For scuba divers, there's a wall dive on the South side of the Island on a very healthy reef formation (it was 2 years ago when I last dove it...) starting in about 65' of water.  When I dove this reef in 2004, I did it with a friend that was a dive instructor.  We found a tunnel on the island side of the reef at 85' that was big enough to easily swim through.  You couldn't see where the tunnel exited because of the bends in the tunnel so we explored it with flashlights.  The walls were covered by colonies of some kind of exotic shrimp that were transparent with little bits of bright colors and had what looked like feathery dragonfly wings.  After winding through about 30' or so of reef, the tunnel came out of the reef at 110' looking straight down a sheer wall into the vast depths!  Very Cool!

Anyhow... this time I had a predicted 2 day weather window which turned out to be more of a 32 hour window.  "Hmmmmm... just enough time to do some good diving (Yes, snorkeling IS diving, especially since we often snorkel to 40' or more) at Conception."  I was lucky enough to be able to talk another VERY good diver, Oliver, into joining me for this trip.  The bonus was that I'd get to try out my new Canon Elph digital camera and it's underwater housing.

We left around 10:30 in the morning expecting to have the weather settle as we crossed the Exuma Sound.  Instead, the seas built to some 6' to 7' after passing the northern point of Long Island.  I have to assume that it was due to a (tidal?) current apposing the winds to build up those kinds of large and confused seas.  We ended up making Conception just shy of 4 p.m.  We dropped the hook into some sand, near several coral heads, and dove them till the sunset made the waters spooky.  Predators do come into the shallows at nightfall, and Conception is not lacking in the numerous species of sharks.

During the night the wind almost died, and the waters around the island settled down nicely.  In the morning, Oliver was awake at 5 a.m. wanting to go see all of the lobsters that walk around on top of the reefs during the night.  Unfortunately for both of us, I was asleep and he wasn't sure how happy I'd be if he woke me up at that time of the morning.  Fortunately, he went beck to bed and didn't wake up until a more reasonable 7 a.m. at  which time I too was waking up.  We had coffee and a breakfast of milk grits containing lobster chunks, bacon and Irish cheddar cheese.  Then we went to our first dive site on the south side of the island.  By around 8 o'clock, we were swimming 3/10 of a mile up current of the boat so that we could do a leisurely drift dive back to the boat.  This area was great for the different species of wild life that it contained.  All of the turtles, Spotted Eagle Rays, Cowfish, Boxfish and a couple of the shark pictures, were taken here.

We then rounded the cliff by the entrance to the SE anchorage and found some nice isolated coral heads to dive on before lunch.  This area was a little more exciting as the number of shark encounter increased dramatically as did the species of shark.  We took a short lunch break and then continued diving heads till mid afternoon.  I'm happy to say that we got in over six hours in the water that day and had a blast!  We saw allot of different fish but, so far, no lionfish.  Lionfish are native to the Pacific but somehow have started reproducing here in the Bahamas.  They're very beautiful as well as poisonous and so far this year I've seen 2 in shallow water, around small heads, in the Exumas.  They have no natural enemy here in the Atlantic to keep them in check so who knows how they will upset the balance of nature.

I'm happy to report that the waters were smooth and flat for a fast trip back to George Town that afternoon.  In fact, we made it back just in time for Oliver to show up politely late for the dinner engagement that he had forgotten (sorry Pam...).

These dive trips are what I live for.  The diving in the Exumas is great, but the diving farther out in the Out Islands is even better!  Love it.

I hope that all of you are unwinding from the holidays and enjoying a "warmer than usual" winter.  Enjoy!

The next posting will be what I had on the George Town page originally, ~ 2/09/07 and it should be Exumas #2...