Bali - Tulamben Dives

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Atlantis International picked me up bright and early in the morning to go back to their shop to get outfitted with gear and join the group going to Tulamben dive site. My group consisted of two Canadians living in India (works in Energy business), an English couple living in Russia (guy works as boss in casino and has taken two months off to become a dive master), a guide and me. The first dive we did was the USS Liberty ship that was hit by a torpedo in WWII. Two destroyers tried to tow it to a base to be fixed but ended up beaching on Bali. When the volcano erupted in 1964 the blast knocked the ship over so the water covered it. It is now an artificial reef. This was my first wreck dive and it was really cool. The bottom depth of the wreck is 26 meters and the water temperature was 30°C. With 60 feet of visibility you could see everything clearly. There were hundreds of types of fish and the coral colors were varied and bright. The dive was short as I burned through my air; I fought buoyancy a bit as my weights were bit heavy. Out of the water we had lunch and relaxed until our nitrogen level dropped and we could safely return to the water. Our second dive of the day was the Tulamben Bay drop off. I t is a shallower dive with my maximum depth being 13.4 meters. The dive follows a slight current along the face of a small underwater cliff. I was able to catch sight of the Bumphead parrotfish, Midnight snappers, and a juvenile Oriental Sweetlips along with thousands of other fish. My underwater photos were horrible. I of course blame the cheap disposable camera; currently I am trying to talk Scott into an underwater digital camera.

Back at the hotel Scott was still not feeling well and working on his hockey thesis so I wandered off to the beach restuarant to have dinner by myself. They had a group of kids performing Balinese dances. They were cute.

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