Look at the direction the antheas are swimming, and you know the direction of the current. Look at how frantically they are swimming, and you know how strong the current is.Diving the canyons at Puerto Galera, I can actually see what the current is doing. I can look ahead and see up and down currents, back eddies and slack areas. Whilst feeling my way in the turbulent water is still a useful diving skill, being able to actually plan my route visually to make use of the current is something I could easily become addicted to.
Its all based on good visibility and millions of antheas, small orange fish that maintain position above their favourite coral heads while swimming frantically into the current.
Look at the direction the antheas are swimming, and you know the direction of the current. Look at how frantically they are swimming, and you know how strong the current is.
The sessile life is spectacular. Although crops of hard corals and large barrel sponges are plentiful, it is the density of bright orange and purple soft corals that dominates the scene. Even so, the thing that really marks the dive is the sheer number and variety of fish. It seems as though every fish for miles around has come to enjoy the current.
Along the sides of the canyon some of the less energetic reef fish flit about in the back eddies. Butterfly fish peck at the reef between the soft corals. A lion fish hovers perfectly in slack water behind a barrel sponge, no doubt keeping a hungry eye on the antheas swimming like hyperactive goldfish to either side.
After the canyons we come to an old anchor embedded in the reef and the end of the dive. Delayed SMBs are in standard use here, necessary for both the strong currents and the large amount of boat traffic. But unconventionally, no one sets them off from a tie in on the bottom. The currents are just too mixed up to make that practical.
Out of the main current in Sabang bay, local dive centres have sunk a couple of small boats as artificial reefs. They don't amount to much as wrecks, but the big attractions are frogfish, ghost pipefish and a shoal of batfish.
A photographer's dream and nightmare. Subjects that we all dream of capturing, but all requiring a different lens and consequently another dive as I use a housed camera system. My first dive to reconnoitre the situation with a wide angle lens for the wreck shots works well, but on my second dive with a macro lens for the ghost pipefish the camera jams.
Next dive I work with my spare camera, also taking the suspect jamming camera along with a medium lens to catch the frogfish. I don't normally dive with two cameras, but the situation warrants it and with just two subjects to worry about carrying the second camera isn't a problem.
Ghost pipefish now in the bag, the photographers nightmare continues as I move on to the frogfish only to find she is not in her usual place. We search the surrounding area in detail, but the well-camouflaged frogfish eludes us.
Another day and another dive, eventually we catch the frogfish at home. I guess that like many celebrities she just gets tired of the paparazzi and has to get some peace and quiet.