The Bolter
Registered
The first dive of the day was 40 minutes by boat so we had plenty of time to gear up. Its incredible how fast you are expected to be ready. Ten minutes in some cases. To a new diver this is almost no time and you rush around like crazy putting on your suit and checking your BC so youre not the one who ends up holding the group back. And, even though the boat crew attaches your BC and regulator to the tank, you have to check everything. Today my regulator was attached upside down and another divers tank fell out while she was underwater.
The highlight of this dive was undoubtedly the sailfin partner goby and his partner bulldozer shrimp. The blind shrimp maintains contact with the goby with one of its antennae. If danger approaches the goby signals the shrimp with a flick of its tail and the shrimp immediately scoots down into the hole. In return, the shrimp continually digs and maintains the hole for the two of them. The shrimp is constantly carrying out little clumps of sand from the hole thus the name bulldozer.
Other interesting critters we spotted: banded sea snake, spaghetti sea snakes, cuttle fish, crown of thorns, moray eel, and leaf scorpion fish. Lots of dangerous animals cool!
One frustrating aspect of being a new diver is not knowing the hand signals for simple things like boat. I guess this is something you pick up as you go but its almost like theres an assumption that everyone knows them.
On our second dive of the day I lost one of my weight pockets. Apparently I play with the handle while Im underwater (perhaps the equivalent of putting your hand in your jeans pocket?) and I unhooked the latch. I wasnt scared since I knew all I would have to do is click it back in but this wasnt easy to do since I was also focused on not letting the current pull me out into the wide blue yonder. So, instead, I let it go for a couple seconds assuming it was jammed in tight but the pocket had different plans. It fell right out. I started to ascend immediately so I dumped all my air and was fighting to stay in place. Once again, I considered bolting (its my nature) but we were at 70 feet and I knew that was not an option. Funny, as soon as I realized this I calmed down (for the most part). I told myself that Ive got air so all we have to do is find the pocket and replace it. My dive instructor was three feet from me so as soon as I alerted her she grabbed me and deflated her BC to keep us both buoyant at that level while our guide retrieved my pocket and replaced it. No worries. We continued the dive
The highlight of this dive was the pygmy seahorse. I saw two of them curled up on the branches of a huge white fan coral. Theyre about a 1/8 of an inch long, orange with white spots and their tiny little tails wrap around pieces of the coral while they sway back and forth with the current. You would never see these things on your own. The dive guide finds them and then shines a flashlight in the area and hands you a magnifying glass so you can see them.
We also saw a lionfish out swimming in the water with all his appendages on display to make him look large and mean. It was quite a sight.
The whip coral was also super-cool. It looks like long thin curled ribbon and it extends out from the wall about two-to-three feet. I wish I knew more about corals and sea life to supplement all that Im seeing. But, I brought my Asia Pacific Reef Guide and Im learning as Im going. I bring the book on the boat and it seems to be a big hit among all the divers who want to identify what they just saw.
Other critters we saw on this dive: robust sea cucumber, at least seven different species of nudibranches which look like vibrantly-colored large slugs with horns, blue-spotted puffer, black-spotted puffer, anemone guards, and crocodile needlefish.
FYI - For Wakatobi trips you do six days of diving with three trips each day. You can supplement this with an early morning or night dive on the house reef whenever you want. I believe they have taxi boats out patrolling from 6:00 am to 10:00 pm. The three dives each day are broken down into two morning dives and one afternoon dive. On one of the six days, the afternoon dive is replaced with a night dive. You go to one of the sites you visited on a previous day so you have some familiarity with it. The staff say the average diver staying at the resort does between 3-4 dives each day but you have to option of doing up to seven.
The highlight of this dive was undoubtedly the sailfin partner goby and his partner bulldozer shrimp. The blind shrimp maintains contact with the goby with one of its antennae. If danger approaches the goby signals the shrimp with a flick of its tail and the shrimp immediately scoots down into the hole. In return, the shrimp continually digs and maintains the hole for the two of them. The shrimp is constantly carrying out little clumps of sand from the hole thus the name bulldozer.
Other interesting critters we spotted: banded sea snake, spaghetti sea snakes, cuttle fish, crown of thorns, moray eel, and leaf scorpion fish. Lots of dangerous animals cool!
One frustrating aspect of being a new diver is not knowing the hand signals for simple things like boat. I guess this is something you pick up as you go but its almost like theres an assumption that everyone knows them.
On our second dive of the day I lost one of my weight pockets. Apparently I play with the handle while Im underwater (perhaps the equivalent of putting your hand in your jeans pocket?) and I unhooked the latch. I wasnt scared since I knew all I would have to do is click it back in but this wasnt easy to do since I was also focused on not letting the current pull me out into the wide blue yonder. So, instead, I let it go for a couple seconds assuming it was jammed in tight but the pocket had different plans. It fell right out. I started to ascend immediately so I dumped all my air and was fighting to stay in place. Once again, I considered bolting (its my nature) but we were at 70 feet and I knew that was not an option. Funny, as soon as I realized this I calmed down (for the most part). I told myself that Ive got air so all we have to do is find the pocket and replace it. My dive instructor was three feet from me so as soon as I alerted her she grabbed me and deflated her BC to keep us both buoyant at that level while our guide retrieved my pocket and replaced it. No worries. We continued the dive
The highlight of this dive was the pygmy seahorse. I saw two of them curled up on the branches of a huge white fan coral. Theyre about a 1/8 of an inch long, orange with white spots and their tiny little tails wrap around pieces of the coral while they sway back and forth with the current. You would never see these things on your own. The dive guide finds them and then shines a flashlight in the area and hands you a magnifying glass so you can see them.
We also saw a lionfish out swimming in the water with all his appendages on display to make him look large and mean. It was quite a sight.
The whip coral was also super-cool. It looks like long thin curled ribbon and it extends out from the wall about two-to-three feet. I wish I knew more about corals and sea life to supplement all that Im seeing. But, I brought my Asia Pacific Reef Guide and Im learning as Im going. I bring the book on the boat and it seems to be a big hit among all the divers who want to identify what they just saw.
Other critters we saw on this dive: robust sea cucumber, at least seven different species of nudibranches which look like vibrantly-colored large slugs with horns, blue-spotted puffer, black-spotted puffer, anemone guards, and crocodile needlefish.
FYI - For Wakatobi trips you do six days of diving with three trips each day. You can supplement this with an early morning or night dive on the house reef whenever you want. I believe they have taxi boats out patrolling from 6:00 am to 10:00 pm. The three dives each day are broken down into two morning dives and one afternoon dive. On one of the six days, the afternoon dive is replaced with a night dive. You go to one of the sites you visited on a previous day so you have some familiarity with it. The staff say the average diver staying at the resort does between 3-4 dives each day but you have to option of doing up to seven.
