auchmeddan

It’s taken me a while to find the time to get around to this update. Work has been crazy, and our Weekend/social time has been mostly taken with diving (shock!). Right now I’m feeling tired, and spread a little thin. This isn’t a good time to ask me stupid questions.

On a lighter note, We started the PADI Night Diver Specialty course just over a week or so, so we’ve managed to get a couple of mid-week night dives in as well as our normal weekend diving. In the past 11 days we’ve managed to get 8 dives - not bad, eh?

The highlights of the dives have been a couple of close encounters with Great Barracuda, swimming into a (dead-end) cave filled with Glassy Sweepers, a pair of Filefish, and pretty much all of our 88 minute Night Dive with Joe (a new record bottom time for us!). On Joe’s dive we saw lots of Lobster and Octopus, a large sleeping Stoplight Parrotfish, a couple of Banded Coral Shrimp, a scrawled Cowfish, and we also got to watch the Glow-worms mate for around 10 minutes with our dive-lights off.

For me, it was a fun weekend for underwater photography as I got to play with my (new) macro lens and was able to take some decent night photos thanks to the diffuser I bought for my strobe (which probably also stopped the barracuda reflecting back too much light). I spent ages trying to get a close up shot of a Lizardfish on our last dive of the weekend, and got a couple of decent ones. My problem is that my camera doesn’t have an autofocus (it’s a fixed length digital) so I have to move it perfectly into place to get the focus in the right spot, and try to judge this underwater, looking at a tiny screen. I did have a Macro wand attached to the camera to help measure distance, but (unsurprisingly) it just scared the fish away!

As usual, Jules navigated for me this weekend and left me free to worry about photographs and nothing else. Bliss!

The photos below are (in order) a filefish, Great Barracuda, Octopus (easy one, that!), Glassy Sweepers, and a close up of a Lizardfish.

The day started with a “mystery deep dive” (we just had to find about 70ft for some people to complete their Advanced course) so Chris anchored in the middle of nowhere and off we went. We saw our first “Rock Beauty” but I didn’t get a photo, and we saw a small shoal of Blue Chromis.

The 2nd dive was the Lartington and although we were slightly disappointed that our LionFish wasn’t there, it did deliver a Lizardfish (which flew in and landed like a fighter jet!) and the first BalloonFish we’ve seen. Jules found it and pointed it out for me - I would probably never have noticed it.

The 3rd dive was Blue Hole, and it was kind enough to deliver a pair of Sharpnose Puffer,and my best photo yet of these little guys! I have an obessession with these cute, odd-shaped little fish that Jules finds a little funny. I don’t know what it is, but I just love them to bits!!

The Photos below are a Blue Chromis, LizardFish, Balloonfish, and my fave little guys!

Had a pretty good day today - we managed to get in 3 Dives over the course of the day with Blue Water Divers

On the first dive, The Lartington, we saw our 2nd LionFish in Bermuda but got up-close to this one and got some pictures…see below.

On the 2nd Dive (the Constellation/Montana) we got within a reasonable distance of a Great Barracuda who was about 3-4 Feet long. I was feeling pretty good about finally managing to get some decent pics of a GB here!

On the afternoon dive, we went back to the “Monstellation” and saw our first eels here! We watched one for a little while and tried to get some pics (which was very, very difficult) and then about 10 minutes later I spotted another.

We’re heading back out tomorrow. For now, I’ll post a pic of the Lionfish

Over the last couple of weeks we’ve managed to fit in 7 dives -3 of them on the 29th July
and have managed a few firsts :

1) We saw our first Octopus night diving with our friend Joe. Joe guided us around an area of North Shore near to where he lives, and we saw 4 octopus over the course of the dive! We were very pleased with that, but then we ended up getting pretty close to a large Smooth Trunkfish which swam right up to Joe’s light, and then up to Jules mask. It was also our first time diving with Joe (though hopefully wont be the last!).

2) Saw our first Scrawled Filefish at Southwest Breaker.

3) Saw a pair of Lobster at SW Breaker. We’ve seen Lobster before, but this was the first time we have seen an obvious “couple”. The larger of the 2 agressively ‘charged’ me while it’s mate scurried for cover. (In the first photo, you can just see the mate at the back)

4) We saw our first Yellow-Headed Trumpetfish (several times on the one dive).

5) We played with a Coney for a while. We’ve played with Puddingwifes before (it’s hard to ignore them sometimes) but this was the first time a Coney took an interest in us. It seemed to enjoy getting as close as it could to take a good look at us (so close that my macro lens couldn’t focus properly on it).

Puddingwife and Coney photos below.

6) Saw our first Barred Hamlet at Blue Hole. What a pretty little fish!

7) Saw our first group of CreoleFish (also at Blue Hole).

It’s been good diving - just wish we could spend more time doing it

We had our first dive from Wyndham on Saturday, formally Sonesta where we used to dive with Fantasea. To ensure a parking spot and pay our annual membership we turned up really early. This worked in our favour as we got our preferred spot at the entry point to the water for a change. It’s been a while since we’ve dived from here as the Hurricane in 2003 blew away the dock. Rather than build an expensive new wooden dock Blue Water have opted to build a make shift floating walkway from the beach to the boat. Not a bad idea but, with my sea legs I can see myself falling in at some point, especially seeing as how I’m laden down with heavy dive gear.

On Saturday we went to Killa Puffa Reef. It’s a massive reef that you swim round is probably the best way to describe it. Never been there before and seeing as how we are advanced open water certified, its time to do our own navigating. Got some general directions from Michael the Boat Captain and off we went. Followed the anchor line to the bottom where the visibility was pretty bad. As per his instructions headed north from there and found the reef. There wasn’t a lot of fish but maybe it was just that we couldn’t see them, everything was pretty blurry, especially when the sun wasn’t out.

We swam around, very slowly due to the strong current. Although there wasn’t much to see we saw a massive Hogfish of which Dave got a pretty good photo. This was probably the highlight of the Dive for Dave but for me it was finding the anchor line.

At about 25mins into our Dive Dave asked if I knew where the boat was. I figured that we’ll come back to our starting point and there will be the anchor. Only problem is reef all looks the same, time for me to use my compass. If we came out going north we have to head back south. At around 40 mins I started turning out from the reef and checking my compass. At one point I figured we must be close so I headed out to look for the anchor line with Dave. Much to my disappointment it wasn’t there but not to be discouraged I stayed out from the reef while Dave swam in closer to it. It had to be here and I knew you couldn’t see it from the reef. After only a couple of strokes I saw it. Made my entire Dive and Dave got a photo of me holding it. Such a small thing but I felt a great sense of achievement. Apart from a Constellation dive a year or so ago this is the first dive where we’ve not had to surface to find the boat. Whoo hoooo!

Didn’t fair so well on Sunday’s dive but, there’s always next week.

Jules

Pics below are the Hogfish, and me holding the Anchor line!

The Bait ball is a bit smaller than it was a few weeks ago, but most of the fish have been forced down to the cave/swim through at the site, packing the area tight with fish!

When we got to the swim-through, Jules gave me a “you go first” look, so I took the lead. I got a little bit confused when I entered it as I couldn’t really see any light from the other side. As my eyes adjusted I started to notice snapper lurking in the dark and then realised I couldn’t see because of the bait-ball that had been forced down inside the cave. As I edged through the swirling cloud of fish I could see a lot of snapper in the cave - occasionaly barging through the smaller fish and swimming very close to me.

When we edged out the other side, we saw a lot of snapper, Bar-jacks, Goat Fish, Butterfly fish, Wrasse - practically any sort of local fish you could think of seemed to have congregated here (the larger ones undoubtedly for an easy meal). We saw a few large (and I do mean LARGE) Grouper, and then as the Jacks charged the bait ball and it thinned before us I saw a very distinctive shape under an overhang in the reef. I grabbed Jules, pointed it out, and we both swam over to get our first up-close look at a Lion Fish in Bermuda’s waters.
I know the fish doesn’t belong (and shouldn’t be) here but it was a thrill to see it anyway. They really are very beautiful to look at, and are pretty shy.

We went through the swim through and back over the top of the cut twice, and just marvelled at the number of fish species we saw.

We had already seen a beautiful Blue Parrotfish earlier - easily the Blue-est one we’ve ever seen, but the variety of fish here blew that away! On top of what we had already seen we could add Trumpet-fish (lots of them!), Juvenile Boxfish about 1-1.5 inches in size, but I can’t identify the species), Parrotfish, Porgys, Sand TileFish. The only fish that was noticeable by it’s absence was Great Barracuda - I was really surprised not to see any at the bait ball.

In terms of seeing the local fish, this was one of the best dives we have had here. Unfortunately, due to particles in the water and the available light, I had a few problems with the camera exposure. I would have loved to have gotten a good photo of the Lion Fish, but it started heading for cover as soon as it saw us.

I’ve put a couple of photos below anyway of the Lion Fish.

The Photos below are a Trumpetfish, and some Soap Fish.

On Sunday we took Jules Dad diving, and it went very well. Diving is a really strange experience the first few times, but he did great! (especially considering his weight belt slipped off when he jumped in).

A Father and Daughter shot is below, early into the dive at the Montana and Constellation.

At this time of year, the Constellation’s old jars turn into a perfect spot for Damsel Fish (Sargent Majors) to nest in. At that time, the nesting parent changes from Yellow/Black to dark Purple and gets super aggressive. They will chase and nip at anything that gets too close, regardless of size.

I got a shot of this guy under my body just as he was about to tag me (the original shot was upside-down, I’ve rotated it).

We went Diving at a new dive site today - “Blue Hole”

This is basically a big, blue sand hole about 30-40ft deep, surrounded by Coral Reef. The most striking thing about it for me was how blue it was - it really changed the colour balance of the photos I took.

There was not a lot of interesting fish to see, and the visibility was getting messed up by the resort divers (not their fault - they’re new to diving) but there were thousands of tiny fry/bait fish that were in huge shoals. At one point we had to swim blindly through the shoal of fish, as they were so dense we couldn’t see past them. It was very cool when they parted like a theatre curtain though to reveal the cut in the reef behind them.

It was the 2nd time diving with Eric and Tina, who both had a better experience this week.

The photo highlights were Jules swimming in a swim-through and hovering in the water as the fish start to part as I approach.

We got out this weekend to do our first dive of the year in Bermuda….and it was bloody cold! I’m not sure I’m cut out for diving in 73 degree weather anymore.

The main reason Jules and myself went out was to be there when our friends did their first dives in Bermuda, and it was worth putting up with the cold to get pictures of Eric, Tina, and Tina’s brother diving. It was also really cool to see your friends conquer their fear and totally get off on their first dive…and kinda funny to see them kicking like hell and bumping into things! It doesn’t seem like all that long ago that Jules and myself were like that, but I guess 38 dives and two PADI courses makes quite a difference.

They all seemed to enjoy the dive so I hope they go back for more. I’d like to be there to get more photos.

The pic below is the 3 of them (Tina’s calmly kneeling at the back, while I’m trying to block of the guys escape - the instructors had gone to the surface to help someone who’d had a panic attack, and the guys seemed to take this abandonment as a signal to go off exploring!)