Underwater marvels

This August seems to become the best diving month I ever had since I came to El Gouna. Of course it’s always been fantastic, but lately somehow we’ve been spotting creatures that are rarely encountered in the Red Sea.

It started with sightings of whale sharks. For days, we kept hearing that this dive centre had seen a whale shark here, another dive centre another whale shark there... The whole TGI staff was going beserk... Why were we never at the right dive spot at the right time??? Desperately we kept going to the spots where the sightings had been reported... And then it happened. One day, on our way to the first dive site of the day, we saw a group of three boats circling, with lots of snorkelers in the open water, nowhere near a reef... Boats circling commonly happens when dolphins have been spotted, but snorkelers in the water in the middle of nowhere??? Instantly all the staff (i.c. Gijs, Ahmed and I) dropped whatever we were doing, grabbed our snorkels, masks and fins and jumped from the boat. Current, waves, guests, boat still moving, we didn’t care as the captain was shouting “Yes, yes, I think it’s a whale shark!!”, but we didn’t even wait for that confirmation. One by one, our excited guests followed us and we swam like maniacs towards where the other boats were, trying the find the animal. Swimming against the current, panting like a marathon runner, following the pointers from the crew on the boat, I reached the whale shark, second only after Gijs who had jumped in the water in a record time. There she was, beautiful... A young female whale shark about 6 meters long was lazily floating at the surface with juvenile golden pilot jacks in front of her enormous mouth, a couple of remora’s stuck on her belly. All the other boats had left, so it was just us and our guests, following this amazing creature for almost half an hour. At one point, I was swimming on her right side and she turned towards me, slowly, drifting towards me... I only needed to extend my arm and I could have touched her face... But I back paddled, eye to eye with her, almost holding my breath... until she lost interest and turned the other way. Her tail fin waved me good bye and I let her go. Being responsible divers, we decided after 30 minutes that she had been stalked enough and we swam back to the boat, elated, ecstatic and feeling extremely fortunate to have had an encounter with one of the largest yet friendliest animal of the sea.

And it doesn’t stop there. Me who had never seen a ghost pipefish until I went to Thailand last January... I was so lucky as to see four this season already in the Red Sea. Our beloved Red Sea, famous for it’s dolphins, blue spotted stingrays, moray eels and lion fish... Suddenly we find these amazing little critters, floating about like little leaves, hiding in the sea grass or hovering above the sand. And then there was a whiskered pipefish too! Looking so fragile, pearl coloured with red design, as if made by the hands the finest jewelry maker.

And maybe it’s our imagination, but does the total banning on commercial fishing in the Red Sea have an impact on the fish population? I see so many blue scale emperor fish everywhere (one of the best fish to eat) and there seems to be a big eye emperor explosion... Maybe it’s because I’ve become more observant than last year, but let’s hope it’s not wishful thinking.

On a regular basis, guests ask me how I came to live in El Gouna and when I choose to tell them about my background, they almost invariably ask me how long I think I will be doing this and if I don’t get bored from diving every day. And every time, my answer is “Until it’s not fun anymore and no, until now, never”. Even when it gets cold, even when I have students who can’t dive, even if there is current or bad visibility, I still like it. As soon as I’m underwater, my breath slows down, my head empties and my body relaxes in its weightlessness. Yes, I get tired after working for more than two weeks non stop, but it’s a nice kind of tired, a gratifying kind of fatigue. I sleep like a baby every night, there’s nothing like a good dose of nitrogen to make your body go into a coma.

Except for Stefano being thousands of kilometers away, summer 2009 is turning out to be yet another fantastic season.

Below you can find a link to some Facebook pictures, where you can see for yourself why this is all so much worth it. Ok, i’m not the best underwater photographer and I’m stealing some of my friends shots, but I hope you enjoy them nevertheless.

Underwater pictures, August 2009:
http://www.facebook.com/album.php?aid=133541&id=523210814&l=9032870d78

Wishing you a fabulous summer,

xYx