There be sharks here. Whale Sharks, that is.
People often ask us why we like scuba diving so much and there is no simple answer for it. This trip gave us so many reasons alone that we are still smiling just recalling it.
Our first dive of the weekend was to the USS Oriskany, the Mighty O, the world’s largest artificial reef. This was our second trip out to the Great Carrier Reef and we were just as excited this time.
Total Whale Shark eclipse of 2016
Around five minutes into the first dive here he comes. A Whale Shark! What a site to behold – so majestic, so beautiful, so HUGE. We spent the next few minutes in absolute awe as we took pictures and video of what may be a once in a lifetime experience.
A long surface interval and back down we went hoping to see the whale shark again. No sightings this time but we did find the log book hidden on the wreck to add our names to the GeoSplash list. It’s like GeoCaching but underwater.
We returned to the dock and quickly drove across town for a couple of night dives on the Ocean Wind, a tug that was just sank in January to create an artificial reef. Steve had the opportunity to dive this site in April but this was Brandi’s first visit. The first dive was done at dusk with a little light left in the sky. There were massive schools of fish everywhere surging up, over and around the entire tug.
The second dive was done at full dark and this time we explored in the sand around the wreck. Beaded Sea Stars in abundance crawled every which way and we came across a field of Sea Pens, standing a few inches to over 2 feet tall, sticking out of the sand as far as our lights could reach.
Sunday morning, we found ourselves returning to the Ocean Wind, where we enjoyed the company of a very friendly loggerhead turtle.
Our final dive of the weekend was on the Russian Freighter, one of our favorite dive sites out of Pensacola. We saw many toad fish, large and small, sea stars, blue angelfish, Spotted Moray’s and much more.
Read more about the story behind the Russian Freighter here.
Whale Shark VideoLoggerhead Turtle Video
