After waking up and getting to the boats early in the morning like usual we headed to the most beautiful dive site so far. This dive site was on the wall of the reef and we dive between 60 and 100 feet but there was a sheer drop off into the blue going 4000 feet. The most mesmerizing part of the area was the structure of the coral and land. For example there were many large tunnels and ravines but one in particular stuck out to me. When we went around a large bend in the land the whole wall was covered in sea fans and it went into a ravine that was big enough to swim through. All the light filtering through the fans and shimmering down the crack onto the fish was breathtaking. Because our first dive was so deep we went to a shallower site that was further along the wall. The most notable things I saw on those two dives was some Nassau Groupers and a large parrotfish. While most parrotfish are typically 10 to 12 inches in length this one was closer to two feet long. I was surprised to see such a large parrotfish just randomly and it was exhilarating. What was so special about the groupers was their unexpected size and ability. Reading about them in the classroom you never gain a scale for the creatures so when I saw a 20 inch grouper just floating at the sea floor I was surprised. The first grouper I saw I watched for a little bit and saw them change colors which was something I didn’t know they had the ability to do. The one I saw started out a dark brown with black stripes because it was in a shadowy part and as it swam out along a sand patch it changed to a light white with grey stripes. Groupers are known to change colors to avoid predators. The second Grouper I saw was hanging under a edge of a cave at a cleaning station. There little shrimps clean their teeth and remove parasites. After lunch at 1:30 we headed to stingray city. There are two locations considered stingray city, first the sand bar where tourists go to snorkel and walk around with stingray and secondly a separate, deeper sandbar to dive and snorkel at with less people. We took a boat to the deeper sandbar and sat in a circle while one of the dive masters, Lee, baited around 5 or 6 stingrays with squid. These stingrays are affected by the Pavlov effect where fishermen used to clean fish at the sandbars and throw out the remains, where the rays would eat it, so now the rays usually hang around the area and gather when they hear boats. All the unusual and cool creatures and formation of the reef today reinvigorated me to dive again tomorrow.
