Saturday conditions looked good for a dive at Natural. No one was available to dive with so I went solo. The entry was a little tricky. Maria stripped all the sand from the little beach leaving only rock. Very little sand came back and even the little sand that was there the last time I dove there was gone. Even with no waves it's slippery and difficult. One I got in and starting kicking out across the reef things looked decent. Visibility was not great but was okay. On the surface there was a little tiny bit of north current, which is what I expected for the time in the tide cycle.
Once I dropped that all went to hell. At depth I first felt a slight south current pushing me north. Not bad, manageable. Then it was a roaring south current! At eight minutes into the dive, I turned around and started back, using every swim-into-the-current trick I know. sixteen minutes later, I decided to surface, head into shallower water and hope for that tiny north to help me. Fortunately, the north current was there at the surface in the shallows. When I got back to the "beach" such as it is, there was the problem of getting out. As I said, the rocks are slippery and dangerous. But I got out okay. That I got out safely was the only thing about this dive that didn't suck.
I've written before about how devastated Natural was by the hurricane. It is slowly, painfully slowly coming back. There are bits of beauty, like this grey angelfish.
There are bits of color, like these sponges.
Mostly it's a drab and drear "landscape."
For twelve years Natural has been one of my favorite - if sometimes challenging - dives. Now, I don't know. I guess we just wait for it to come back.
I'm glad this was a solo dive.
On Sunday I went back to Crashboat, this with our friends Hernan and Heidi.
This was a completely different dive. In spite of the fact that there was a big class from San Juan plus other divers (at one point there were at least 30 divers in the water) visibility was good. There was no current. And there were fish. Lots of fish...
and other stuff;
and this guy (we'll just assume it's a guy; I'm not looking to see). He's about 16 inches long, just working his way across the sand.
And that doesn't even begin to show the huge schools of sargent-major fish that have come back. Someday I'll figure out an effective way to photograph the blizzards of fish swimming by.
Those of you who have read about pre-hurricane dives at Crashboat know about the bicycle. It's still there, but just another part of the wreckage.
A couple of years Pre-Maria
Now
All in all it was a fun easy relaxed dive with two good friends. Just the kind of dive I like.
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