Night Diving off Catamaran Beach

I had set up my camera for photographs of a deep wreck yesterday, but Jerry failed to show and failed to let me know he was not coming, so I did not get to dive yesterday. This morning I got the camera and changed lenses back to my macro lens and headed for the beach.

It was windy on the beach and the visibility was terrible over the sand, but farther East things were clearer. I found a Banded Tube Dwelling Anemone, but I had to turn the movie light on the anemone to focus the camera, and the light caused the anemone to curl its tentacles.




Visibility was much better up on the Swiss Cheese Reef. Lots of reef fish there, too, but nothing particularly noteworthy. I went up at 40 minutes for a short surface interval.

Bottom temperature was 80 degrees; maximum depth was 24 feet; dive time was 40 minutes and my SAC rate was 20.71 psi/minute on an aluminum 80.




When I surfaced I was just slightly North of the condo building North of Bahia Mar. I move farther East during the surface interval, then descended to 26 feet. I decided to head up the the Umbrella Stands by the Marriott and swam slowly against the current while looking for shells. Didn't find much, but I got this shot of a Lionfish.  I got to the Marriott in about 20 minutes, so I headed West a bit and then South to get back closer to Bahia Mar.  I called the dive at 40 minutes and ascended.

Bottom temperature was 80 degrees; maximum depth was 26 feet; dive time was 40 minutes and my SAC rate was 15.59 psi/minute on an aluminum 80.



When I got to the surface I found that I was just a bit South of the Yellow Condo building. Bahia Mar was due West of me. So I just drifted during the 5-minute surface interval, then I descended to 25 feet and headed West following my compass bearing.


I went to the Swiss Cheese Reef, where I got this shot of an Intermediate French Angelfish, then onto a long flat sandy area where I searched for shells.



Then I swam over some more reef and got this shot of a Red Grouper.

I ran into a swim buoy, though I thought I might be off Tower 3 instead of Tower 4. I continued West over the white sand and surfaced in 8 feet of water just East of Tower 4.


Bottom temperature was 80 degrees; maximum depth was 25 feet; dive time was 36 minutes and my SAC rate was 15.92 psi/minute on an aluminum 80.