Info and Discussion...Roatan Dive Sites

[CajunDiva]

Gotta watch out for Thib the Toadfish...you never know what he might do next

 

[CajunDiva]

OK, so here's one of my favorites from this trip. We were out doing a shore dive/lionfish hunt on Half Moon Bay Wall at Media Luna Resort. After shooting the lionfish, they were dropped on the sea floor and left. (Not good to feed them to the critters) So at the end of our dive, this Green Moray Eel comes out to beg and ends up discovering one of the previously shot lionfish...on his own! Just watch his body whip around when he catches the scent

This leads me to HOPE that the next step will be for them to learn to hunt lionfish on their own! It seems like a stretch, but evolution is possible...

 

[EvilOtter]

@Doc Great shots of the toadfish! Thank you very much for sharing. He looks like a huge character. I'm not sure that I would have risked my watch like you did. Those guys are fugly!

@CajunDiva Sorry to hear that your video did not pan out. It's disappointing to miss opportunities like that. Fortunately, there is always another great shot just around the corner.

I flubbed all my footage from a night dive last week. I was trying to get some fluoro video using blue light filters and yellow barrier filters on the mask and camera. Unfortunately, the camera filter would not stay in place so all I got was blue saturated nonsense. Of course, I didn't even notice until the end of the dive. Classic task overloading! I still had an amazing dive and saw some amazing bioluminescence through the mask filter. I will get 'em next time!

 

[CajunDiva]

It happens...

So I said Calvin's Crack is my favorite dive site. I think that was a bit premature. Farther to the east, near the island of Barbareta, lies a place called Morat Wall. It is rarely dived, so the wall remains pristine and beautiful. I don't have time to compose anything special, but I dumped a few of my videos together into one scene to display here:


This is a truly spectacular dive, but one does not often have the opportunity. Our friends at Aqua Adventures, the dive op at Media Luna Resort, offer this trip on a regular basis in combination with a day at Pigeon Cay. Contact them if you'd like to join! aquaadventuresroatan

 

[Roatan Marine Park]

Being the person who installs and maintains the majority of the dive moorings around the island, there are over 200 sites which have buoys and i can honestly say there are no bad spots around the island. Personally Morat Wall is one of my favorite, along with Texas, any seamount dive, and a new site called "Land of the Giants". This is a recently installed site and is between Man of War Key and Palmetto and has some awesome topography. Right at the mooring there is a crack which leads down to a sand patch. The sand patch is at 100ft and there are sky scrapers of corals reaching up to 60ft all around the area. When the viz is great it's an awesome dive and then there is a whole outer reef which you can explore.
The Marine Park also has a fundraising project where people can purchase dive sites, name them and install them anywhere around the island. So far we have sold over 25 sites and this has helped the maintenance of the island wide marine infrastructure program. You could have the opportunity of people saying that YOUR dive site is one of the best on the island. Here is more info on the program Roatan Marine Park » Donations

 

[CajunDiva]

Thank you so much for participating with us here on ScubaBoard! I am delighted to hear about the progress you are making in designating new dive sites. These are new places that I'll certainly plan to check out on future visits I have often dreamed of naming a dive site in Roatan "Cajun Place", so now I see that is a possibility! I will have to start saving my pennies

We are thankful to the Roatan Marine Park for its efforts. We've been collecting our Marine Park tags over the years and I proudly display them on one of the D-Rings on my BC:

This year there was no tag, so we got a wristband instead. As you can see, I love the tags and wish you would continue with those. A purple one would be ideal...it would match my BC Maybe since I didn't get one, you could name a dive site near Calvin's Crack "Cajun Place" in my honor anyway

I look forward to hearing more from you with regard to dive sites in Roatan. We would all benefit from your knowledge. Please feel free to share more information with us about what the Roatan Marine Park is trying to accomplish!

 

[Roatan Marine Park]

Thank you for your nice words, it is greatly appreciated. The team at the RMP work hard and unfortunately not everyone who makes a living from the reef supports our cause. Every bracelet and token, t-shirt and donation goes towards us working on protecting Roatan's reefs. We are now a registered 501C3 so supporters can make tax deductible donations so naming a dive site just got that much easier.
If anyone is interested in a map of all the dive sites and other GPS points around the island, you can email me on info@roatanmarinepark.net and i will forward you a kmz file you can open with google earth
P.S. we have tokens in stock so you will have to come back to the island to get your blue 2017 one. Purple was 2010 and 2016 and we do offer people old tokens

 

[CajunDiva]

@EvilOtter, here is one I found of the toadfish...it's several years old:

 

[Brodydog]

CajunDiva loved your Calvin's Crack video. Very nice!

 

[CajunDiva]

Thanks @Brodydog! I noticed a little more fish action this trip than before