The plan was for us to dive today at Little Cayman. There was a dawn dive scheduled and a few divers went in for it but it turned out not to be so good. The wind had picked up and Captain Allan was afraid that we might break our mooring. There is no protected place to go when the winds pick up. The bottom was getting stirred up so the new plan was to set sail for Grand Cayman as soon as the last diver got on board.
Our crossing back to Grand Cayman was shorter and smoother than our crossing to get to Little Cayman.
The reason was that the wind was at our back and we had a following sea. That is always more comfortable than when plowing right into the waves.
Captain Allan told us that we would miss our two morning dives but he would try to get us in for two afternoon dives (even if it meant pushing back dinner) and then having a night dive. We arrived in Grand Cayman and made our first dive at a site named Big Tunnels.
It was a very nice wall dive but it was deep. I hit 103’ on the dive and had a bottom time of 33 minutes. We went through a few swim throughs and we saw a few tarpon. It was a nice dive but not on the better dives on the trip.
We followed this dive with another one that was not at the top of my hit list. We dove the Doc Poulson, a 70’ cable laying ship that was sunk in 1981.
It was kind of neat to see it but being in 53’ of water, it wasn’t big enough to hold your interest for an entire dive. There was reef around the ship but I decided that I would take my photos of the ship and head for the surface. Warren got bored with the Doc Poulson pretty quickly and wandered around the reefs that surround it. I could kind of kick myself for not thinking more about this dive before doing it. It was another perfect spot for a Magic Filter but I never thought about using it. There was a lot of particulate in the water and it was hard controlling the backscatter.
There was night dive offered on the Doc Poulson but Warren, Robin and I declined. The divers that made the dive had an enjoyable time. So did we!
Captain Allan told us that since we missed a few dives today that he would offer a dawn dive tomorrow. Since it was going to be our last day of diving and the diving would stop at noon, we decided that we would do the dive.
Tonight was the night that we got to see the video that Lauren produced as well as a slide show by Photo Pro, Trenton Smith (Trent).
We all liked Lauren’s video a lot. On other dive boats that we had been on, the video crew tries to poke fun at the divers by hanging rubber chickens on their tanks and pretending to push them off the swim platform into the water. Lauren did her best to make us all look good in the video. Veronica and I don’t usually buy the video but we liked Lauren’s video so much that we bought it.
Trent’s slide show was great. He has a lot of talent and to add to our enjoyment of the show, he informed us that he was burning all the image files to disk and we would all have one on our bunk to take with us. He told us that we could use the files for personal use and asked not to use them to enter photo contests unless we entered them under his name.
Trent is my crew member of the day. He is young but doesn’t let any grass grow under his feet. He has been around the world twice in the last two and a half years. That is something that a lot of us dream about but very few of us get to do. Trent was incredibly helpful to any photographer on the boat that needed his advice. He made the week thoroughly enjoyable.
Since this is a shorter blog, it will give me the opportunity to introduce you to four more passengers.
Lawrence and Allyson are from the UK and they were a pleasure to be with all week. Allyson seemed more outgoing than Lawrence but that was only my observation. They did love to dive and they were in the water a lot during our week. Veronica spent some time talking with Allyson and she saw a photo of their cottage back home and learned how proud Allyson and Lawrence were of their children. Lawrence looked like he really liked to read and was often buried in the pages of a book.
Next is my mystery couple, Monica and Juan from Spain. The real mystery about them is why it took me all week to get to know them. They are wonderful people and are aspiring underwater photographers.
When we were diving, I would watch them to see what they were doing and I think that they were doing the same. Juan didn’t speak much English so Monica did all the translating. By the time that we really got friendly, it was Friday and the week was just about up.
I did learn that Juan is an architect and he and Monica filled me in on how different it is being an architect in Spain compared to the United States. Check out their web site here. I could only access the web site in Spanish but Google will translate it for you.
My problem is that I don’t meet people easily. Veronica is quite the opposite. I am sure that she knew everyone on the ship long before I did. To attest to that, when awards were given out on the last night aboard the ship, Captain Allan proudly presented Veronica with the “Boat Mum” award.
If you know Veronica, you know that she truly fits the award. I am a lucky man to have married such a wonderful woman.
My next blog will be of our last day of diving in the Cayman Islands and it will include a dive that I loved as much as any dive that I have ever done. In the meantime, if you want to see any of my other photos from the Cayman Islands, visit my Photo Gallery and look for subjects that you have seen here or input “Cayman Aggressor” with out the quotes in the search box and you will find all the photos from this trip.
© 2010, Herb Segars. All rights reserved.
Dear Herb;
Thank you very much for your nice words, and thank you also for this special diary you are doing… It’s very exciting to wait for the next day.
Regards.
Monica