Weather was looking so good that Dennis called it a GO early in the week and he didn't have to walk it back. There were 7 official CHUM members on our roster plus myself as crew. With typical two hour surface intervals, I spent an hour after each dive filling tanks and the other hour napping so I didn't get to socialize as much as I wanted to but everyone on the boat seemed to have a great time. Nobody got hurt and I don't think anybody lost any expensive gear. One thing we've been doing new this year is starting Saturday an hour later, with 7am wakeup and 8am first dive. I think everyone enjoys that. Unfortunately, time back to dock and turnaround trips make that not feasible for the day to return.
We followed the usual weekend schedule with 2 Saturday morning dives on West Bank #1, a noonish platform dive on HI-376B, 2 afternoon/night dives on East Bank #4, then 2 Sunday morning dives on Stetson #1 and #3. Moving buoys on Sunday morning was an unusual special treat, thanks to the DMs installing a brand new mooring ball between the dives.
At FG, viz was excellent and currents mild to moderate, with water temps about 79 degrees.. There were tons of fish and we did see some small mantas and a few sharks but not as much big stuff as I had been seeing on earlier trips. This was my 5th trip this year. West Bank featured so many triggerfishes it was like an infestation. Large schools of crevalle jack were present. The platform dive was on the smaller platform due to a supply vessel on HI-376A but fish life was dense. A moderate current meant you had to steadily fin to hold position or hide behind the columns and crossbars. The bars are completely covered with brown chromis and other small fishes. At West Bank we saw the big resident loggerhead. I skipped the night dive but I heard the divers saw her on that one, too.
At Stetson, viz was murky on top but decent below, water temps 76-78 degrees, and current was mostly mild on bottom except for coming over the ridges from the wall but if you knew where to go you could get completely out of it. Stingrays were everywhere and I often saw 4 or 5 at a time cruising around back and forth.
