Advertisement
I found Nemo's father!
I found this clownfish staring at me. (Sorry for the poor quality. I was only using a disposable waterproof camera while snorkeling at the shallow end of the beach when I took this picture.) We hired a van for 2500 Php from Mandaluyong crossing to Planet Dive in Mabini, Batangas. The driver took us to a different route compared to the map I downloaded from
Planet Dive's website. We got into the resort at 8am (we left Mandaluyong City at 5:30am) safely anyway so it was okay. It was just funny that the driver hasn't stopped complaining about the rough road till we got into our destination.
Saddle Point
Off we go to Saddle Point. This is my first dive for the weekend. It has been months since I last went diving so I probably would find myself grappling with my gears a bit. This boat dive had 7 other divers with Joey Fullon as our dive master. I descended the last because I found it difficult to equalize on my descent. I was trying to adjust and recall my diving skills since 6 months ago. All went well, I guess I'm a real diver now! There's no reason for Dencio not to hand me my c-card... tee hee! I feel so accomplished! I saw my first sea turtle!!! It was huge... the size of its shell alone could cuddle 3 or 4
Gil made it back to the Big Blue!
We have the cast of Finding Nemo here. (Sorry for the poor quality. I am only using a disposable waterproof camera. I was only snorkeling at the shallow end when I took this picture.) babies! How peaceful it was to watch a sea turtle resting by the coral reef. By the way, Saddle Point was not called such for nothing. The terrain looked like a horse saddle; so, go figure.
Mainit
This is the second dive of the day. I was so full. I ate a lot on our buffet lunch! I convinced myself I need a lot of energy for my diving spree.
We saw the usual moorish idols, clown fish, three-spot damsel fish, fascinatingly colorful parrotfish, barracuda, and a 15-foot tall barrel sponge -- the tallest I have ever seen! Again we saw the large turtle we saw that morning. The best part was seeing a grey reef shark!!! My first shart sighting! Amazing!
I had one new blooper though. I was amazed looking at this large, colorful fish that was staring at me. He seems to be busy parading in his little corner of the sea while staring at me. So I stared back at him and thought it was cute. I think I even allowed myself to be left behind a bit. I think I was just about 4 feet away from that cute fish.
spikeys abound
A blue starfish and a sea urchin (Sorry for the poor quality. I was only using a disposable waterproof camera while snorkeling at the shallow end of the beach when I took this picture.) Then a fellow diver gave me the "we're leaving now" sign so I left the fish alone. It was not until we all boarded the boat when this fellow diver was warning me of that Titan Triggerfish. What I thought was cute was actually already contemplating on attacking me! Like what?! How could I possibly know? I never saw her say the "dangerous" sign... or maybe she did but I didn't see it. Oh geeez... then they told me stories of how violent and dangerous that Triggerfish is. They say it's very territorial and at one time, they rushed a resident diver to the hospital due to a Triggerfish attack. Its teeth are as large and as strong as dog's teeth! Accckkkk!!!
Larry's Garden
This is my favorite dive site this weekend. I am thankful to Grace, she convinced me to stay instead of pursuing my initial plan of taking just a day trip.
I wish I took a picture of the DM's sketch of the terrain during the briefing. It was a site full of drop-offs! This is my deepest dive! 100 feet below sea level, and surprisingly, I surfaced with 1000psi of air. Really great! In this dive, I learned to appreciate the terrain aside from just the sea creatures.
There were two gigantic hills with large blue fan corals around. We went deeper to peek at the drop off. The place felt really, really dark and creepy. It was exciting! It was such an eerie place and I think all that was lacking was the background music of 'The Twilight Zone'. At one point, I thought we were floating fast (which is bad)... so I kept on monitoring my SPG. To my surprise, we were maintaining a 100 feet depth all the while! We were not going up -- the sea floor was simply going deeper and deeper and deeper to infinity! Gosh!!!
This is my favorite dive site, next to the Cathedral on my check out dive last September.
Mainit
(again)
Our divemaster brought us to Mainit again. He wanted to show us a "top secret" turtle's nest. Unfortunately, the turtle was not there. Not bad for a finale dive because this time, we met 3 groups of divers at Mainit. They were obviously clad with fancy underwater camera equipment. I do not know if there's such an etiquette when divers from other resorts accidentally meet underwater but, I wish I said HI. Tee hee!
Advertisement
Tot: 0.21s; Tpl: 0.01s; cc: 18; qc: 70; dbt: 0.089s; 1; m:domysql w:travelblog (10.17.0.13); sld: 1;
; mem: 1.2mb