Wednesday, November 27, 2013
We got up around 6:30 a.m. and headed down to the restaurant to hang out and enjoy the morning before the girls showed up to serve breakfast. It was another beautiful morning. The sun was shining and the water was like glass. I took a nice silhouette photo of Eric sitting in the restaurant with the water behind him that he posted to our Facebook page.
After our breakfast of fresh mango slices, Belgian bread with butter and mango jam, and mango juice we sat and enjoyed the morning for a while before getting our dive gear ready for the first dive of the day. We headed out on the boat about 9 a.m. It was Eric and I, Analique (a Dutch doctor) and Cyril (whom we have dove with the last two days) and our German guide, Albert.
We went to a site where they have a small plane that was placed as an artificial reef. Just to the side of the plane there is a small patch of garden eels. Eric set up Tim’s camera and got some good video of the garden eels. Eric also got some video of a pipe seahorse carrying eggs on its belly. Not too far from the plane wreck was a large purple/pink barrel sponge. I swam over to look down inside and what did I see in the bottom but an anemone with a clownfish living in it. That is something I will probably never see again.
After we all swam away from the wreck to explore the rest of the reef I came across an anemone with some very protective clownfish. As I approached they both swam up and were looking me in the eye and swimming in front of my face. One of them actually nipped at the front of my forehead (on my beanie). Eric got photo of them looking me in the eye.
Right at the end of the dive Cyril pointed up in the shallow water and at first I saw something which I eventually figured out was a large squid. I then looked to the right of it and there was a line of about 20. Of course we did not get any video or pictures as they know how to stay just out of camera range. Cyril said he actually counted them and there were 20. They were the largest squid I have ever seen. When I saw the first one I thought it was a cuttlefish.
After that dive we headed back to the resort. We all decided to take a break and have some lunch and then head out in the afternoon around 1:30 for an afternoon dive. We had our standard lunch of garlic rice, Belgian fries, and chicken sandwich with my mango juice. Unfortunately, we discovered last night that they also have ice cream bars (dipped in what else but Belgian chocolate). So we of course had to have one of those after lunch.
The afternoon dive we went back to the spot we went yesterday where we saw the ornate ghost pipefish. It is a very pretty spot with lots of healthy colorful coral and tons of fish. We must have seen at least five or six large turtles too.
We then came back to the resort. As we were taking off our dive gear to rinse and hang up I looked up in the tree above the bench to see a very large beautiful yellow-backed spider. It was very large and sitting right in the middle of a very ornate web with the sun glistening through the tree and illuminating the web. Eric got some good photos of it. It is not something I would want to find in my room, but beautiful to see in its natural habitat.
They were actually doing a night dive tonight but Eric decided to sit it out and relax and work on photos, etc. We ended up talking with a lot of the other guests and the next thing we knew it was dark and time for dinner. For dinner tonight we decided to try spaghetti carbonara (vegetarian). Eric and I split it (the servings are very big) and it was really good. After dinner we of course had to have ice cream, again. I will probably come home 10 pound heavier. The food is so good here. Of course I will have mango running through my blood too.
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