Just like every year, we get a lull in people coming here. And this November has been very slow for everyone here. Although this year, I have taken this slow period to secure a new location for Fantasea Dive. This will be a place for divers to hang out and watch diving videos, view fotos, use internet, watch football games, etc. I like to think of it more like a clubhouse than a dive “shop”. We will still be using the same location at Calle 2 as well…but it is more for storing equipment and the boat. Stay tuned for future developments. Wish us luck!

Join me as I guide Maartje, from Holland, through her PADI Advanced open water course. Her boyfriend, Duco, is already and advanced diver but joins her on every dive. The weather has been less than favorable so we had to go to Cozumel to make the course.

Each year my folks come down with my brother for a little R&R from their jobs and for a visit with you know who! This year my Dad and Brother wanted to go through what we do in the Advanced course just for fun so off we went. Shipwreck, Cozumel, and crackin’ eggs at 100ft! It was a ton s fun diving with my family. My mom however, doesn’t dive anymore because of 2 back surgeries…so she’s surface support. I did manage to get some video of my Dad and Brother in Cozumel. I have included it below. Have a look at the man and little brother that has spent more time in, around, and under the water with me than anyone else. I love you guys!

I love my job! Not only do I get to dive and fish…but sometimes I get special requests to make a beach party in a very remote area inside a barrier reef. This month I was hired by the one of the owners of the Beer Bucket located here in Playa off the 10th Street between 5th and 10th Avenues. Redneck Steve he was called, and boy did he live up to his name…just one of the “good ole boys” from Texas. We set up a smorgasborg of food and drink for him and his party including champange, sushi, roasted chicken, all types of cheeses and meats, as well as as fully stocked bar. It was the best beach party trip I think I’ve ever made! I would like to give special thanks to the managers of the Bucket, Jez and Duke, for all their help. I was able to get some photos so have a look. Enjoy!

We too sometimes get to take a vacation…and this year I joined a couple of my friends from Playa along with some of our friends from the 1/26th Marines on a sail trip from San Pedro, Ambergis to Placencia for 8 days. These guys were what was left from their company over in Vietnam and meet up every year for reunions. Glad to have shared this experience with them. Thanks Boys!

Since the Marines were not much into the diving, I only got to make a few dives along the way. But you can see what I saw in the video below that Belize does have some very nice reefs. I did not get to do all the big name dive areas like the Blue Hole or Glover’s reef or Turneffe….so I will definitely have to go back to check those diving areas out.

It’s always fun to meet friends who travel together. Russia-born, Alex and his friend Peter came down to visit us from the USA to try some diving here. Alex had his license and proved to be a great diver. Peter, however, did not have a license, so he took the PADI open water course with us. After a couple days, we had Peter diving like a fish! On the 3rd day of the course, I promised them something special for Peter’s last 2 check-out dives. We would be going to Tortugas reef in search of not only turtles, but a massive school of tarpon that frequent the reef in the summer.

We had planned to do a free descent down to 50ft and begin our search. The current pushed along nicely through the clear water. We passed numerous turltes and a couple morays, then out of the blue…here they come! About 300 tarpon between 3-5 ft long weighing between 30-100lbs! I scanned the faces of my divers and they were all smiling from ear to ear. Guess they were having some fun! After we passed through the school, we burned off the rest of the air from the tank then started up to the safety stop level. Once back on the boat, they talked incessantly about the animals we had encountered. The second dive we made over Barracude reef. This is a reef shaped like a hand and is loaded with bright corals, fish, and some turltes as well. As we crossed the sandy patch heading to the next “finger” I noticed what looked like a 1 inch small piece of coral floating just inches from my mask. My eyes focused and I realixed it was a baby seahorse riding the current to the next bit of coral. I cupped my hand gently around him to show Alex and Peter. Alex snapped off some foos and then I hekpd the lil bugger over to the reef safe and sound. That had made my day! We continued on til we got tabout the end of the dive and then we had Peter remove his mask and replace it…which was the only skill he was a bit worried about. We all kneeled down on the sand and let him go for it. He nailed it! We all applauded him and lifted up off the sand to continue diving.

Once back on the boat we all congratulated Peter for finsihing the course and now being “part of the Gang”. He wasn’t no longer a guppy, but a full-fledged dolphin. I could see that Alex and Peter’s friendship had just taken a new turn….and that Alex would be dragging his buddy to a whole new set of diving destinations, which isn’t that what some of diving is about?…Travelling, making new friends, and creating memories with the ones you already have!

I always enjoy every year when May rolls around. The big fish move in to feed and the excitement is incredible! This year we’ve had sail fish, blue, black and white marlin as well as the tasty mahi-mahi, also know as dorado here in Mexico, all on the line. I have had half and full day trips this year, all yielding anywhere from 5 -7 fish. We also have been catching the usual reef runners like barracuda and wahoo. I recently had a couple friends from Boulder, Colorado along with a friend from Mahahaul out on the boat for morning fishing. In the morning we started out catching a couple barracuda, and later in the morning we ran into a school of dorados. At one time we had three dorados on the lines, but we only landed one. The other two crossed their lines and got off. Ugh! Total catch for the day was 3 barracuda and 2 dorado.

On another full day trip with two couples from Breckenridge, Colorado, we had caught three barracuda in the morning. Around noon we pulled inside a barrier reef inside Punta Maroma to enjoy our Java Joes sandwiches and do a little snorkelling. Once the group had tuckered out from swimming around the reef we decided to get back in the boat throw out the lines and this time land a big one! As we motored out to sea Miguel, the captain, and I noticed that all the other fishing boats went in for the day. About that time we noticed a frigit sailing about 500 feet over the cantil wall not far from us. We sped the boat up and slowed down as we began to circle underneath the frigit and within minutes we had two dorados on the lines. Now a funny thing, on the trip one of the girls, Jessica, had never been in a boat, never been in the ocean, and certainly had never caught a fish… but today was her lucky day. As she reeled in her dorado the other dorado got off the line. Jessicas dorado broke the water and we saw that it was a bull dorado, meaning BIG. Just as she was about to tire out from reeling in the fish, I took hold of the line lead the dorado near the boat and with one swoop gaffed it and brought it into the boat. Jessica’s first fish ever was a bull dorado weighting 55 - 60 lbs.!!! Way to go Jessica…girls can fish!

I realize that I am blessed with the gift of being able to help people to enjoy the ocean and all the life under it almost every week with folks like Glenn. And when I have some one like Glenn from Canada who had never even seen the ocean approach me and want to try diving…I got as excited as he! He explained to me that he could swim, not very good, but still wanted to breathe underwater and swim with the fish.

We went over some of the basics about diving then loaded the boat to go to our practice some skills. We head north to a bay inside a barrier reef where we could practice what we had talked about back on shore. He, like most people, was a little nervous. But after a few minutes of just breathing from the regulator he calmed down and began to trust in his equipment. We went through the skills needed to make the dive. I could see his confidence building with each skill he mastered. Once I felt he was ready for the dive, we loaded up the boat and headed out to the reef.

“Ya hay alguien a la muerre” the captain said…informing me that there was already somebody on the permanant line attached to the reef.

“Drop the hook! I told him, and he moved the boat over sand for me to drop and set the anchor. I helped gear up Glenn, did his buddy check and jumped into my equipment with a flash. “OK once you hit the water swim up to the front of the boat to the anchor rope, we’ll go down there”, I instructed Glenn. And here’s the count down…Three - Two - One and GO! and with each count down, Glenn’s eyes got bigger and bigger!

Splash!!! We popped up and swam towards the anchor rope. “You ready?” I asked. His head bobbed up and down and I proceeded to let the air out of his jacket. As we slowly went underwater, he watched me and everytime I equalized he did as well all the way to the sandy bottom in 20ft. of water Once on the bottom I added just a little air to his jacket making him weightless and we were off to explore the reef.

We glided up and over the reef. Glenn was loving it! I saw a HUGE shcool of grunts hanging over the reef so I swam him right for them! Glenn held out his hands like a kid in a candy store reaching for that unreacheable candy. The fish slowly parted the way for our friend Glenn just slipping out of his reach by inches. Then as faith has it for the super lucky intro divers, we had a spotted eagle ray passing by. As soon as I saw it, I started waving my arms up and down. Glenn probably thought I had lost it, until he saw the rather large ray passing by!

After about 35 minutes down Glenn had started running low on air so we proceeded up to the surface. Now, for some one who had never even been in a boat on the ocean much less swim or dive in it, he was just blown away. Throughout the training he had not smiled hardly at all taking it all very seriously, but now Glenn had a HUGE smile across his face. “That was the best thing ever!” He told me. I told him, “If that dive didn’t hook you to the sport, nothing will!

Jan and Erik visit Playa every year for months at a time. They had listened to the tales of local divers all too much. Finally, they decided to take the plunge and try scuba diving with a Discover Scuba Diving course with me. Upon arriving at the beach at 8:30, we got their equipment together then sat down at a table on the beach to go over some physics of diving as well as some skills that would be need to complete their open water dive. Before I got started “lecturing” about diving I asked them had they tried snorkelling or diving. They had tried snorkelling and had even dove down 15+ feet. “Great”, I said! This meant that they had equalized their ears to be able to get down to the bottom when they were snorkelling. So I got to teaching them the PADI flip chart.

They took to the theory just fine so off we went to the confined water. Now…Erik originally had alot of reservations and Jan was gung-ho about…but in the water with all the equipment on, it was a different story. After about 1 hour in the water practicing skills, we loaded up the boat and off we went. In the confined water, Jan had displayed less then enthusiastic feeling about continuing to dive. Although she confessed she had never felt claustrophobia, she had today. And didn’t like one bit.

We decided to dive the Jardines reef which was about 5 minutes away. Once there, we got moored up and ready to go. Erik was putting on his weight belt and fins, getting ready to put on the scuba unit, when I noticed Jan just sitting there. I sat down beside her and asked if whe was alright. She wasn’t. And she wasn’t going to dive either..I could see that. She said she just wanted to snorkel above us while we dove. Well…if there’s anything I have learned about women and diving…give them what they want. So I suited up, and me and Jan rolled into the water.

We drifted slowly down to about 20 feet and started drifting with the current. Amazingly enough, Erik was so perfectly weighted he hardly had to add air to his BCD jacket. We crept up next to the ledge that the reef sits on and started to explore. I found an octopus straight away tucked into a hole. We continued on to find a small golden ray buried under the sand not meters away. The dive itself lasted about 40 minutes, which for a beginner is quite long. And boy did we find the critters! Lobsters, crabs, morays everwhere, huge schools of horse-eyed jacks, porkfish, grunts and snappers. After the safety stop, we surfaced right at the boat.

Erik was a natural straight away. He knew and his smile didn’t lie. He had the most anxiety in the beginning and at the end of the day turned out to enjoy it immensely. Jan on the other hand may be sticking to snorkelling only in the future. It just goes to show…you just never know if your going to like being under the sea until you do it!

Rob, a commercial diver from Nova Scotia, has joined me for a couple months of diving and hangin’ out. He’s seen just about everything we got around here. But today was a special day for him. He got to join four long-time local pros for a day of spearfishing and shark watching. Straight out from our shop we hovered right over the beginning of the wall of el Canti’l. El Cantil is the name of the trench between Cozumel and Playa del Carmen, mainland Mexico.

We suited up, did our final buddy checks and were off with a splash! We each plumetted down to the wall’s lip sitting in 100′ of water. Rob stayed next to Alberto, 25 year pro here, and I went a little deeper with Miguel, 12 year local pro. We hit 130′ and before I knew it, Miguel had shot a 17 kg. (35lbs) Mullet Snapper. We swam at that depth for a couple minutes. I look around behind me and sure enough there were 2 Bull sharks right behind us and catching up quick! We head up to find that both Alberto and his friend Antonio had speared fish and now had 3 bullsharks swimming within feet of them. Rob had no spear and was just observing everything going on around him. I had a camera and was clicking away like crazy (although no pics came out). I was more concerned with the multipying numbers of Bull sharks ranging from 8-12 foot! At my last count in sight there were 8. That’s just about enough I thought! If my mouth could have dropped open without me losing my reg, it would of hit the floor! And they weren’t shy about what they wanted….the spearfishermen’s catch.

At 15 feet, we all leveled off for our safety stop. All the while sharks were passing around us, behind, and coming up from out of the abyss to see what we had. And what we had were three Mexican spearfishermen (with fish) and one amazed and petrified Canadian and American. After a few minutes of just watching them go by we made our way up to the surface. It was actually peaceful seeing them move about with such grace and power. At no point did any of the sharks ever come close enough to take the fish from the spearfishermen. But they said it has happened…and I believe them!

We finally made it up to the surface and look down and all we saw was sharks passing under us and and getting closer! I looked around and …no boat. Uh what….that’s right…no B-O-A-T. Ok mister longtime professionals…what to do…well we planned to leg it back to shore. Luckily, it was only a couple hundred yards away. So off we go…heads down and swim keepin’ a close eye on the sharks below. At one point we were in only 15 foot of water and still had a 10 footer pass under us. A boat passed by saying he would go inform our captain of our location. The current had changed direction and we had ended up in a completely different place. It happens sometimes with changing currents, not often, but it does happen. However, we were prepared and all inflated our surface marking bouys to alert boats of our place in the water until our boat could collect us. After a few minutes, the Lil Kitty dive boat appeared….Thank God!

We readily threw our equipment into the boat after swimming a few minutes. In seconds, we were back to the beach for beer drinkin’ and tales at the bar of our great diving adventure. Boy, you should have seen their eyes when we told the size of the sharks we had just encountered. The size of saucers I tell ya!