Black Manta trip, October

Divers hanging on to the line during their safety stop.

Hermit crab. The shells used by this species are nearly always coverd with small anemones. This relationship provides comouflage and protection for the crab, and gives the anemones the opportunity to feed in many different locations as the crab moves. When disturbed, the anemones expel long stinging threads called acontia. The crab benefits from these acontia and uses the anemone as protection against predators. (source: Crustacea-Guide Of The World, by Debelius)

Common marble shrimp (photo taken during a night dive)

I spent 5 days on a live-aboard (diving boat with bedrooms and all), scuba diving on some of the most famous wrecks around Singapore, Malaysia and Indonesia. Most of these wrecks were very deep dives, therefore didn't last very long---the deeper you go, the shorter your dive (this has to do with the amount of nitrogen in your body and how your body reacts to it). I now realize that I prefer longer, shallower dives. These dives give me more time and light for photography. It's also safer. On the deep wreck, you also have less life and coral. Still managed to get a few decent pictures, all of them on shallow, relaxing dives.

This was finally the first trip where I would have the opportunity to test my new dive computer (looks like a watch). On my second day of diving, while decending on a deep wreck, the computer fell off my wriste and fell to the bottom, 46 meters below. The whole dive, i had tears in my eyes: it would be impossible to go search for the computer: the bottom was at 46 meters and the maximum allowable depth for recreational divers is of 40 meters. It was gone forever! When I came back on the boat, everybody offered their sympathies for my loss.... And then, Vicent, the owner of the boat, offered to go back down on TriMix to search for it. TriMix is a mix of 3 gases. You must be a technical diver to use these and it allows for deeper dives. This is what commercial divers use. Well guess what? The guy found my 800$+ computer! It took him 15 minutes to find it, but because it was so deep, he had to decompress for well over an hour before being able to surface. I am so grateful! Thank you, Vincent!