Another day in the warmth - warmer than the freeze warning back in Ohio the other day, and the snow on Mothers Day. Its 87 now, at 6:30 pm! But we were in the water most of the day, so it felt great.
We were on Looe Key Reef again, but this time on the 8 am time slot. Unlike Tuesday the water was very clear, visibility really good. As usual, Captain James took us to 2 spots. Unlike the first time, the trip over was not choppy. So David was relieved.
The first stop, were we the first to jump from the boat – again – yes ? Its because when the boat stops it seems that thats when people wake up to the need to get ready. We had already prepped our masks, attached the snorkels, and had our underwater cameras attached to our wrists. How does one jump in? The best is to just hold ones mask to ones eyes, and jump feet first, holding flippers. Then put the flippers on. Its way too difficult to put the fins on first, unless you have a landing pad like the boat yesterday did
– and then theres always a long wait to get in. This way folks were jumping in from 4 spots (2 have ladders to climb out).
Knowing that sharks are often seen early on (guess they might leave the noisy area after a bit), we set off away from the boat down a sandy channel, and yep – there were 2 nurse sharks. And a Southern sting ray (they are flat, no chunky faces). Nice lots of blue parrotfish and stoplights, rock beauties (those bright yellow and black ones), etc etc etc. The huge black grouper was once again lingering under the boat. The lighting was better this time, so we could see his rectangular markings. In Aruba a grouper can so big that restaurants dont want it. But this grouper wasnt that big. On our way back to the boat, David yelled look down and there were 3 majestic eagle rays (their faces are chunky, like an eagles) moving across our path. He took off after them – they were hardly flapping but I just cant keep up.
The second stop was the most amazing: yes, the usual nicely colored fish and bright purple waving coral
fans, and lots of barracuda and a bevy of Midnight Parrotfish, which are so rare in Aruba. We heard people chattering excitedly – so we were curious and swam over. The bottom was sandy, which made for good viewing, and I noticed a large piece of dead fish wedged in the coral. Yep, the sharks were circling around, trying to get that. Probably 4 reef sharks and black tipped, not sure, of varying sizes, lets say 4 to 7. That was great. But then a ginormous thing out of the murky blue – a scalloped hammerhead!!!! About 10 is our guess. The dorsal fin was 3 tall! He joined the circling, and finally hes the one who swooped up that dead fish and carried it off, creating a bit of a feeding frenzy. Glad we were not part of the buffet.
We stopped for fish for dinner – and the fishmonger encouraged us to try triple tail.Weve never seen one in the wild to add to our list – can we count it now? Had a nap, and chatted to our landlords, who are working nextdoor in the other unit.
at Looe Reef, as the winds are picking up Saturday etc. Whether we can do that kayak ride to the nearby island to snorkel is questionable, but we have researched a sheltered area just in case. Hope you are enjoying the blog.
