to work with but the earliest it would be is 2022+. She was visibly angry and stated she would never book another aggressor again, even though she had gone on 2 in the past and loved liveaboards. While I have gone on a high number of aggressors (5+) and always been satisfied, this is the first of the shortcomings that I have had and it was a major blow. It is a very tough experience to book vacation time far in advance and fly 19 hours around the world to be highly disapointed with what may have easily been prevented. I think from now on I will only book with liveaboard companies that actually own their own yacht or just stay at a dedicated dive resort. It just seems as if there were many miscommunications between Aggressor and the yacht owner that would not have happened if they owned their boat directly instead of being the middle man. Just buyer beware to check out your other options such as Master, Explorer, etc etc.

 

[Brodydog]

They gave me a $1000 voucher for another trip and offered to pay the cancellation fees for my airline.

Are you saying they only gave you a $1000 voucher or they gave you the voucher in addition to refunding the price of their trip?

I’ve read several of these bad reports about Aggressor cancellations over the years. They do not seem to have the customer in mind at all when it is the boat’s fault for the cancellation. Really makes me think twice about booking with them.

 

[Scuba Beast]

They gave me a $1000 voucher on another aggressor yacht to be used within the next 2 years in addition to a getting a full refund. Unfortunately when traveling that far for me it required a 10-14 day stay at the minimum instead of just a week and I had booked other things far in advance such as the transfer, hotel (that they recomended) and diving prior along with the $1600 airline ticket and I still would have lost a sizeable amount of money if I just switched to a different aggressor. Upon further review I will only book with liveaboard companies that own their own yachts from now on instead of playing middle man games. If returning to Fiji someday I will be booking on the NA'AI to dive the bligh.

 

[schwinnfin]

I was on that boat in 2016 and thought it was unseaworthy then. The railing was so loose that I was afraid someone would fall overboard if they leaned on it. They had no tee shirts for sale as rats had chewed through them all.