Arrived in Manila 5:30 am on Sunday. We pretty much blew thru Saturday. At 4am we crossed the International Date Line and it was Sunday. When we got to Manila we were processed through customs and started a 2 hour bus/van ride to Batangas south of Manila. From here we boarded boats contracted to the resort for 1 hour ride to the island of Mindoro and our destination port of Sabang beach and the Atlantis resort.
We arrived at the resort at 11am Sunday. We were met by the resort staff who provide fresh cold, wet towel to refresh ourselves and a nice non alcoholic refreshment. Members of the massage staff started around the room making sure everyone was relaxed with a short 15 minute neck and back massage for everyone.
We were introduced to the dive staff and then prepared for our first dive of the day. A 50 minute orientation dive.
My group was taken to a site 10 minutes from the resort location “Monkey Beach” The dive consisted of a sloping reef that went from 15ft to 60 feet. We drift dove around 40 – 60 ft observing clown fish, tiger fish, shrimp and various soft and hard coral.
Main purpose of this dive was to acclimate to the location and check equipment. Started with 3000lbs of compressed air and ended with about 350lbs left in my tank. Need to learn to relax my breathing more and conserve my air.
1st dive today is at a location called “Ernies” Looking forward to the 1st dive. I will have an underwater camera for my next dives and hope to take many pictures. Since it is film I will convert images to a disk so that I can upload them on the page.
I will get back to all of you after today’s dive until then here are some pics from the trip in.
3 comments:
Okay. Now that is more like it! Love the pictures! Can't wait for more. :)
As a hint...you probably cannot use the underwater camera for much more than 10-15 feet away, visability dependent. Also, probably will work better at shallower depths where sunlight is able to adequeately reach. Hopefully you let my buddies know that should you drown...they are to at least recover the scuba gear; the little fishie's should take care of the rest. Looking at your photo on the plane; it looks like you could provide the fish a good meal for quite some time. Just kidding...come back safe. Signed...Brother...that wishes he were in the Philippines diving right now.
Nice,much better than the first day. I knew you could write with no typographical errors. Your brother (I think the one who commented on the if you drown I want my stuff back) is humorous.
I am taking pictures of computer science without you and I think you will enjoy them. Chao!
Your most non-republican,non-optimistic student
Sunshine
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