On Submarine Spelunking

Well, yesterday I managed to check two things off my "to do" list: scuba diving in Arrecife (yeah, I know it's about time) and cave diving. My friend/coworker Ollie and I went diving at a site called Eden Rock, at the southern edge of Jamestown. It's about 35 feet deep on average, but we went as deep as 48 feet in some parts (according to the ol' dive computer). The coral formations down there are absolutely awesome! There are so many different kinds, with fish all over the place too. The caves themselves were great as well - they are actually natural passages between two ancient coral heads that started growing about 5-10 feet apart, but started growing closer together as they reached toward the surface. There isn't too much inside the caves - mostly sponges and encrusting algae - but the cavern structures themselves were really cool, with light filtering down through the remaining cracks at the surface. Since they're open at both ends, I suppose they're technically tunnels, but caves sounds cooler so I'm going with that.


This is a shot just coming out of one of the caves. The corals get a lot closer together at the top, but it's pretty hard to take a good picture of that. Besides, I took videos of my swimthroughs instead.


This is a type of sea anemone (I haven't looked up what type yet) we found growing on the seafloor at the base of a coral head. I love the structure and the way that parts of the tentacles are opaque and the rest are transparent.


This is another of the omnipresent Mutton Snappers, who decided to follow us around a bit.



Coral formations everywhere!


This is a Lettuce Sea Slug (no, not a nudibranch, though I admit that's what I thought when I first saw it) I found in a little crevasse on the way to another one of the caves.


Another (currently) unidentified anemone, one of the varieties more commonly found in these parts. Zoom in and check out the patterns on the tentacles - very cool.

That's probably enough pictures for now - I'll save the cavern videos and scary barracuda pictures for a later date... (just kidding... sort of...)