Today was our first day of diving. We woke up, then went to rent our gear at Dockside Divers, which is the dive shop at Coco View Resort. After that we ate breakfast. Our first dive was at Anka’s Place. We saw a nurse shark, two lobsters, and two moray eels. For our morning drop dive, we dove Newman’s Wall. We saw a seahorse on the shipwreck. We also saw a puffer fish by the safety stop.
After we ate lunch, we stopped into the dive shop to finish our nitrox certification. We did a test then the dive master taught us how to analyze tanks. We need to analyze our nitrox tanks ahead of our boat dives. We also stopped by the camera shop to rent a camera.
The afternoon boat dive was at Two Tall, Two Small. We saw a nurse shark underneath coral. Andy saw a lobster. Actually, this trip we’ve seen so many lobsters and hermit crabs that the novelty is wearing off a bit. The drop dive was at Coco View Wall. Again we saw another lobster in the coral.
We waited a bit to eat dinner. The Super Bowl was on TV in the upstairs of the restaurant and bar area. We watched the game and ate dinner. I talked to another guest who also happened to be an unemployed database administrator. After the halftime show, we set out for a night dive.
We are a bit more prepared for night dives on this trip. We have a spare flashlight to share as a backup. We also each have a beacon light. It doesn’t focus a beam like a flashlight. Instead it’s like a light bulb. So it illuminates the other diver for you. We had some difficulty keeping track of each other without this last trip.
On our night dive, we saw several hermit crabs. We saw a few lobster on our way to the safety stop. Our plan was to dive Coco View Wall first and turn back early. Next we wanted to explore the Prince Albert wreck in the front yard. We saw a couple coral clinging crabs – they have a large round body. On an earlier dive we saw one in a barrel sponge too. When we made it to the wreck, we saw three or four turtles. We saw two separately, then two together. The sea turtles had fish sleeping on their backs. Just along for the ride, like in Finding Nemo. Andy also saw a couple small squid, probably a little bigger than one of his fingers.