Solo Dive on the Ledge of Turtles

      The morning was calm and quiet.  A good day to dive.  I descended in about 12 feet of water and swam to the reef.  I looked for the rock pile but couldn't find it, so I surfaced to see where I was, and I had gotten set quite a bit North.  I descended again and swam South until I reached the Rock Pile, then focused on holding a 120 degree bearing to swim to the Ledge.  I got into some staghorn coral about 15 minutes out and knew I was off course, though I did not recognize any landmarks.  I guessed that I had gotten set to the North, so I swam SW and found the Ledge.  I spent most of the dive just hanging out at the Ledge taking pictures and working on the strobe.

 Got several pictures of this Juvenile Yellowtail Damselfish, who was rather curious about what I was doing.

This Three-Spot Damselfish busily protected his territory in the Staghorn Coral.

I found the Christmas Tree Worm pictured on the left just a little North and East of the Ledge.

I also encountered this Sharptail Eel off in the Staghorn Coral.

And this Giant Anemone on the coral and rock structure North of the Ledge.

This Yellow Jack came over to see what I was doing and to see if I was likely to kill something so big he could get fed, as well.






It looked like I might make a 2 hour dive, but I was well short by the time I got to the beach.  I was cold, too, so I passed on a second dive.