Superstar Sluggers

I leave at 8pm tonight.  They need the room at noon, so I need to be packed except for my shower/plane stuff.  I’ll use a shower in the spa to get ready.

I was so honored to dive with Ali, Jim and Bernard.  They are like three superstars of the Nudibranching community. 

Ali has her PhD in slugs and her site is:

http://aliciahermosillo.com

She identified 582 species on this trip!
https://www.flickr.com/photos/8723238@N07/albums/72157657798887103

Jim is known as the Scottish Nudibranch guy and his site is:

http://www.nudibranch.org

And of course, Bernard is our esteemed scientist on the trip.  He has many sites listed at the bottom of this page:

http://www.habitas.org.uk/staff/bpicton.html

It’s like diving with the Chicago Bulls I guess.

So after 27 days, 76 dives and 389 unique nudibranch species and endlessly humming Mahna Mahna, this trip was “Apo Apo”!!!

I’m not sure that phrase “Apo Apo” has any meaning, it’s just a funny thing to yell when the dive guys are all shouting in Indonesian.  J

Until Next Time, Sluggers!

Mustachioed Nudibranch

Just four more dives today and then this vacation is Pau.

I am feeling ready.  Ready to get back and have my own space again.  I just want to be a girl.  I think after my Shedd volunteering on Friday I’ll get a mani/pedi and have my eyebrows waxed.

The Air 2 free flowing problem seems to be fixed again.

On the 11am dive, I got the message “Card Full” after I only took 75 pictures.   Oops.  I can’t just drag to the delete folder, I need to reformat the card in my camera each time.  I need to put that in my reminders for the next trip.

On the last dive had a nudi with a moustache.  I swear!!

After all these dives I was reminded that you gotta log the bottom time to find cool stuff.  I guess that applies in life too.  J

Check it out, even on the last day, I got to log a ton of new stuff.

372 - Tambja amakusana

373 - Goniodoridella sp. 2

374 - Trapania sp. 9

375 - Berthellina delicata

376 - Elysia sp. 30

377 - Nembrotha sp. (juvenile)

378 - Eubranchus sp. (White with pinkish/lavender)

379 - Pleurobranchus varians

380 - Cuthona sp. 11

381 - Cuthona sp. (unique aeolid with white body grayish purple cerata with white tips and a pink face with primitive eyes)

382 - Nembrotha cristata

383 - Favorinus sp. 3

384 - Flabellina delicata (pink body white cerata with yellow and hot pink rings - bumpy orange rhinophores)

385 - Doto sp. 10

386 - Trapania palmula

387 - Kaloplocamus sp.

388 - Trapania vitta

389 - Unknown (Maroonish red nudi with unstructured white rhinophores and primitive eyes

Remora Rhumba

We went 15 minutes away for the first dive this morning to a new location none of us have been to before called Pantai Lahar.  It was in a unique little fisherman town and we were followed around by several remora!

I am so excited that I will still have several days to do nothing when I get back.  I fly in Thursday morning and I don’t go to work until Monday morning.  So cool.

I cannot get over how annoyed I am that I didn’t keep up with the blog.  I know its no big deal.  I just like to document my trips.  I swear I’ll work on catching up!!!

Today my ankle started swelling up a little right near where a sore has developed.  Grrr… so annoying but there is only today and tomorrow left for diving.  Then I don’t really need to worry about it anymore.

On the night dive, my Air 2 regulator started free flowing again a little bit.

And Ali captured this money shot:

363 - Cerberilla sp.

364 - Okenia plana

365 - Favorinus sp. 10

366 - Costasiella usagi

367 - Doto sp. 5

368 - Dendrodoris denisoni

369 - Hallaxa indecora

370 - Cuthona sp 12

371 - Phyllodesmium poindimiei

Sting like a Slug

For the first dive the camera worked fine, but then about ¾ of the way through the dive, it went to the mode of - - again.  I took it out after the dive and wiggled the lens and that seemed to correct it.

I still have an issue every once in a while that the camera “blacks out”.  This may have been because I wasn’t reformatting my card every time.

Something stung my ankles.  I wear full foot fins, so pretty much every part of me is covered except my ankles.  I don’t know if it was a jellyfish or hydroids, but it is annoying.  (And these “stings” lasted for a couple of months after I got home!)

On the night dive, Dharma found a pair of sunglasses and put a black crinoid on top of them like hair and then found a rock that looked like a nose.  I called it the Bob Marleyfish.

Everyone (including me) was too tired for the Nudibranch Spelling Bee.  We never did pull it off.  L

New Nudis today…

358 - Goniodoris sp.

359 - Kaloplocamus sp. 8

360 - Tambja sp. 1

361 - Goniobranchus striadella

362 - Stylocheilus striatus