First Day of Dives in Palau - Day 1

Sunday, June 7th, 2009

I met up with Joe and Andy in the hotel lobby to go for breakfast at the Palm Bay Inn where we had had breakfast each morning last year. This time we have breakfast vouchers since we booked through Sam's Tours. Jim and Melanie met us a few minutes later and we all got the
American Breakfast, yum! Now off to our first dives of the day!

Our breakfast view at Palm Bay

Our breakfast view at Palm Bay

Wow! What a great first day! We boarded the Hammerhead at Sam's with Jim and Siksei, our Dive Masters/Guides, a family of Japanese and two girls, Sunny and Megan, which were on a college research trip studying cyst-eating Gobies. Andy, Joe and I were diving together while Melanie and Jim were getting comfortable towards the dock of Sam's. Our first dive was Sais Corner so we drove about 45 minutes to Ulong island where we let a couple of the Japanese divers off so they could go through some training. The rest of us then went back out about 10 minutes, donned our gear and backrolled into the open water. There was a nice current, good visability and lots of amazing corals and fish. We dove for about 55 min. then got back on the boat and headed back to Ulong for lunch.

Jim our dive guide and Arson the boat captain

Ulong Beach

Ulong Beach

A Grouper along Sais Corner

Some coral at Sais Corner

Corals along Sais Corner

Siksei guiding us along Sais Corner

It was a long surface interval of about 2hrs 30min as we were waiting for the incoming tide to be able to have a nice dive along Ulong Channel, and boy was that wait worth it! But while waiting, i walked along the beach and got some sun, did a little bit of snorkling which was decent and captured some beautiful pictures of the beauty of Ulong Island. Back on the boat for some great diving, backrolled into the blue and was just in awe of the beauty of this ocean that surounds us. The currents were strong and we barely had to fin at all. We drifted along the wall for a little bit when we came along the cut which we then hooked in and were graced with the presence of a huge Marlin swimming along the surface about 40 feet above us. While hooked in i saw lots of Grey Reef Sharks, Whitetip Sharks, Napoleon Wrasse, lots of Tangs, Triggers, Wrasse, Butterflies, Angels, Damsels and hundreds others. There was a bit of silt due to the strong currents but i went ahead and got some video of what it was like from my view. We stayed hooked in for about 10 min or so and then drifted through the channel at amazing speed. All i had to do was keep my buoyancy and just make sure not to knock into any coral or other divers. Somehow i got towards the back of the divers with Joe and one of our guides Jim and were separated from the rest of the group. I was OK until i noticed Jim just take off in front of me leaving me and Joe with his bubbles. So i of course got my legs in gear and hauled ass after him keeping an eye that Joe was still behind me. Apparently Sunny got a bit separated as well ahead of us so he wanted to make sure she was OK and let her know we were around. We all met back up at the end of the channel, did our safety stop and got back on the boat. What a rush!

Yup! that's right, me on Survivors Ulong Island!
Ulong Beach
Ulong Island
The beautiful views of Ulong Beach
Ulong Beach

Ulong Beach

Ulong Beach

Lunch at Ulong Beach

Ulong Beach

If you look closely you can spot the Marlin swiming at the
surface within minutes of our backrolls into the deep blue!
Hooked on the mouth of Ulong ChannelAndy with his mask and regulator offwatching the Gray Reef Sharks while hooked on Ulong Channel

racing the Whaleshark back to Sam's, we're on the Hammerhead

Once back at Sam's Tours we met up with Melanie and Jim who decided to not go on the third dive. Joe, Andy and I decided to stay at Sam's with them as it was already 5pm and a late wreck dive just didn't seem too appealing at that time...for me, a beer and some food sounded better :) So we sat around and had a beer, some sandwiches and got all our gear rinsed and hung in the locker room for the next day. Now it's 9:00pm and i am in my hotel room writing this in word in hopes to get to a computer with internet access. Getting a bit sleepy though - a bit of sun and a lot of diving will really wear you out. Stay tuned for more updates and pictures!