Paranormal Parasites

Only two more days of diving here.  I’m going to make the most of it!

We went pretty far away today and only as we were pulling up to Beang Bay did I realize I had already been there on the first day.  It is a really fun couple of dives!

Before the night dive, Peter told the story of a local Dugong who tries to get it on with guests. It is crazy!  He is really fast and gets right up on the person.  I guess he is lonely.  They nicknamed it Harvey.  After Harvey Weinstein.

Epic night dive.  I found a lot of new nudis and I tried to get a picture of a green pipefish and a red pipefish hanging out together.  I thought it would make a good Christmas card. This is the best I could do:

There was also a white frogfish chomping away on something. I was too late to get the crazy chomping but here is a video of one chomp. Go really slow at like 3 seconds in. Man, these guys are FAST!

Got to have dinner with the four owners/managers of the resort.  They are really very cool people.

At night it rained pretty bad and the power was on again off again.

Here are the nudis I saw today:

141 - Tenellia sp. 58

142 - Unknown (white one maybe Halaxa or Atagema?)

143 - Doto sp. 6

144 - Flabellina cf. rubrolineata

Has a little white parasite on it.  I posted this to Nudibase and Dave Behrens said "Papillate rhinophores. Doesn't match anything in NSSI 2. Maybe new? Anyone - thoughts?".  Marli Wakeling saw the same species but didn't know the ID.  I sent to Pirjo and she says this is Flabellina cf. rubrolineata.

145 - Facelinid sp. 5

146 - Favorinus sp. 10

147 - Goniobranchus fidelis

148 - Marionia sp. 15

149 - Goniobranchus verrieri

150 - Gymnodoris rubropapulosa

151 - Phyllodesmium longicirrum

152 - Phyllodesmium tuberculatum

153 - Phyllodesmium rudmani 

154 - Atagema intecta

Dolphins and Rainbows

BCDP is my new term. That’s the water that accumulates in your BCD that you have to drain out before you roll in.  The BCD is peeing.

Nico forgot his fins on the first dive so he earned the Chicken!  Graham insisted we have a ceremony for him and we did the Menomena song… but we should have changed to the Chicken Dance!  How have I never thought of singing that when we give out the chicken?  That is the theme song and we could even do the dance along with it.

The first dive was down to 73 degrees.  OMG. It was so cold but luckily I had my 7 mil on and my hooded vest, so I stayed pretty comfortable.  We saw a Wobbegone shark under a ledge.  It was pretty cool.  They just lay there and have lots of fringe around their mouth. I only had a macro lens but this is what they look like:

During the surface interval we started talking about science.  Peter is from Cambridge, England and his dad is a pretty well known scientist who did research with penicillin.  He came up with a method of extracting it that was used with uranium and the atom bomb. As a result, the process was classified. A few years back it was unclassified and now many people reference the method.  I shared that my Grandfather worked on the atom bomb in Oak Ridge. Graham was very impressed with that. I am reading a book right now called The Atomic City Girls: A Novel.  It is very interesting to learn what it was like.

On the ride back we saw a pod of dolphins.

It was raining as we went out to the afternoon dive.  And we saw a rainbow.  A full arch rainbow.  And it wasn’t all that far away.  Wow.

I guess life is all dolphins and rainbows.

It wouldn’t be a dive trip if Lightroom didn’t give me trouble.  I guess the good news is that it behaved until today.  On my afternoon import, the application stopped working. I did all my tricks and it wasted a couple of hours but I think I may have it working again.  I may have lost a few pictures but I don’t think they were any unique nudis.

Here are the nudis I saw today:

134 - Dermatobranchus kalyptos

135 - Phyllidiopsis pipeki

136 - Mexichromis multituberculata

137 - Hexabranchus sanguineus

138 - Goniobranchus kuniei

139 - Chromodoris annae

140 - Thuridilla gracilis

Tide is High

We got regular power back, so we actually have air conditioning… and a hot shower again. Woot!  They said that this is the longest they’ve been without power in a while. They are worried about being able to fill all the Nitrox tanks they need.

The first dive was under a jetty.  It was the best laid out jetty.  There were many pillars covered in life.  The sun was shining down and there was a frogfish and many nudis.  I couldn’t have been happier.

The second dive was even prettier.  It was a beautiful coral reef covered in fish.  Here is Graham’s bravado.

After the second dive, there was a local guy in his underwear spearfishing.  He was wearing these homemade wooden goggles.  Graham told me that I could buy some if I wanted.  

On the way back, the current in the middle of the pass was really rippin’ so we spent some time looking for a Mola Mola.  No luck.

Several of the people on the boat have been to a dive site where there are hundreds of sea crates. Can you imagine?  I can handle one.  Barely.  I CANNOT imagine hundreds!

Today was the greatest tide difference yet.  We can tell by the jetty ramp.  It was really steep in the morning.  Then in the afternoon it is basically flat.  The water is supposed to get colder now.

On the afternoon dive, Graham found a little lego dolly and put it down right behind a nudi, swam me over to show it to me.  I laughed but didn’t take a picture of it.  After the dive, he told me he was sad that I didn’t.

After the afternoon dive, I took Peter down on the house reef to try to find the black frogfish again but I friggin couldn’t find it… or the rock that I found it on.  Oh well.  I guess they CAN move.  Although they usually don’t.

Dinner was early tonight because they had a staff party to celebrate the year.  After we are done, they are shutting down the resort for a month or so.  I really would like to come back.  But if I do, I need to book early and/or get myself on a waitlist.  This place is really small and there is high demand!

Here are the nudis I found:

128 - Marionia sp. 1

129 - Phyllodesmium poindimiei

130 - Phyllidiopsis shireenae

131 - Phyllodesmium iriomotense

132 - Tritonia sp. 10

133 - Chelidonura amoena

Not FOMO... FOMOON

We had no air conditioning last night.  And no power in the early morning.

I found a tick digging into the top of my foot.  Ugh!  I quickly got it out and then looked to see if they left anything behind… I used my nail clippers to dig out just a little bit that was left and then put some Neosporin on it.  I think I’m gonna live.

Poor David.  Although his camera is sorta working now, it’s not reliable so he hasn’t brought it back down.  God love him though, he isn’t showing his frustration.  And then today one of his two dive computers just completely died. Kaput.  He thinks it may have flooded.  Ugh. What else could go wrong?  Which brings me to consider buying a backup dive computer.  I should think about that.

I found the HUGE black frogfish on the house reef.  OMG. It was just enormous.  I played around and took a picture of Josh next to it to give a sense of scale. 

I sat across from Max and Lauren and next to a guy named Andrew.  He is helping them build the pools and told me that the logistics are the hardest part.  For example, he has to import sand in order to lay the concrete for the pools.  And getting the sand here is a nightmare.  And he has to over order because much of it will get damaged on the way.  I thought about that a little bit and then I realized… this guy is literally bringing sand to the beach.  Huh.

They asked me why it took so long for me to get to Alor.  I wasn’t sure really since this place is INCREDIBLE for nudis.  Especially this site called Matap.  WOW.  We went there for the second dive and the night dive.  A.  MAZE. ING.  Dive guides were pointing out things so fast that I dared not take more than three pictures of each subject for fear of missing the next nudi!

Maybe I should coin a new term.  FOMOON? Fear Of Missing Out On Nudibranchs?

Here is what I saw today:

101 - "Taringa" halgerda

102 - Phyllodesmium parangatum

103 - Phyllidia polkadotsa

104 - Verconia alboannulata

105 - Miamira sinuata

106 - Thorunna daniellae

107 - Phyllodesmium jakobsenae

108 - Siphopteron tigranum

109 - Siphopteron nigromarginatum

110 - Baeolidia variabilis

111 - Nembrotha milleri

112 - Antonietta sp. 1

113 - Nembrotha mullineri

114 - Glossodoris acosti

115 - Hypselodoris iacula

116 - Hypselodoris decorata

117 - Goniobranchus albopunctatus

118 - Marionia sp. 18

119 - Hypselodoris nigrostriata

120 - Nembrotha cf. cristata

121 - Elysia tormentosa

122 - Nembrotha kubaryana

123 - Pleurobranchus peroni

124 - Gymnodoris sp. 18

125 - Gymnodoris inornata

126 - Gymnodoris ceylonica

127 - Favorinus japonicus