La Luz Dive Trip Report

[shugar]

Dove in La Luz Resort's House Reef in San Juan, Batangas. Not a hotbed of diving by any measure but this little clump of rocks was pleasantly rich and made for a very enjoyable dive.

DISCLAIMER: it's the first time i'm using a strobe (and 2nd time using a real camera underwater)... none of the shots are color corrected or cropped, so be kind...

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DIVE #1: The Hike
Time In: 1030 am
Dive Time: 56 Minutes
Max Depth: 111 feet
Avg. Depth: 47 feet
Water Temp: 30C - 27C

the name of the site is "The Hike" and consists of a roundabout trail around some coral and rock mounds with depths ranging from 5 feet to well over 130 feet. I had snorkeled the very shallow portions several times before and found it alive although strewn with garbage from a nearby poor-people resort... I didn't see any garbage during this dive and that was a welcome fact.

The dive team was composed of Rommel (the owner) and Allan (the friend of a friend who was booked in La Luz)

Descent was slow and relaxed... it's probably the least number of times I've ever had to equalize underwater. Checking my dive's profile that night I noticed we were doing things like taking 1 minute to get from 7 to 9 feet... interesting...

Anyway along the dive was a surprising array of life. There were sweetlips, surgeons, a lot of schooling yellow-finned fusiliers (i think). We saw a pretty large grouper at depth (didn't notice the depth it was in) as well as some pretty large clams and such. We were not lucky to bump into the resident turtles - the resort owner (and our DM) said the previous weekend he bumped into 4 of them!

It was a relaxed dive overall... my photos sucked large lemons and at some point wanted to hurl the whole rig into some innocent damselfish but decided against it. I even almost did a Steve Irwin and landed belly first on a scorpion fish... good thing i was working that bouyancy... lesson learned *whew*.

My best shots are from an anemone that was playing host to several anemone shrimp (I spotted them!!!) in the middle of a sand patch... talk about relaxing photoshoot hahahahaha






We began the dive at 3000psi and ended it at 200psi after 56 minutes.

This was a very good dive overall.

Jag

PS
as a parting note: my most insightful photograph of the dive!

 

[shugar]

Dive #2: The Hike
Time In: 430 pm
Dive Time: 70 Minutes
Max Depth: 36 feet
Avg. Depth: 17 feet
Water Temp: 28C

Late in the afternoon I returned to La Luz Resort (from Balai sa Laiya) to ask Allan if he was up for another dive. He was up to a night dive actually, but I wasn't too keen in waiting for at least another half-hour before we were to gear up. So we ended up doing a late afternoon dive with the weather turning a bit glummy.

Tide was low so we had to enter from a different direction and work our way from memory - we were both trying to remember the map we saw that morning and neither of us had a compass. The dive was to be very conservative - +/- 30 feet max; turnaround was around 500 psi with a let's-surface pressure of 100 (we're that near the shore). My main intention was to putter around more with the camera and was not expecting to actually move around a lot. Also I was conscious of keeping the last 1000psi or so of diving to the safety stop depths so we'd be doing a very long deco in effect and can bail quickly in case of an emergency.

Being dusk there were a large number of lionfish on the hunt. The sea life hadn't really changed just yet so these must have been the early birds.

My photos here sucked even more... I don't know if it was the strobe misfiring or my impatience waiting for it to charge or my settings were waaaay off. Either way about 50+ minutes into the dive I thought: fax it! so i clipped the camera to my BC and chose to enjoy the dive like a normal rec diver.



Some of the above I added because despite being obviously underexposed it did lend out a very nice transparent green color... comments please (and assistance so I can do it properly next time)

Just then my buddy taps me and tells me that he was feeling cold... so we began to work our way back towards shore. It was too bad... we both had 1000psi left in the tank and it was such a waste of air!!! (hehehehe I know, baaaad dive buddy). I did see the beginnings of a fairly big octopus in a crevice but since we had to head back... tsk tsk tsk... too bad really...

Turns out he was cold and he had to pee... he wasn't in a wetsuit, is a guy and still can't pee in the water? tsk tsk tsk...

We were along a pretty barren rock cover at 6 feet and we thought... this must be close to shore right? let's breach. surprise! it was a 30 meter-or-so swim on the calm surface back to shore hahahahahaha we did it on our backs (he was also in a bp/w) and ended the dive with big smiles on our mugs.

I chose not to dive the next day but will definitely return soon! that little reeflet has tons of nooks and crannies to explore! and at 150/ tank it's a steal!!!

Jag

PS:
this i saw on the way back... what the hell is it???? it's pretty big and hefty...

 

[shugar]

Just so you guys don't think I'm a horrendously hopeless and lousy photographer, I did take this money shot on the surface that night... before my amazing massage by the shore



no PS tricks...

Jag

 

[dingho]

o k!is there a operating diveshop there, cost for diving n lodging,any dive package?

 

[Xizang]

Jag thats a fat starfish

 

[clgsamson]

Grasshopper, you got to hop on a plane to see, hear and learn from Master V....

I like the "insightful photo" btw. The last pic is a keeper, Jag.

 

[shugar]

Grasshopper, you got to hop on a plane to see, hear and learn from Master V....

I like the "insightful photo" btw. The last pic is a keeper, Jag.

@jai: that's it??? i figured it was starfishy but jsut that? a fat one? ptth...

@caloy: i'm currently offering my left tit for sale on ebay to get to go to PG in June... really could use the master's touch here hahahaha

very insightful huh? hahahaha

Jag

 

[shugar]

o k!is there a operating diveshop there, cost for diving n lodging,any dive package?

technically there's no "dive shop". the owner of the resort is a DM and he has a few tanks, some weights and a compressor - that's it. no gear rentals or fancy-schmancy PADI posters or anything

i don't think there are any dive packages. tanks are at P150... about US$3... it's a shore entry to the site - i don't know if there are any more off shore sites that you'd need a banca to get to, though... i hear there are some diveable sites to the south of the resort... www.laluzresort.com... you can tell rommel (the owner) that Jag sent you

Jag

 

[alcina]

We call them cushion stars here

Looks like a good time!

 

[swisstrav]

@shugar

hi, you got me interested in that little resort. since im not that familiar with the locations. how long a drive would it be from batangas port to the resort? could you imagine that they let you dive solo?

thanks. swisstrav - planning his next trip