his dive story / 36

13 August 2012

This past Sunday’s dive was by far one of the better dives I’ve had so far. I can finally check off my list the hammerhead. It was at Northwest Point and I was coming up from 42m to the reef wall at 30m when from a distance, I saw a shape of a shark that I figured was just another reef shark so I was preparing to ignore it… :) then I noticed that it had a strange head, that of a hammerhead!! Quick, my mind was flashing..take a pic or video it…at the very last second, I decided to video it and it was a good thing as the typically skittish hammerhead swam by really fast and I caught it!!! Yeahhhh man! Finally!

The other shark I saw was a nurse at a dive site called Two Steps. I had seen this one before at the same location but this time, it had sadly a fishing hook line and weight on its mouth… it was dangling it around and making clanking noises when it brushed against hard corals…I hope the hook falls off soon. When I first saw it, it was next to a huge lobster that appeared to be guarding it! How funny… Enjoy – James

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his dive story

25 July 2012

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The island experienced a boating accident a few months back and many resorts started to request to have swim buoys installed in front of their resorts and fix, if needed, their boat lane markers. For those not from the TCI, as part of the deficit containment initiative, the government earlier in the year had slashed many workers from various agencies, one being the Department of Environment and Coastal Resources (DECR) which was eventually merged with the Department of Environment and Maritime Affairs. Under DEMA, there exist a shortage of resources both in man power and equipment. At the Grace Bay Club where I work, we recognized this issue and decided to purchase our own buoys and boat lane markers with the help of Vikram, our project manager, to help DEMA but more importantly to help protect our guests and local residents who come to the public beach in front of our resort.

With the help of Provo’s Zero Tolerance Committee under Mike Bookalam, Caribbean Security Services (Mr. Simmons of CSS), Beaches Resort (for the tanks and dive gears), and of course DEMA (Paul Dickenson), we started the project. Evan,our beach supervisor, and I volunteered to help as the job requires at least 5 individuals as you will see from the video. 3 in the water and 2 on the surface including the boat captain. it’s tedious and time consuming work….

Drilling in front of Grace Bay Beach is not so easy as there is a rock plate underneath and sometimes will not go all the way in. It was a hit and miss case many times as we were looking around for what we think is soft sand to drill. My responsibility was to maintain the buoyancy of the lift bag as it holds the machine afloat and release the air as needed to apply downward pressure as we are drilling. Of course, I had to make sure the machine does it drop on Paul!

While doing this, in between breaks, I was able to dive around and saw some nice and big starfish… Paul and I also saw something that we will most likely never see again any time soon…while we were drilling, we saw a big crab run towards the pin and suddenly grab something from underneath the sand. We both followed it and realized that it was a mother crab taking its young away from the drilling to safety. We stopped drilling and I followed her to video her with her baby. Enjoy it!

Go check out my previous diving posts HERE.

James

his dive story

17 July 2012

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June is nesting season for sea turtles. We didn’t know this when we arrived in Tulum and the hotel staff kindly informed us that we should venture out at night to see the giant turtles nesting. I knew Joana loooooves turtles as she always wanted to see my dive videos and pics of turtles. It was our last night in Tulum and we decided to go for a walk looking for them. I had my bright dive torch with me. At first, we were thinking yeah, no way man that we will be so lucky to see turtles….

It was about 15 min. into our walk in the pitch dark when I spotted a large dark hump on the sand with my torch (I didn’t want to flash the bright torch too much as it will scare away the turtles who are planning to beach). I knew immediately that it was a turtle and we followed her as she struggled to move her large body forward on the sand searching for the right spot to lay her eggs.

Then we saw another one as she was leaving for the beach. These turtles always come back to the same locations to lay their eggs and with all the resort developments up and down the coast, some will not have the chance to lay their eggs and will be force to lay them in the sea where they will be eaten by fishes. Sad but a reality…

Conservation groups are helping identify locations and are trying to protect or at least safeguard the eggs until they hatch. It was a really magical night and one that I will always remember. The next day, we went out to retrace our steps to see where the eggs were laid. You can see loads of turtle tracks everywhere on the beach. Enjoy!

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– James

his dive story

31 May 2012

his dive story

15 May 2012

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Well, I had another great dive this past Sunday at Northwest Point. Lately, I have been diving with Sarah, an instructor, who is coming out on Sundays for recreational diving only.

Funny enough we both are practicing taking photos with our cameras and strobe and learning as we go. I discovered that I could actually add more red to my underwater pics by adjusting the WB which I am only discovering now after 3 years! Anyway, enjoy the turtle, lobster and the shark. I am compiling some macro pics for next week!