Diving at dive site Coral Gardens, Alma Bay

Name: lars, © Author: Lars Hemel

I was disappointed about the amount of marine life we saw. Different species such as the fluerescent plankton, crabs and lobsters, but most common coral reef fish were sleeping.

Interesting point was that 4 of the dive group got lost so we, together with the instrctor, had to surface and go down again for three times before we found them. On the way back we saw a huge cone which turned out to be some sort of snail.

Name: lars, © Author: Lars Hemel

The navigation specialty consists out of navigating in a rectangle, navigating with a slight curve halfway and navigating straight ahead and back. We also had to find teh way back to shore by looking at the sand composition. The sand ribbles are created by the waves and are therefore in general in the sam direction as the shore.  Other items we remembered were little rocks and small coral formations which we found on our way back, telling us we were still diving in the right direction.

Name: lars, © Author: Lars Hemel

Yesterday, we had a whole day of reading and excercising, but today we finally go diving again. The naturalist dive is meant to give you an idea about the underwater marine life. One thing you are expected to do, is to remember the fish you saw. We saw surgeon fish, stingrays, painted sweetlips, batfish, baked coralfish. Coral life included sea cucumbers, nudibranchs, seaweed and seagrass.

It is a nice reef. Relaxed diving, just offshore, and looking at the fish you see and at the things the instructor points out to you. Back at the surface he told us what it was we saw.