UAE East Coast Temperatures

[Searcaigh]

Back to Anemone Gardens yesterday, temps 26C and was fine in my 5mm + hood

Nothing special apart from this largish catfish (20cm) that appears to have lost its shoal. Normally we find shoals of smaller ones (3cm).



Second dive was on Inchcape 2, nothing special, but my buddy Kerstin did find two Janolus nudis after I ascended.

This Oman Hawkfish seemed happy to pose for me



Big holiday weekend coming up for everyone in the UAE (National Day), so some intensive diving planned on both the east and west coasts.

 

[Searcaigh]

Three reasonable dives and one rubbish one over the past couple of days.

National Day Weekend here so Thursday and Friday are holidays, but hey every day is a holiday for me now

However it did mean that my best buddy Kerstin was available and we stayed over at Fujairah after a late start on Thursday. So two afternoon dives yesterday and two morning dives today. Water temperature was a consistent 26C

Ruby Reef had poor vis on our first afternoon dive, around 3-4m. and we struggled to find a decent subject to photograph. I was shooting the 40mm lens again and basically looking for subjects around 30cm and I did get a few over the weekend.

However I was happy to find a small sea snake at the end of the dive, which did put us into a deco obligation, but we do carry 50% to mitigate these circumstances when they occur.



The second dive at the Blocks was complete rubbish with around 1m vis, but I did find a large seahorse, however it was impossible to get a clean shot due to lack of clarity in the water.

Today was much better. We were the first boat onto Inchcape 1, and we found a Pineapple Fish but it was hiding in a tyre, so no good shots unfortunately. There was a juvenile Emperor Angelfish though which behaved well enough for a couple of decent shots.



The adult version looks like this and I did find one on Ruby Reef yesterday.



On our second dive this morning at Gunther's Wrecks we had a glorious 15m vis. Nothing special critter wise, only a few nudis but my best shot is probably this Lionfish.

 

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26C on Angels Reef and Inchcape 10 this morning with great vis at 10m on Angels Reef.

Loads of sea snakes at Angels Reef too, spent most of my dive following them.



Second dive on Inchcape 10 was rather uneventful to be honest. It appears my cock is getting dirty and needs its annual clean!

 

[BoltSnap]

It appears my cock is getting dirty and needs its annual clean!

You need to clean it more often if you want to be able to use it for long.

 

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Repeat dive locations same as last Sunday, Angels Reef and Inchcape 10.

I was going to clean my cock which is situated in the toilet / shower room inside Inchcape 10 but I forgot to bring a brush, so that will need to wait until next weekend perhaps.

A few seasnakes at Angels Reef but couldn't get a decent head on shot as they were moving too fast towards me when I did get in front of two of them. The species has been identified as Hydrophis ornatus by some people on iNaturalist,

Ornate Sea Snake (Hydrophis ornatus)

Ornate Sea Snake from Fujairah Reefs on December 01, 2022 at 12:00 AM by searcaigh. Not 100% sure of exact species

www.inaturalist.org

I did manage to get a decent head on shot of a small crocodile fish though.



I also found a moray eel with some cleaner shrimp on it, which was nice



Water temps were 25C on Angels Reef and 26C on Inchcape 10, comfy enough in my 5mm + 5mm hood.

 

[BoltSnap]

I was going to clean my cock which is situated in the toilet / shower room

Your talking about cleaning your cock in the toilet/shower room is troublesome to me. Good thing however is that you're doing it in the privacy of the bathroom thank God

 

[Searcaigh]

Your talking about cleaning your cock in the toilet/shower room is troublesome to me. Good thing however is that you're doing it in the privacy of the bathroom thank God

Good grief not in the bathroom, I take it outside as I don't want to silt up inside the wreck.

 

[BoltSnap]

I take it outside as I don't want to silt up inside the wreck.

You cock sure gets the royal treatment. It must do wonders for you.

 

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So this week I had plans to dive over on the east coast with a friend from Sweden.

Monday was planned for diving with BDC in Fujairah but received a message whilst I was on my way to pick up Erik at a hotel next to Dragonmart, Coast Guard (CG) issued a full weather warning, no boats allowed out so we went to Plan B and dived Bulgari Bridge off Dubai.

Thursday was re-scheduled for BDC and in the meantime Erik had moved hotels to the opposite side of Dubai adding more time to the drive by one hour!

Up at 05:00, set off to collect Erik at his hotel 30 min drive in the opposite direction of where we were going to dive at 06:00 and got a message that the CG issued a full weather warning again

Plan B was to go to another area further north, but since none of the other two dive centres that I would use (Divers Down and Sandy Beach) would not be open to check we set off anyway. I haven't been up to that area in ages and there is a new road that I've only used a couple of times, so I decided to use Google Maps in order to not miss the turn off ...... BIG F**Ken mistake Will start to use WAZE from now on.

Lesson learned here was sometimes the longest way to a place is the quickest! Next time will be the Truck Road via RAK.

Ended up on roads I hadn't used in years and some I'd never used before. Eventually reached Khorfakkan and called Sandy Beach, all good there weather wise, but only one place on the boat available at 09:00. Called Divers Down, and they had two slots available on their 09:30 boat, no weather problems.

Sat on the boat and ready to set off and send a message to some friends that we had succeeded in getting on a boat, when I received a message from the dive centre in Fujairah, that was Plan A, informing me that the CG had lifted the all weather warning

The dives we were now doing were kinda OW easy stuff, Dibba Rock 15m and Sharm Rocks / Three Rocks 10m, the gases I had with me were 34% and 40% based on the sites for Plan A okay not a problem but we were also limited to 50 mins whereas Plan A would be limited to how long the gas lasted as Erik and I would have had the boat at BDC all to ourselves.

My camera gear was also set up for Plan A, Macro 60mm lens and what happened on the first dive ...... A FEKKEN WHALE SHARK ................ Bloody Murphy! but on a plus point Erik and I were the only two people on the boat not to see it

Photographically not great dives either, two best shots;

Broomtail Wrasse, Cheilinus lunulatus



Porcupine Puffer, Diadon hystrix



Ideally I should have had the 40mm lens for these fish as the 60 didn't allow me to get closer.

Water temps were 23C at Dibba Rock and 24C at Sharm Rocks.

 

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A very wet day yesterday even above sea level and heavy rains came down over most of the UAE.

Fortunately it was dry in the morning and I had my first dives of the year with Kerstin and Dimitris on Inchcape 10 and Car Cemetery 2.

Vis was quite reasonable on Inch 10 despite overcast skies and lack of sunshine. A cool 24C from surface to bottom and air temps were 22C.

Used the TG6 on the first dive and got a half decent shot of this small school of catfish that live off the back of Inch 10 around the jet skis.

Fortunately no wind during the SI, so was not too cold in my wet 5mm, but really wishing I was in a drysuit, I need to get a new one soon.

During the second dive on CC2 the vis dropped significantly from about 5m to 1m, something that appears to occur at this site frequently. Surface temps were 23C.

The state of the vehicles at CC2 has deteriorated significantly since my last dive at this site. The roofs of most vehicles have collapsed as has the roof of the Bedford tanker.

I had changed to the Nikon for this dive but only managed to find a couple of nudis to photograph.

Caloria indica

The return drive to Dubai was crazy with torrential rain after we had lunch, visibility was so bad that I was down to 20 kph several times and my fear was some @sshole would rear end me despite having my fog lights on as well as my main lights. For some reason certain people in this country appear to think that by having hazard warning lights on prevents them from having accidents whilst doing 120 in rain and in fog

Spent an hour on a flyover to get onto the E311 from the E66 heading back to JVC after dropping Kerstin off, due to severe flooding at the other end of the flyover where it joins the E311. Anyone not in a 4x4 or larger was certainly going to have issues, and not a place to drive an EV either I suspect. I raised my suspension and got through without incident.