Yesterday not a breath of wind was stirring so Dave and I ditched work in favor of a dive. We couldn't decide where to go - it was one of those days that virtually all dive sites might have been possible. But since we had been diving in the Gulf and the tide was pretty big, we decided to go find some blue water.
Before we reached the dive site we were diverted by a huge amount of splashing - turned out to be a good sized, very dense baitball being devoured by all manner of predator. I have to admit my wuss status here - I didn't get in
I did stick the camera over the marlin board and managed two shots that are OK. It was an incredible thing to watch so we spent quite a while there...here's some soon-to-be deceased fishies...
This post is a little different as most of the shots are truly "average"...but I decided to post them anyway, just to get some colour out there and to show the site a little bit. I'm not sure this is a good thing or if I shouldn't post unless I bring back "keepers" - I'll let you all be the judges on that. I definitely want to go back. Although we had 20-25m viz and quite blue water, the swell was pumping and the surge created was throwing up bits of fine white sand. There was a good current when we first dropped in and it only got stronger; this was OK to begin with but after a while it just became too much effort to really stay in one place so I resorted to "fly bys". I will use these images to remind myself what I want to achieve next time we go - there's so much out there that if I don't have some sort of plan I'll just get too distracted and come home without the shots I want again!!
The site is a bunch of coral bommies and many of them are covered with all manner of leather corals, soft corals and small fans:
There were also a couple of hopping cleaning stations, but unlike some on other sites, the really active ones were in heavy current areas. On this one I was able to belly down on the sand between two bommies, but I kept getting pushed through the channel. When I moved around the bommie the current was worse, so back I went. It limited my view a bit but it was still fun to watch.
The larger bommies had all sorts of fishes, nudibranchs, ascidians, clams and eels. There were also at least three large morays - two giants and one with orange eyes that I can never remember the name of. I have a couple of shots with this big guy's (one of the giant morays) mouth open, but I just like his attitude in this one...
There were also several good crevices filled with schools of fish, fans, cave corals and lots of other neat stuff. In one these two fans sit about three feet apart so I knew I wasn't going to get anything great this time out. This is a site I definitely want to take the 10-20 to next time! And hopefully we can figure out the current so you're not whizzing by, swimming back around the bommie and whizzing by again! LOL
There were plenty of schooling fishes, too - trevally, sea perch (very snooty, swam away if I even looked at them) and drummers. I didn't take any shots of the schools...don't ask me why, obviously just having some brain-fart moments
I didn't take a lot of fish shots of any kind on this dive, but I did spend the last couple of minutes with this little guy. I don't think I remember seeing this particular colour pattern - the distinctly yellow face with brown body - before. He was hunkered down near the sand under a little ledge. Until I popped him with the strobe a couple of times he was pretty outgoing, but once I encroached on his little space he retreated well under the ledge and kept doing that peculiar boxfish spin and I gave up.
Anyway, that was my Monday afternoon...hope your's was great, too!
Before we reached the dive site we were diverted by a huge amount of splashing - turned out to be a good sized, very dense baitball being devoured by all manner of predator. I have to admit my wuss status here - I didn't get in
I did stick the camera over the marlin board and managed two shots that are OK. It was an incredible thing to watch so we spent quite a while there...here's some soon-to-be deceased fishies...
This post is a little different as most of the shots are truly "average"...but I decided to post them anyway, just to get some colour out there and to show the site a little bit. I'm not sure this is a good thing or if I shouldn't post unless I bring back "keepers" - I'll let you all be the judges on that. I definitely want to go back. Although we had 20-25m viz and quite blue water, the swell was pumping and the surge created was throwing up bits of fine white sand. There was a good current when we first dropped in and it only got stronger; this was OK to begin with but after a while it just became too much effort to really stay in one place so I resorted to "fly bys". I will use these images to remind myself what I want to achieve next time we go - there's so much out there that if I don't have some sort of plan I'll just get too distracted and come home without the shots I want again!!
The site is a bunch of coral bommies and many of them are covered with all manner of leather corals, soft corals and small fans:
There were also a couple of hopping cleaning stations, but unlike some on other sites, the really active ones were in heavy current areas. On this one I was able to belly down on the sand between two bommies, but I kept getting pushed through the channel. When I moved around the bommie the current was worse, so back I went. It limited my view a bit but it was still fun to watch.
The larger bommies had all sorts of fishes, nudibranchs, ascidians, clams and eels. There were also at least three large morays - two giants and one with orange eyes that I can never remember the name of. I have a couple of shots with this big guy's (one of the giant morays) mouth open, but I just like his attitude in this one...
There were also several good crevices filled with schools of fish, fans, cave corals and lots of other neat stuff. In one these two fans sit about three feet apart so I knew I wasn't going to get anything great this time out. This is a site I definitely want to take the 10-20 to next time! And hopefully we can figure out the current so you're not whizzing by, swimming back around the bommie and whizzing by again! LOL
There were plenty of schooling fishes, too - trevally, sea perch (very snooty, swam away if I even looked at them) and drummers. I didn't take any shots of the schools...don't ask me why, obviously just having some brain-fart moments
I didn't take a lot of fish shots of any kind on this dive, but I did spend the last couple of minutes with this little guy. I don't think I remember seeing this particular colour pattern - the distinctly yellow face with brown body - before. He was hunkered down near the sand under a little ledge. Until I popped him with the strobe a couple of times he was pretty outgoing, but once I encroached on his little space he retreated well under the ledge and kept doing that peculiar boxfish spin and I gave up.
Anyway, that was my Monday afternoon...hope your's was great, too!
