bradells
Contributor
I figured I'd start a new thread and post my dailies here rather than my older thread.
Travel day (Saturday): Houston/United decided to not put any luggage on the plane (A good half of the plane didn't get luggage).
Got in around 6pm to rolling showers and cold Belikins.
Day 1 (Sunday): diving was blown out by the weather, which cleared up around 10am. Ended up having some great hikes through Cockscomb Basin. Howler monkeys, Snakes, Leaf Cutter Ants were the sights of the day.
Still no luggage.
Day 2: Silk Caye
Oldie but a goodie. I did my OW 3/4 dives here with SPLASH right after a discover scuba many years ago on my first trip to Belize.
The weather cooperated and we headed out on the Princess Taia. SPLASHes 46?' Newton. There were 8 divers, 2 DM, 1 instructor and a handful of shark bait (Snorkelers) and guides. It took roughly 1h15 to get out there (~22mi away) from the 8am departure (7:15 pickup)
As my equipment hasn't arrived yet, a quick 'what sizes do ya need?' From the equipment room and I'm set to go diving for the day.
Dive 1 was to North Wall, a wall that starts at roughly 60ft and keeps on going. We did a 80ft/45min dive, in a typical multilevel profile. 10-15 minutes 70-80ft, another 10-15 at 60 and another 10 at 50 before a blue water ascent to safety stop(s) and then the boat.
The big items were a few hawksbill turtles (one of which was massive, almost loggerhead sized), a nurse shark, and Kirk the DM spotted a reef shark which didn't stay long enough for all to see. There was quite a large free swimming Green Moray on top of the wall. I don't know what it is about me, but the bigger the Moray, the more they like me. This one came up several times to within a foot of me, looking for a handout of lion fish.
A nice 1-1/2 to 2hr SI on one of the cayes with some tasty BBQ chicken and fixins, and on to dive #2 at White Hole.
There was quite a bit of surging current at the start and end of this dive. The middle portion was quite relaxed.
A smaller nurse shark (4-5ft) was spotted. My dive buddy Jeff brought his original GoPro down for this dive. There were lots of small critters out, and many cleaning stations for filming. We spent most of our 50 minute dive at 50-60ft.
I spotted a large trumpet fish at a cleaning station, and in typical trumpet fish fashion, he quickly went into 'hide mode', inverting and slowly moving away from us. Along with quite a number of banded shrimps hanging out in the long yellow sponges.
With Silk, there is always a snorkel while visiting the fishermen when they are cleaning the days catch, as southern sting rays, logger heads, and nurse sharks come to clean up the scraps. Today we saw many of those, and even a spotted eagle ray came by for a meal.
One of the loggerheads had quite a number of remoras hanging around its neck. I don't know if that's just because they're picking up everything he's chomping down on, or he buried them in the sand from his belly.
Getting back to town, I forgot my room key, and also found out Tropic Air had brought my bags down from Belize City that United finally delivered. A quick taxi run back to the airport and my dive gear is secured!
I started assembling and charging batteries, only to discover that I have forgotten something fairly important. Something requiring all those batteries for video lights and it's own batteries.
Sadly, my camera is back at home, sitting patiently on the shelf, waiting to go on vacation.
Bummer.
Some tacos, a Belikin or few and a little rum to wash it down ends this evening, as tomorrows adventure starts even earlier.
Day 3 (Tuesday): Grand Channel
An earlier 6:15 pickup to start the day for a 7AM departure to Grand Channel. Again, it was a 1h15 boat ride north in Princess TAIA. With the early departure, many places aren't open that early to grab some breakfast, but no fear, there is a small 'continental' spread waiting for you when you arrive at the shop with warm burritos, fruit, toast, and juice to name a few.
The winds were out of the north, so inside the reef was a little choppy getting out, but nothing too horrible (I stood most of the ride doing my morning stretches with little problems).
Going through Placencia harbour, we encountered a decent sized pod of dolphins out for a morning hunt. They came right up to the boat and dropped in behind to play in the wake for a little bit before we headed around the southern tip of Placencia and then North towards Dangriga.
Today, we had a new batch of divers, along with our 'half way there' soon to be OW diver. Again, 2 DM, 1 Instructor, 7 Divers, plus the Captain and a hand.
So getting to gear, Patty and Ralph have quite the outfit, fitted with Scubapro Jacket BC and regulator sets, and Mares? Fullfoot fins in many sizes. Well maintained and ready to go. They have a small storage room that you go through in the morning to get fitted for fins, wetsuit (3mm shorties) and BCD, and you also pick up your mask/snorkel. The staff will take your BCD and Regs and set them up on the boat (and change over tanks on SI), you carry out your personal items (very little of which are needed, just some sunscreen, long sleeves/pants, hat)
Their AL80 tanks do have longer stems opposite of the valve, so they're side mount friendly. (NOTE: I don't know if SPLASH is side mount friendly or unfriendly.)
They also have Nitrox on hand, and the 3 tanks today analyzed between 31.9-32.3% All the tanks I've gotten on the boats were nice full 3000psi/207bar fills.
Having used their gear on many occasions, and as recent as yesterday, None have ever given me a problem.
Now, using my own gear, It could just be a placebo effect, but using ones own equipment just makes the day that much better.
We gear up just inside the protection of the reef, and head out for a quick 2-3minute jaunt to the first dive site: Northern Slope.
James lead our first dive, the wall starts around 40 feet. This dive had a profile of 80ft/45 minutes, which ended up being 15 minutes at 80ft, and moving up to 40-50 feet for the rest of the dive to 50 minutes, getting to the surface at 56 minutes.
Lots of cool things in this area. It has a shorter wall, with a sandy bottom, that then turns into another wall down into the abyss.
There were a few turtles about, but I was looking at all the smaller things today. As much as I love seeing turtles, rays and the like, I like just watching the small things and looking at sponges.
For a few minutes of the dive, a large Trumpet fish was following my light and munching away while we drifted along the wall. There were a few pairs of Banded Butterfly fish on the wall. I've never really seen them here, usually on top by some coral heads.
Lots of critters, and great coral scenes. Made me miss packing my video camera, but then, I probably wouldn't seen half the things that I did if I was looking through a viewfinder.
A 1hr SI back on the boat, inside the reef, and we were back out to the second dive of the day: Silver Slide.
This one was on the top of the wall, with nice big patches of sand to look for Yellow Head Jawfish and Sand Divers. I didn't notice any on this dive, but then again, it's been a while since I've looked for any. There were a few puffers out. One smaller Balloon Porcupine, and a handful of Sharpnose Puffers.
Now I'll say this about the Sharpnose puffers. During the Roatan Invasion, this is what we saw. Millions of them. In every one of my photos, you can count at least 2. It didn't matter what you took a picture of. It took me quite a few dives to see past the puffers and spot, say a giant Black Grouper. I'm not kidding! While it was nice to see the few puffers, some flashbacks did happen about seeing nothing but these cute little annoying (for critter hunting) puffers.
There were lots of hard tube coral (sorry, I don't know coral names too well). But the Blue, Black, Yellow coral that isn't quite iridescent under light, but gives off a cool glow to it. There were lots, and quite a few shrimps. There were also tonnes of Damselfish. I'm quite certain every kind of Damselfish in the Belize waters were all here (Yellow tail, 3 Spot, Sgt Majors, Purple Reef, Longfins, Dusky, Bicolor ...)
This dive was a 60ft/45minute dive, which we did 60ft for the first 25 minutes, and ascended higher to 40ft for the next 25 minutes, making a 53 minute dive.
A nice 2hr SI back on the boat with lunch and more than enough time to have a nap in the sun. Around 1h40, we started to gear back up and in the water by the 2hr mark.
The last dive was at Southern Slope. Basically similar to the first dive, but heading the other way from where we were diving all day.
This was shallower again, a 60ft/45min profile. We stayed near the top of the wall for 30 minutes and on top for the other 20 minutes making for a 55 minute dive.
This dive was nice, as our newly certified OW diver joined us on this dive marking her first FUN dive, and did the whole 55 minutes with us!
Again, there were a few turtles, we kept on looking for some rays as the currents were up, and hoping they were out for a cruise, but couldn't see any.
I found my Yellow Headed Jawfish and Sanddivers. Quite a few actually, which really means that there were around 60 more than the 6 jawfish that I found.
Again, lots of little things and great corals to look at on this dive. The usual flybys of Blue Parrotfish, some Grey Angelfish, Rock Beauty, Blue Tangs, etc.
One thing that happened on all of our dives, was a lone remora (different every dive) looking for someone to become a travel companion during the ascents.
Back to the shop, for some juice and cookies as people clean up their gear, pay their tabs, and a ride home for the evening. Todays excursion was from 7am-4pm, 6am-5pm in real time away from your hotel room. I had already gone to the store to stock up on more beer and food, had a shower and started in on said beer and food before 5pm hit.
I'll add the rest of my trip here in this post as the days go by.
BRad
---------- Post added January 14th, 2015 at 09:26 PM ----------
Day 4: South Water Caye
Unfortunately, the 3 tank dive day was called off due to weather. A big storm rolled in around 6am and lasted quite a while.
Around 8am I was picked up, and all my gear was setup and waiting on the boat for our dives. We headed out on one of their smaller '6pax' fibreglassed boats (with a fibreglass top).
Again, it was roughly a 1h15 boat ride up to South Water. We hit a few rain spells along the way, but when we got to SWC, it thankfully cleared up and the sun was peaking through.
Today, it was 2 Divers, 1 DM and the Captain. There was a little confusion earlier in the morning about whether it was a 2 or 3 tank dive day. Leaving around 9 am doesn't do well for a 3 tank dive day out of Placencia. By the time you get out to the reef, and get a solid 1 & 2hr SI, plus a lunch and 3 1hr dives, its getting really close to after 4pm, leaving not much time to get back home in daylight.
We ended up doing Long Reef first, running a 70ft/60min profile. We worked our way slowly along the wall, checking out Peterson Shrimps, Caribbean Lobsters, Stoplight Parrots, Blue Chromis, Gray & Ocean Angelfish, Groupers, French Grunts, etc. And by slow, I mean, the most I finned was backwards most of the dive to check out everything just that much more longer.
Moving to the top of the wall, there were tonnes of things to see, many cleaning stations, nice coral heads and everything else you'd find there. About 45 minutes into the dive, my favourite thing happened. A large Hawksbill Turtle was cruising along the reef directly for us, getting to within a few feet, he turned down the wall a bit, then headed back up to the top, and headed back to where he came from. These are the turtle encounters I really like. Not the stalking or chasing down, but the turtle checking us out.
I found my first Pallid Goby in a small sandy spot as well. Harlequin bass, and lots of wrasses were out as well. One fish that I don't quite know what is, but looks like a black/brown version of a Red Hind or Graysby Grouper. I seem to find it hanging out, sitting in/on tops of coral heads, like its in a Jacuzzi.
Our total dive time was 67 minutes, with lots of gas to spare.
We headed over to the dock/bar at South Water for lunch and a 2hr SI. Some awesome breaded chicken, pasta and sauerkraut. This has been the only place in Belize, where I can consistently find a small octopus and black sea horses. Today wasn't much of an exception. I found 2 black seahorses migrating along the dock, but unfortunately no octopus today.
Dive 2 was at Trick Ridge. This is a long pinnacle at 60-40ft, one side with a sandy bottom, and the other goes down. Usually there are eagle rays cruising around, but I didn't see any. The only ray that I saw was a southern that glided under us during our ascent. We did a similar profile as our first dive. 60ft/60minutes.
We did however spot a spotted moray hanging out of his den, and shortly after, there were two huge Grey Angelfish that I was watching as they were following us. At one point I turned away for a moment, and they snuck off to a cleaning station, right alongside the biggest Green Moray i've ever seen. It seemed to be the diameter of a volley ball, and the length of, well lets just say similar to the class snake in The Simpsons.
There were a few Filefish just hanging around on top of the pinnacle, trying their best to hide in some small patches of coral. Quite a few large Stoplight Parrotfish and Groupers hanging out in the lip of large Cauldrons, along with schoolmasters bunching together behind the cauldrons.
We squeaked out a 74 minute dive this time, and headed back to Placencia.
BRad
Travel day (Saturday): Houston/United decided to not put any luggage on the plane (A good half of the plane didn't get luggage).
Got in around 6pm to rolling showers and cold Belikins.
Day 1 (Sunday): diving was blown out by the weather, which cleared up around 10am. Ended up having some great hikes through Cockscomb Basin. Howler monkeys, Snakes, Leaf Cutter Ants were the sights of the day.
Still no luggage.
Day 2: Silk Caye
Oldie but a goodie. I did my OW 3/4 dives here with SPLASH right after a discover scuba many years ago on my first trip to Belize.
The weather cooperated and we headed out on the Princess Taia. SPLASHes 46?' Newton. There were 8 divers, 2 DM, 1 instructor and a handful of shark bait (Snorkelers) and guides. It took roughly 1h15 to get out there (~22mi away) from the 8am departure (7:15 pickup)
As my equipment hasn't arrived yet, a quick 'what sizes do ya need?' From the equipment room and I'm set to go diving for the day.
Dive 1 was to North Wall, a wall that starts at roughly 60ft and keeps on going. We did a 80ft/45min dive, in a typical multilevel profile. 10-15 minutes 70-80ft, another 10-15 at 60 and another 10 at 50 before a blue water ascent to safety stop(s) and then the boat.
The big items were a few hawksbill turtles (one of which was massive, almost loggerhead sized), a nurse shark, and Kirk the DM spotted a reef shark which didn't stay long enough for all to see. There was quite a large free swimming Green Moray on top of the wall. I don't know what it is about me, but the bigger the Moray, the more they like me. This one came up several times to within a foot of me, looking for a handout of lion fish.
A nice 1-1/2 to 2hr SI on one of the cayes with some tasty BBQ chicken and fixins, and on to dive #2 at White Hole.
There was quite a bit of surging current at the start and end of this dive. The middle portion was quite relaxed.
A smaller nurse shark (4-5ft) was spotted. My dive buddy Jeff brought his original GoPro down for this dive. There were lots of small critters out, and many cleaning stations for filming. We spent most of our 50 minute dive at 50-60ft.
I spotted a large trumpet fish at a cleaning station, and in typical trumpet fish fashion, he quickly went into 'hide mode', inverting and slowly moving away from us. Along with quite a number of banded shrimps hanging out in the long yellow sponges.
With Silk, there is always a snorkel while visiting the fishermen when they are cleaning the days catch, as southern sting rays, logger heads, and nurse sharks come to clean up the scraps. Today we saw many of those, and even a spotted eagle ray came by for a meal.
One of the loggerheads had quite a number of remoras hanging around its neck. I don't know if that's just because they're picking up everything he's chomping down on, or he buried them in the sand from his belly.
Getting back to town, I forgot my room key, and also found out Tropic Air had brought my bags down from Belize City that United finally delivered. A quick taxi run back to the airport and my dive gear is secured!
I started assembling and charging batteries, only to discover that I have forgotten something fairly important. Something requiring all those batteries for video lights and it's own batteries.
Sadly, my camera is back at home, sitting patiently on the shelf, waiting to go on vacation.
Bummer.
Some tacos, a Belikin or few and a little rum to wash it down ends this evening, as tomorrows adventure starts even earlier.
Day 3 (Tuesday): Grand Channel
An earlier 6:15 pickup to start the day for a 7AM departure to Grand Channel. Again, it was a 1h15 boat ride north in Princess TAIA. With the early departure, many places aren't open that early to grab some breakfast, but no fear, there is a small 'continental' spread waiting for you when you arrive at the shop with warm burritos, fruit, toast, and juice to name a few.
The winds were out of the north, so inside the reef was a little choppy getting out, but nothing too horrible (I stood most of the ride doing my morning stretches with little problems).
Going through Placencia harbour, we encountered a decent sized pod of dolphins out for a morning hunt. They came right up to the boat and dropped in behind to play in the wake for a little bit before we headed around the southern tip of Placencia and then North towards Dangriga.
Today, we had a new batch of divers, along with our 'half way there' soon to be OW diver. Again, 2 DM, 1 Instructor, 7 Divers, plus the Captain and a hand.
So getting to gear, Patty and Ralph have quite the outfit, fitted with Scubapro Jacket BC and regulator sets, and Mares? Fullfoot fins in many sizes. Well maintained and ready to go. They have a small storage room that you go through in the morning to get fitted for fins, wetsuit (3mm shorties) and BCD, and you also pick up your mask/snorkel. The staff will take your BCD and Regs and set them up on the boat (and change over tanks on SI), you carry out your personal items (very little of which are needed, just some sunscreen, long sleeves/pants, hat)
Their AL80 tanks do have longer stems opposite of the valve, so they're side mount friendly. (NOTE: I don't know if SPLASH is side mount friendly or unfriendly.)
They also have Nitrox on hand, and the 3 tanks today analyzed between 31.9-32.3% All the tanks I've gotten on the boats were nice full 3000psi/207bar fills.
Having used their gear on many occasions, and as recent as yesterday, None have ever given me a problem.
Now, using my own gear, It could just be a placebo effect, but using ones own equipment just makes the day that much better.
We gear up just inside the protection of the reef, and head out for a quick 2-3minute jaunt to the first dive site: Northern Slope.
James lead our first dive, the wall starts around 40 feet. This dive had a profile of 80ft/45 minutes, which ended up being 15 minutes at 80ft, and moving up to 40-50 feet for the rest of the dive to 50 minutes, getting to the surface at 56 minutes.
Lots of cool things in this area. It has a shorter wall, with a sandy bottom, that then turns into another wall down into the abyss.
There were a few turtles about, but I was looking at all the smaller things today. As much as I love seeing turtles, rays and the like, I like just watching the small things and looking at sponges.
For a few minutes of the dive, a large Trumpet fish was following my light and munching away while we drifted along the wall. There were a few pairs of Banded Butterfly fish on the wall. I've never really seen them here, usually on top by some coral heads.
Lots of critters, and great coral scenes. Made me miss packing my video camera, but then, I probably wouldn't seen half the things that I did if I was looking through a viewfinder.
A 1hr SI back on the boat, inside the reef, and we were back out to the second dive of the day: Silver Slide.
This one was on the top of the wall, with nice big patches of sand to look for Yellow Head Jawfish and Sand Divers. I didn't notice any on this dive, but then again, it's been a while since I've looked for any. There were a few puffers out. One smaller Balloon Porcupine, and a handful of Sharpnose Puffers.
Now I'll say this about the Sharpnose puffers. During the Roatan Invasion, this is what we saw. Millions of them. In every one of my photos, you can count at least 2. It didn't matter what you took a picture of. It took me quite a few dives to see past the puffers and spot, say a giant Black Grouper. I'm not kidding! While it was nice to see the few puffers, some flashbacks did happen about seeing nothing but these cute little annoying (for critter hunting) puffers.
There were lots of hard tube coral (sorry, I don't know coral names too well). But the Blue, Black, Yellow coral that isn't quite iridescent under light, but gives off a cool glow to it. There were lots, and quite a few shrimps. There were also tonnes of Damselfish. I'm quite certain every kind of Damselfish in the Belize waters were all here (Yellow tail, 3 Spot, Sgt Majors, Purple Reef, Longfins, Dusky, Bicolor ...)
This dive was a 60ft/45minute dive, which we did 60ft for the first 25 minutes, and ascended higher to 40ft for the next 25 minutes, making a 53 minute dive.
A nice 2hr SI back on the boat with lunch and more than enough time to have a nap in the sun. Around 1h40, we started to gear back up and in the water by the 2hr mark.
The last dive was at Southern Slope. Basically similar to the first dive, but heading the other way from where we were diving all day.
This was shallower again, a 60ft/45min profile. We stayed near the top of the wall for 30 minutes and on top for the other 20 minutes making for a 55 minute dive.
This dive was nice, as our newly certified OW diver joined us on this dive marking her first FUN dive, and did the whole 55 minutes with us!
Again, there were a few turtles, we kept on looking for some rays as the currents were up, and hoping they were out for a cruise, but couldn't see any.
I found my Yellow Headed Jawfish and Sanddivers. Quite a few actually, which really means that there were around 60 more than the 6 jawfish that I found.
Again, lots of little things and great corals to look at on this dive. The usual flybys of Blue Parrotfish, some Grey Angelfish, Rock Beauty, Blue Tangs, etc.
One thing that happened on all of our dives, was a lone remora (different every dive) looking for someone to become a travel companion during the ascents.
Back to the shop, for some juice and cookies as people clean up their gear, pay their tabs, and a ride home for the evening. Todays excursion was from 7am-4pm, 6am-5pm in real time away from your hotel room. I had already gone to the store to stock up on more beer and food, had a shower and started in on said beer and food before 5pm hit.
I'll add the rest of my trip here in this post as the days go by.
BRad
---------- Post added January 14th, 2015 at 09:26 PM ----------
Day 4: South Water Caye
Unfortunately, the 3 tank dive day was called off due to weather. A big storm rolled in around 6am and lasted quite a while.
Around 8am I was picked up, and all my gear was setup and waiting on the boat for our dives. We headed out on one of their smaller '6pax' fibreglassed boats (with a fibreglass top).
Again, it was roughly a 1h15 boat ride up to South Water. We hit a few rain spells along the way, but when we got to SWC, it thankfully cleared up and the sun was peaking through.
Today, it was 2 Divers, 1 DM and the Captain. There was a little confusion earlier in the morning about whether it was a 2 or 3 tank dive day. Leaving around 9 am doesn't do well for a 3 tank dive day out of Placencia. By the time you get out to the reef, and get a solid 1 & 2hr SI, plus a lunch and 3 1hr dives, its getting really close to after 4pm, leaving not much time to get back home in daylight.
We ended up doing Long Reef first, running a 70ft/60min profile. We worked our way slowly along the wall, checking out Peterson Shrimps, Caribbean Lobsters, Stoplight Parrots, Blue Chromis, Gray & Ocean Angelfish, Groupers, French Grunts, etc. And by slow, I mean, the most I finned was backwards most of the dive to check out everything just that much more longer.
Moving to the top of the wall, there were tonnes of things to see, many cleaning stations, nice coral heads and everything else you'd find there. About 45 minutes into the dive, my favourite thing happened. A large Hawksbill Turtle was cruising along the reef directly for us, getting to within a few feet, he turned down the wall a bit, then headed back up to the top, and headed back to where he came from. These are the turtle encounters I really like. Not the stalking or chasing down, but the turtle checking us out.
I found my first Pallid Goby in a small sandy spot as well. Harlequin bass, and lots of wrasses were out as well. One fish that I don't quite know what is, but looks like a black/brown version of a Red Hind or Graysby Grouper. I seem to find it hanging out, sitting in/on tops of coral heads, like its in a Jacuzzi.
Our total dive time was 67 minutes, with lots of gas to spare.
We headed over to the dock/bar at South Water for lunch and a 2hr SI. Some awesome breaded chicken, pasta and sauerkraut. This has been the only place in Belize, where I can consistently find a small octopus and black sea horses. Today wasn't much of an exception. I found 2 black seahorses migrating along the dock, but unfortunately no octopus today.
Dive 2 was at Trick Ridge. This is a long pinnacle at 60-40ft, one side with a sandy bottom, and the other goes down. Usually there are eagle rays cruising around, but I didn't see any. The only ray that I saw was a southern that glided under us during our ascent. We did a similar profile as our first dive. 60ft/60minutes.
We did however spot a spotted moray hanging out of his den, and shortly after, there were two huge Grey Angelfish that I was watching as they were following us. At one point I turned away for a moment, and they snuck off to a cleaning station, right alongside the biggest Green Moray i've ever seen. It seemed to be the diameter of a volley ball, and the length of, well lets just say similar to the class snake in The Simpsons.
There were a few Filefish just hanging around on top of the pinnacle, trying their best to hide in some small patches of coral. Quite a few large Stoplight Parrotfish and Groupers hanging out in the lip of large Cauldrons, along with schoolmasters bunching together behind the cauldrons.
We squeaked out a 74 minute dive this time, and headed back to Placencia.
BRad
