Daily Dive Log June 3 - 9, 2018

June 3, 2018 PM Boat Trip

Captain: Domingo
Divemaster / Instructor: Ray
Weather: Sunny blue skies – great for training!
Water Temperature: 80 degrees

Dive One

Site: Paradise Reef
Max Depth: 40 feet
Dive Time: 50 minutes
Key Animals: Spotted eel, Yellowhead Jawfish
Visibility: 100+ feet
Notes: After doing a pool session the students were was ready to hit the open water. Paradise reef is always a good start – nice viz and slow current. First on the sea grass area to get comfortable and as we explore we find a flounder and puffer fish. Later the coral formation brings all those beautiful colors, and at the end of the dive we found the yellow head jaw fish trying to put the eggs to a bit of sunshine. Just awesome! Ascending was nice and easy watching computers to complete the training. Dive number one, nice!

Dive Two

Site: Casitas
Max Depth: 40 feet
Dive Time: 55 minutes
Key Animals: Pipehorse, Starfish
Visibility: 100+ feet
Notes: The Casitas dive site is always rewarding. There is artificial reef growing fast and along the sandy bottom we found the starfish walking. When we called Henry away from his pipehorse to video the starfish I found a second pipe seahorse. What a surprise! One after the other! Also it is nice to see the shipwrecks at only 40ft of water, excellent for pictures!

Oreaster reticulatus, the Cushioned Sea Star, is uncommon in Cozumel, but can be regularly seen in a few select locations.

June 4, 2018 AM Boat Trip

Captain: Domingo
Divemaster / Instructor: Ray
Weather: More great Cozumel weather
Water Temperature: 80 degrees

Dive One

Site: Cedral Pass
Max Depth: 55 feet
Dive Time: 50 minutes
Key Animals: Several Nurse Sharks, Hawksbill Turtle
Visibility: 100+ feet
Notes: Xuan is ready for more adventure so we decided to take her to Cedral Pass. Lucky for her it was almost no current, as soon as we descended there was hawskbill turtle. We spent about 7 minutes just watching her eating, A few minutes ahead there were two sharks laying on the bottom. We stopped the drift to stay around the sharks and we managed to stay and look at them for a good while. They changed spots several times in the same area, one of them came very close to where we were, it was awesome. At the end a splendid toad fish came half way out of his house, super cool!

Dive Two

Site: Yucab Reef
Max Depth: 50 feet
Dive Time: 55 minutes
Key Animals: Channel Clinging Crab, Jewel Damselfish
Visibility: 100+ feet
Notes: There are many fish in this site, schools of blue chromis, and yellow wrasses – always a great backdrop for a dive. We also found a crab under the reef and one coral head had more than 10 lobsters. We stayed as the slow current was barely moving north. Once we called the dive we had a last view of a juvenile jewel damsel fish and all those neon blue spots all over its body. What a beautiful baby fish!

Microspathodon chrysurus, but more commonly called the Jewel Damselfish. We are lucky they are not bigger because they sure are mean little dudes!

June 4, 2018 PM Boat Trip

Captain: Domingo
Divemaster / Instructor: Ray
Weather: Continuing as a great day!
Water Temperature: 80 degrees

Dive One

Site: Casitas
Max Depth: 40 feet
Dive Time: 35 minutes
Key Animals: Spotted Moray, Dwarf Filefish
Visibility: 100+ feet
Notes: It’s beginner divers this afternoon so we start shallow and easy Especially with Emilie who is just 10 year old. Its sea grass all along the bottom and we share ok signal with prithika as we descend to a 15ft bottom. Gradually Sam reached 40ft where the concrete blocks are and the show started Ravichandran found on the sand a starfish, then spotted rays, later the pufferfish. To end up the shipwreck is nice for pictures. I think pretty awesome for a first ocean dive ever for the 4 of them.

Dive Two

Site: Villa Blanca
Max Depth: 28 feet
Dive Time: 55 minutes
Key Animals: Sharptail Moray, Big eyed jacks.
Visibility: 100+ feet
Notes: After adjusting some gear we are ready to dive again. Ravichandran has the video camera and he starts shooting right away as many jacks and parrot fish surround him. Prithika found a sharp tail eel and it was fascinating to see it sliding thru the bottom. So many small fish like the smooth trunk fish among others. Emilie gets close to the statues and get herself a picture. So fun to dive with kids, Sam ends the dive very happy to find a lifetime dive buddy – his daughter!

A juvenile Jacknife fish, Equetus lanceolatus, is a close cousin of the infamous Spotted Drum, Equetus punctatus. These fish are so similar, in fact, that in the above photo you technically cannot tell which of the two species it is.

June 5, 2018 PM Boat Trip

Captain: Domingo
Divemaster / Instructor: Ray
Weather: Cloudy skies, but dry
Water Temperature: 80 degrees

Dive One

Site: Cedral Wall
Max Depth: 60 feet
Dive Time: 50 minutes
Key Animals: Green Moray, Hawksbill turtle, Nurse sharks
Visibility: 100+ feet
Notes: Lou is new in the group today. He is a dive instructor, so we don’t miss a beat. We all descended slow at 30ft first and surprise! There is a hawskbill turtle, Then a group of Ocean Triggerfish circle the coral head and Xu is taking pictures. Xuan and myself looked under the reef and we found the green moray and a shark resting together – awesome! Xu wants to try deploying his surface marker buoy at the end of our dive. He just finished his rescue course with us and he deployed it perfectly.

Dive Two

Site: San Francisco
Max Depth: 50 feet
Dive Time: 55 minutes
Key Animals: Nurse Shark, Flounder
Visibility: 100+ feet
Notes: Last dive for Xu and Xuan. This divesite has spectacular views since it is a wall dive. The coral colors are so pretty once the sun shines from the west in the calm afternoon. Wait… what is that I thought, and yep there is a shark tail! As we drifted we saw the whole thing, just cool. When we were ready to finish the dive a flounder moved close to the bottom and Lou just waved at it – time to go up.

Finding one Nurse Shark, Ginglymostoma cirratum, is always a treat. But finding two together? Sign me up!

June 6, 2018 PM Boat Trip

Captain: Domingo
Divemaster / Instructor: Ray
Weather: Cloudy skies still. Forecast isn’t looking good.
Water Temperature: 80 degrees

Dive One

Site: Santa Rosa Wall
Max Depth: 130 feet
Dive Time: 45 minutes
Key Animals: Green Moray, Hawksbill turtle
Visibility: 100+ feet
Notes: It was an awesome dive! First we started with a deep dive, going all the way to the limit – 130ft, Lou is an instructor and Joanne, a good friend of us has been diving a lot recently, so we all are ready to go. The landscape is so beautiful, especially in the afternoon when we have all the light coming from the west. The current was so gentle that we could just stop to enjoy the view, as we ascended to the second part of the dive, since it was a multilevel, we found this green moray swimming free, We love free-swimming morays! Then the turtle and at the end during the safety stop the typical school of horse eye jacks, fantastic!

Dive Two

Site: Cedral Pass
Max Depth: 50 feet
Dive Time: 65 minutes
Key Animals: Pipehorse, Splendid Toadfish
Visibility: 100+ feet
Notes: We were given a slow current so it was time to take advantage of it. Cedral Pass is the best spot. Lou found a pipe horse, he has got good eyes! We were barely moving so the chance to find splendid toadfish magnifies. We found 5 of them! And at the end in the swim through it was a huge crab.

We can often count on finding a few Green morays when diving at Cedral. Gymnothorax funebris, as is the common name, always requires a pit stop to enjoy a minute or two with.

June 7, 2018 PM Boat Trip

Captain: Domingo
Divemaster / Instructor: Ray
Weather: Cloudy skies still, but staying dry so far.
Water Temperature: 80 degrees

Dive One

Site: Colombia Reef
Max Depth: 100 feet
Dive Time: 60 minutes
Key Animals: Splendid Toadfish, Channel Clinging crab
Visibility: 100+ feet
Notes: This afternoon was windy but we still made it to Colombia reef. Will is a very experienced diver and Lou is willing to adventure to a far reef in search of swimthroughs and tall coral formations. As we pass through one of those we found a couple of splendid toad fish, they were shy, but sitting together. A bit later the big crab showed up walking down the pinnacle without concern for us Many fish in all directions, too much to name, but it was a great 60 minute dive. Imagine the hundreds of fish we saw…

Dive Two

Site: Palancar Gardens
Max Depth: 60 feet
Dive Time: 60 minutes
Key Animals: Ocean Triggerfish, Spotted Lobster
Visibility: 100+ feet
Notes: We visited every little corner of this reef. What caught Lou’s attention was the school of creole wrasse – hundreds of them! Also it was a lobster walking out of its home. Will was happy to see that many ocean trigger fish at the safety stop, It was an endless stream of fish swimming past. It was another 60 min dive, many more fish and smiles.

June 8, 2018 PM Boat Trip

Captain: Domingo
Divemaster / Instructor: Ray
Weather: Cloudy skies still, but staying dry so far.
Water Temperature: 80 degrees

Dive One

Site: Punta Tunich
Max Depth: 100 feet
Dive Time: 60 minutes
Key Animals: Bota, Green Moray
Visibility: 100+ feet
Notes: Keeping up with the deep dive series Lou is now on Nitrox 32% so we plan the dive at 100ft. Along the Punta Tunich Wall is just perfect! We felt the stream of fresh water coming off of the ledge. As usual this fresh water entrance creates a blurry vision, it is a fantastic phenomena. Marine life wise still very attractive. A turtle was swimming down from the surface all the way to our depth. Also there was a green moray. This is the second time I see her in the same spot! At the end of the dive we visited the thousand fish cave, with many grunts, Glassy sweepers, and snappers, plus the mating sargent majors and many more…

Dive Two

Site: Santa Rosa Wall
Max Depth: 70 feet
Dive Time: 60 minutes
Key Animals: Spiny Lobster harem, Nurse Shark
Visibility: 100+ feet
Notes: Santa Rosa Wall in the late afternoon is always spectacular. Last time I went with Lou a few days ago we did not make it to the swimthroughs, so this time we were ready for it. Current was nice and two minutes into the dive we saw two nurse sharks swimming in circles followed by the turtle. As we were going out of the cavern a huge lobster was walking in the ‘wrong’ direction, that gave Lou a nice video of it. Later the splendid toad fish I visit often became the subject for pictures. After visiting all the swimthroughs we can possibly visit, we swim to the shallow reef parallel to the wall and found a green moray, what a nice dive!

A Cozumel favorite, Sanopus splendidus, the Splendid Toadfish.

June 9, 2018 PM Boat Trip

Captain: Domingo
Divemaster / Instructor: Ray
Weather: Mostly Sunny
Water Temperature: 80 degrees

Dive One

Site: Palancar Gardens
Max Depth: 40 feet
Dive Time: 45 minutes
Key Animals: Spiny Lobster, Hawksbill Turtle
Visibility: 100+ feet
Notes: It is the first open water training dive for Janessa and Scott. They have done this before as discover scuba, but today is more significant since they are getting certified. Janessa is a bit nervous but here they go. Palancar Gardens helps to complete the task, a shallow place at first and slowly swimming to the main coral formation. Janessa discovers the turtle ahead of us, we all are excited, and then Scott points to the lobsters that have their antennas out – super cool! Time to go back to the shallow starting point, nice and slow ascent, first dive done!

Dive Two

Site: La Francesa
Max Depth: 40 feet
Dive Time: 50 minutes
Key Animals: Barracuda, Splendid Toadfish
Visibility: 100+ feet
Notes: We are ready to do the second dive. La Francesa reef is what we have as destination. The visibility here is always nice and clear,. We are looking for sharks! Scott is first amazed fish was the barracuda that he points to. Then Janessa is hovering above the reef and we needed to stop because there is a splendid toad fish that i want them to see. Only found in Cozumel so it is worth the kicking to stay and enjoy the view. Once at the safety stop we practice a couple of skills and we surface. That was an awesome dive Janessa said.