Wet Dreams

Playboy managing photography editor Jim Larson got an offer that was hard to refuse. Would a photo crew and a handful of Playmates like to fly to Fiji, stay on a 100-foot vessel, spend two weeks scuba diving and record the excursion for a pictorial? Larson, who has traveled to Africa and Iceland for exotic Playboy layouts, thought about it for a nanosecond and signed on. So did Miss August 1997 Kalin Olson, Miss April 1997 Kelly Monaco and Miss January 1996 Victoria Fuller. After traveling 7000 miles from Chicago to Fiji, the Playmates donned their gear (minus those pesky scuba suits) and headed underwater, where they swam with tiger fish and barracuda. Then La Niña hit. "Rain, wind and lightning disturbed the clarity of the water for photos," Larson says. "At times, the waves were so fierce that it sounded like our boat was being smacked with a baseball bat." Stirred but not shaken, the group traveled to the coast of Honduras to wrap things up. "It became more of an adventure than we wanted," Larson says with a chuckle.

Where and how to buy on page 157.