July 23 - Egypt: Na'ama Bay - the Sinai Peninsula of Egypt
Today was another big, fabulous diving day. We met our transport to the dive shop at 8:00AM in the lobby of our hotel. Unfortunately, we couldn't secure a room at the Gazala Hotel tonight, but the Camel Dive Club Hotel had a room and gave us a discount. So we loaded all our bags onto the bus and took off to the dive shop. We were all quite excited because today the boat took us into the Straights of Tiran where there are some beautiful reefs and hammerhead sharks!
Dive #1: Jackson Reef - South side of the reef
Depth: 31 meters
Bottom Time: 52 minutes
Visibility: 20 meters
The boat moored up on a line attached to the reef, and we all jumped in. There are more fish than I can possibly count or know. I'm starting to think that scuba diving is much like bird-watching, only without the binoculars. I really want some sort of reference sheet underwater because I forget which fish I saw by the time I surface. Geoff has a great book on the boat, but I can never remember what I saw. Anyway, what I CAN remember are these: jackfish (trevally), lionfish, cornet fish, and a HUGE Napoleon!
We surfaced for an hour with the boat in the same place. Our next dive was going to be on the other side of the reef where the boat cannot moor or anchor so we prepped to do a drift dive.
Look closely at this picture - over my right shoulder you can see dark blue. These reefs are smack in the middle of the ocean surrounded by 800 meter depths. The reefs seem to rise up out of nowhere and reach within inches of the surface. It's amazing! So here's what happens when you're out for a joy-ride and not paying attention:
D'OH! Bet the skipper of this one felt kind of stupid. Especially since these reefs have been on the map for decades.
Dive #2: Jackson Reef - North side of the reef
Depth: 24 meters
Bottom Time: 37 minutes
Visibility: 15 meters
The north side of the reef is quite rough and has very, very strong currents. So our boat couldn't get too close to the reef or it would be washed up. So this was a drift dive - where we jumped off and hurried over to the reef where the current was less strong. Then we descended to about 20 meters. The sole purpose of this dive was to find the school of Hammerhead Sharks that live there. Geoff says there are around 100 of them, but he will only guarantee that we will see water. So we completely ignored the reef and swam out into "the blue" which is quite surreal because there are no landmarks to use for navigation. We were all looking everywhere for anything. After about 10 minutes, a hammerhead finally found us, looked around, and then swam quickly away. Sadly, that was the only one we saw. The current was so strong that it pulled us even further away from the reef which means further away from the hammerheads. When we surfaced, we were so far away that our boat didn't see us or our inflatable marker for a good 10 minutes. So we just hung out on the surface and floated until the boat sighted us. It was difficult to climb up the ladder into the boat because the swells were so big. But we finally made it and were on our way to the next reef.
Ice Cream Boat
We stopped at a flat reef for lunch, along side some safari boats. We were all laying around the boat talking after lunch when out of nowhere someone yells, "Ice Cream!". The ice cream boat had arrived. It was a little speed boat with ice cream pictures on it, and the only thing missing from the picture was the tinkling music. The ice cream man grabbed a cooler and boarded the boat, offering ice cream to everyone. Because supply was low and demand was high, the price of an ice cream was ridiculous. So as much as we wanted one we waved him on.
Dive #3: Thomas Reef
Depth: 24 meters
Bottom Time: 56 minutes for Heidi, 39 minutes for Jon
Visibility: 30 meters
This was an incredible dive! Thomas Reef is a small circular reef, and I made it all the way around it. While we were down, we saw some huge tuna, Napoleon fish, parrotfish, barracuda, surgeon fish, and unicorn fish - just to name a few. Our breathing skills are getting better with every dive. Here's the way it works: Geoff sends us up to the surface as we reach 50 bars on our air gauge or 60 minutes - whichever comes first. For this dive, I was the last diver up because I was breathing efficiently. So for about 10 minutes it was just me and two dive masters down there. This is kind of like having your own personal tour guides because they see things that I would never see. Every once in a while, I just hung out in neutral buoyancy and stared at the reefs. There are SO MANY things to see!
After we got back on land, Jon and I checked into the Camel Hotel and went for a quick dip in the pool. Then we showered and went out to meet our new friends Ian and Shelly for drinks. We sat at a bar on the beach and talked and laughed and had a very good time. The beers went straight to our heads because we were so exhausted and hungry. We left at 10:00 because we all have to get up early tomorrow to go to the Thistlegorm Wreck.