Arrived in Puerto Princesa, a nice and relaxed port city on central Palawan island tonight at 3 am. Had a last breakfast at 6 (as the Seadoors crew claimed we should by now have gotten used o erring up early, with an early morning 6 am dive for the past 5 days), and then slowly packed and celebrated farewell. The 4 crazy Chinese are heading back to Nanjing, les deux Rolands, Tony, Rhita, Bernard and Thierry back to France, Rhita's daughter Sandrine will stay one more week and our two diving buddies, Alexandra and Rafael from Puerto Rico, will also continue their honeymoon. This was our group for the last 6 days, from ages 27 to 74. Along with the 10 guys from Seadoors. All in a 25m vessel, in the middle of nowhere (12 hours boat ride away from the mainland. One evening we actually enjoyed a couple of hours on solid ground - we walked through shallow water over to the ranger station in the north atoll and had a small party there: 10 rangers and 1 Irish research assistant live in a 10x10 m hut on the water. But at least it was not shaking.
The waves (along with being in the Sulu sea and different stories about hijackings by pirates and Islamic fundamentalists, the prospect of diving with sharks, having strong currents and the next compression chamber being at least 2 days away) sort of got on my nerves the first day. So I skipped a meal and the first dive but when joining for the second dive and being under water, felt soooo much better. And we did see sharks, in 85% of our dives: a whale shark, a hammerhead, a thresher shark, nurse and black tip sharks, grey and silk sharks, and tons of white tip sharks. Really impressive, and not scary at all. Tons of turtles too, 2 manta rays, three swarms of dolphins, barracudas, huge swarms of tuna (man, they look mean!, jack fish, aggressive trigger fish, ,... and such an overwhelmingly rich flora and fauna - the corals were truly amazing. The pictures will follow. And I successfully finished my Advanced Open Water Dive Certificate, together with buddy Alexandra. Great food too, some first pics below:
The waves (along with being in the Sulu sea and different stories about hijackings by pirates and Islamic fundamentalists, the prospect of diving with sharks, having strong currents and the next compression chamber being at least 2 days away) sort of got on my nerves the first day. So I skipped a meal and the first dive but when joining for the second dive and being under water, felt soooo much better. And we did see sharks, in 85% of our dives: a whale shark, a hammerhead, a thresher shark, nurse and black tip sharks, grey and silk sharks, and tons of white tip sharks. Really impressive, and not scary at all. Tons of turtles too, 2 manta rays, three swarms of dolphins, barracudas, huge swarms of tuna (man, they look mean!, jack fish, aggressive trigger fish, ,... and such an overwhelmingly rich flora and fauna - the corals were truly amazing. The pictures will follow. And I successfully finished my Advanced Open Water Dive Certificate, together with buddy Alexandra. Great food too, some first pics below: