It’s another nice day in Anilao though there was bad news at breakfast, yes, they have no bananas, they have no bananas today, this is a great shame as I had adopted them as my breakfast of choice.
In other news we learn that Dawn had spent 5hrs in ‘the chamber’ overnight following her symptoms from yesterday, oh, and she tested positive for Covid though it is not known at present whether the two are related, she was coughing a lot yesterday.
Today is Darrall and Diane’s last dive day so they should be picking the sites. We are happy wherever we go.
Let’s see how the day unfolds.
In the meantime, here are pictures of the wall art in our room which is ‘C2’ or ‘Ghost Pipefish’.
We head out for Kirbys Rock but found that the current fish had beaten us to it so we change direction and head across to Olympic Point only to find that the Current Fish had followed us ll the way there. We get in anyway.
On the seabed Jo realised that of all the little nooks and crannies into which you can hide silica gel packs, that small gap between the front of the lens and the glass of the front port is, perhaps, not the most conducive to photography.
That teeny tiny faux pas combined with the Current Fish which was in abundance tipped the balance for Jo and she elected to ride this one out topside. Meanwhile I show willing and soldier on…
Overall, things improved slightly, I even took photos of Tiger Shrimp, Donald Duck Shrimp and Mantis Shrimp.
We drifted what seemed quite some way but when we finally surface on the SMB, we are only about 30 metres or so from the dive boat which zooms to our rescue in no time at all.
We decide to head back to base to find tune camera operations before we head around the corner to Mainit School.
Mainit School failed to disappoint – plenty to see including Psychedelic Nudi, Flamboyant Cuttle Fish, all manner of other nudis and interesting and colourful things.
After the dive we head back for lunch, so that was the end of the diving for Darrell and Dianne – they head back to Australia tomorrow. As it’s just Jo and Myself on the boat for a day or two – we decide to bring the afternoon dive forward by an hour and do two back to back – nice!
Lunch is a simple affair consisting of the ubiquitous B.L.T. with Fries for Jo and Pancit Canton for me (OK, noodles and vegetables!).
At the newly arranged tine of 14:00 we head out to Apolls Point which is a spectacular arrangement of hard coral formations and sandy areas where we hunt for different things and get a few nice shots.
Once back at the surface we make our way across to Coconut Point for the second of the afternoon dive but once again there is current – so we cross back to the main land and decide to dive Mainit Corner – which is an absolute favourite. We enjoy more coffee and Oreos during the surface interval and jump in at the appropriate moment.
It’s starting to get dark so some of the cup corals are coming out – as well as some of the other night time performers – these get most of our attention though there is plenty more to see.
Mainit corner is a group of rocky outcrops at the end of a point on land – imagine something like ‘The Needles’ at the Isle of Wight but under water. There are so many different areas to move around and because it is on the point – and receives a lot of current at times – it is festoon with life – a really nice dive.
It is still light when we get to the surface – plenty of time to capture the sunset.
We get back to the camera room to find that care of the stock of ‘lollies’ from Australia has passed to us – two very large bags remain for distribution to crew and guests on the dive boat – we shall do our very best!
Dinner was grilled Snapper in a spicy sweet and sour sauce with traditional sides of Fries and Coleslaw, very nice indeed, thank you very much Darrell and Dianne.