Spelonk: what a dive!

Last week, it has been quiet all week and I was really in the mood to go look for a new dive site. I discussed this with the captain and he said it was wise to dive Spelonk first, so we decided to do that.

The sea was not as calm as we expected and eventually, we spotted the Lighthouse. During our drive I already gave the briefing, in which I clearly explained what the rules were on this dive. After the backroll, we all descended together and I decided to go North. That’s very different from Funchie’s Reef! The corals grow on the seabed in a way which makes it look like a blanket of corals. Once we got close to the bottom, we saw huge amounts of fish between the corals. After about 10 minutes, the current turned and I decided to continue in the opposite direction, South. Right after our turn, we spotted a giant Goliath Grouper – what an enormous creature that is!

As we swam over the bottom, we noticed that a lionfish hunting match would be perfect here. I spotted the biggest lionfish I have seen on Bonaire so far! As we headed further South, we saw two small wrecks that unfortunately, are almost completely gone. The wall had beautiful sponges growing on it and we also met a school of tarpon. It was a great dive!

During our trip back, we jumped into the water to swim with a group of Dolphins for about 10 minutes. The sea became more quiet and we continued our surface interval at the mooring at White Hole. We sat down on the boat, enjoyed our lunch and talked about our dive at Spelonk.

In the White Hole, we counted 32 tarpon and I felt like seeing a lot of turtles. My wish came true! On our way to Turtle City we met a beautiful large Stingray who was a very willing model for photos and video. I had spotted it early so we could all join him on the bottom where he was just waking up. When we arrived at Turtle City, I only pointed my finger around in a circle: there were turtles everywhere!

While we did our safety stop, we were in the middle of a school of Horse Eye Jacks and Yellow Fin Tuna. It’s almost a disgrace that I get to see all of this, on just one day. I’m deeply ashamed.