divesergeant 6 years, 8 months ago.OK, two days since last update and one day post-camera flooding . We’re close to a getting a new camera. Good thing, after three dives with Casey and no camera, I’m about at wits end. It’s killing me. The dive I ruined mine, we saw an ocean trigger fish that hung around and would’ve been a great photo op. Damn, no camera. On that same dive we saw a juvenile midnight parrotfish. Damn, no camera. On the Kittiwake we saw four squid that hung around and were quite photogenic. Damn, no camera. (And there was Casey, rubbing it in!)
So we went to Cathy Church’s that evening. We’ve never really thought much about going there, mainly due to their connection with Sunset; we had a bad experience with Sunset on our first dive trip in 1998 and never wanted to go back. Still, Joe and the CAG speak highly of Cathy’s shop, so we gave it a try. We’re very glad we did. Upstairs, the folks took all the time in the world to help and to answer all of our questions. Then we got to the downstairs. Theunis and Addie were a hoot. Just like upstairs, they were not pushy, did not push us to buy, patiently answered all of our questions and then made recommendations for what they thought would serve our needs. We ended up renting an Olympus XZ-1 for a shore dive session at Turtle Reef. Pics to follow….. and probably a purchase to follow, I’m afraid.
Anyway, the dives we did on the 11th (sans un appareil photo, and please pardon the trashing of the French language!) were great. We did Wall Street / Big Tunnel for the first and Bonnie’s Arch for the second. That afternoon we dove the Kittiwake.
The Kittiwake looks a lot like a ship that got sunk to make a reef. Odd, huh!? After four months there is some growth starting on it and it teems with small fish. We enjoyed it and, especially for regular Cayman visitors, we recommend diving it. It’ll be fun to watch as the wreck/reef matures and see how the new life takes hold. It’ll also be interesting to see what happens when the first hurricane hits. It seems like they sunk it a bit shallow; you can stand on the top and have your head out of water. Underwater, the deck sits on a slight angle that can really throw your perception of up and down off. I found I had a bit of vertigo going on. It was weird, but still really cool.
On April 12, we met Mr and Mrs Billinwilliamston at Turtle Reef for some shore dives. What a perfect way to spend the afternoon. We laughed, we had all flown 1600 miles and met for the first time when we really only live 50 miles from each other back home. We thoroughly enjoyed the relaxing dives with them; it is nice to share relaxing dives with another couple who share our love of the water and of diving.
On these dives, I had the rental from Cathy Church’s. “T” had given me a good primer on how to use it and these resulted…
Here’s Mr and Mrs Billinwilliamston in their native habitat…
Trying out the camera I took this shot of a grunt. They’re kind of like rabbits; they’re everywhere, but this came out pretty nice so here it is…
Mrs DS spotted this Moray, we think it is a goldentail…
We ran into this squid right at the entrance and it hung around for a few shots…
On the last dive I felt a tug on my fin. It was Bill. He gestured out into the blue where there was an eagle ray paralleling us. I could not get a good shot, but managed this. Just before I took it, the ray pulled up into a vertical climb and seemed to turn so we got a planform view…
After the dives, we moved to the bar for some fried coconut crusted shrimp and calamari. After our snack, Mrs DS and I had to scoot in order to get our rental camera back before close. We made it just in time!
As we sit here and dine on pizza and jungle juice (about 60% amaretto and 40% coconut rum), we think we might pick up a rental camera and do Lighthouse Point tomorrow.
It was great to meet Mr and Mrs DiveSergeant face-to-face. We had a very nice, relaxing afternoon of diving on the mini-wall at Turtle Reef and, as DS said, more than a couple of laughs. I’m not the photographer that DS is, but…
Turn about is fair play, so here are Mr and Mrs DiveSergeant in their natural habitat:
Cheryl (Mrs. BillInWilliamston) in the middle of a school of tarpon:
We saw a large number of small grouper on the dives.
And a couple of lobsters
My attempt at a picture of the ray we saw
Saw this cute little guy near the ladder at the end of our second dive. The photo is small because I forgot I had set my camera to take video trying to catch the Eagle Ray in motion (the ray was too far away for my little camera to get a decent video of).
It was a very enjoyable afternoon, we’ll have to do it again sometime.
April 13- Shore dives at Lighthouse Point
We hadn’t planned to dive today, but we looked at the weather last night and saw winds of 1mph, building to a gusty 4mph and decided we had to. So, we scooted to Cathy Church’s for a rental camera and zipped up to Lighthouse Point.
Reflections on L.H.P. v. Turtle Reef- LHP has nice, new facilities and more secure parking. Nice dive shop at both. We liked the entry/exit ladder at Turtle Reef better ‘cuz it was easier. LHP’s ladder was steep, TR’s was more like stairs. We had more silt in the water today than we had yesterday when we dived at TR, but that is an ever-changing thing and isn’t site specific. We also saw more stuff at TR yesterday than today at LHP, but again a day of diving at each doesn’t give a good representation. Bottom line, both are great shore dives. We didn’t eat at LHP so can’t comment on the chow. LHP staff gave us a very thorough pre-dive brief including a photo-board of the site which was very helpful.
We shot the heck out of the rental camera and got a few passable shots. We’ll start with a curious turtle that came and swam right alongside of me for quite a while, and even poked his snout up to the lens…
A bit later I found a pair of banded butterflyfish. Since they were being nice and sticking nearby, I felt obligated to take a family portrait…
I posted a pic of a grunt the other day and hesitate to post another, but I kind of like this shot, so here ya go…
Not to be outdone, Mrs DS took control of the camera and managed a nice shot of a honeycomb cowfish. I never seem to be able to get one broadside, they always seem to be going away for me. The Mrs had much better luck, and here is the result…
Still wielding the camera, she found yours truly staring down a prospective dinner option. This fella is damn lucky we were in a marine park, or there’d have been some cajun flounder on the table…
I got the camera back and returned to my post and shot him from my view…
We both have noticed that we are seeing more flounder this trip, and fewer moray. Don’t know why. Might just be the way the luck falls
Finally, as we worked back to the entry/exit, Mrs DS spotted this clump of social feather dusters…
After rinsing the salt from our bodies, we joined Joe and Peggy for lunch at Coconut Joe’s. We’d met Peggy last year and were glad to finally meet Joe. The blackened mahi mahi caesar salad was heavenly. It was a great opportunity to get to know Joe and to get the low-down on island happenings from him and Peggy.
And now the day gets expensive…
We returned the rental camera to Cathy Church’s and loaded our pics onto our laptop. With two more days to dive, we didn’t want to be camera-less and renting seems like money down the drain. So we ended up buying a new setup like the one we had been renting. What the heck, we’ve been talking about it for almost a year, so we were ready. Tomorrow’s pics will be from our new camera.
Cathy’s prices are indeed as low as anywhere. An online shop might come close or maybe even match, but at Cathy’s they sell you the camera, then give one-on-one coaching and a full briefing on the camera and its functions. When we walked out of the shop, all settings were properly set, we knew how to change setting if needed, we knew how to care for and inspect our housing and we were comfortable with the entire setup. You simply cannot get that service online.
We finished the day with dinner at Eats and look forward to morning dives with Casey on the north wall……
