Capturing the Moment

  Often when I tell people about the beautiful tropical coral reef off the coast of Kenya and Tanzania to people back in the States I get a lot of blank stares. I feel like it is one of East Africa's great secrets. People know about the incredible savannas filled with antelope, and big adventures like climbing Kilimanjaro, but scuba diving off the coast around the ancient Spice Islands can be right up there.   Here is a quick five minute video I put together to give you a feel of that beautiful underwater world that won't remain a secret forever.

Anemone on the Reef Giant Clam and Cucumber    When my dad told me that I had to see these amazing coral gardens near this tiny island off the coast of Zanzibar I was immediately interested. Doing a little more research into this island called Chumbe, I discovered that it was an uninhabited island that was turned into a marine protected area and an eco lodge back in 1994. The eco lodge has won all kinds of accolades for self sustaining the coral park and its no-impact vow on the surrounding environment. The lodge and bungalows run on solar, complete with vegetation grey water filtration system and composting toilets. One side of the island is open to fishing while the other side consist of one of the best coral gardens I have ever seen. Healthy Reef   Since it cost $280 per person to stay overnight on Chumbe Island we decided to book a day trip for $90. This includes the return boat trip, a fabulous lunch, snorkel gear and guides, a nature walk, and acces...

Christmas in Fiji   What an amazing place. A week of surfing and diving on the coral coast with Myles and Jack, a private surf trip to the fabled cloudbreak, and a true Fijian island experience on Wayalailai in the Yasawas is how I've come to know this country. Eco Haven, the resort here on Waylailai, is run by the local villagers. Everyone stops to say, 'Bula', or hello in Fijian, and are just downright nice. I hung out with some local kids on top of the big rock, went for hours of snorkeling on the fringing reef, and hiked to the top of the massive granite outcroppings that make this island resemble a mini Yosemite. The guys have shared their local drink Kava, which is supposed to mellow you out kind of like marijuana, and have also taken us all out for a not so intense 'shark feeding' with one curious white tip. You could tell the guide was enjoying things when we saw dolphins on the way back.  View from the top View looking the other way ...

Coral reefs are amazing things. They grow in warm, clear waters around the globe. They have the ability to live in nutrient poor tropics because of a mutualistic relationship with algae called zooxanthellae that lives inside the stony coral skeleton. The zooxanthellae uses the ample sunlight in the shallow water to photosynthesize creating food for it and its host coral. The algae also provides color to the otherwise white coral. All young coral need to find something sturdy to attach too in order to start growing into a reef. They could grow on top of another reef, rocks, or in this case a shipwreck!  We dove the US Transport ship Liberty here in Bali, Indonesia and I was shocked to witness the amount of color that is underwater. So many different types of coral, both hard and soft, have attached to the ship wreck and have grown quickly. The wreck has been completely submerged for about 50 years which is a relatively short time for coral to form such dense coverage. Indonesia's l...

Clownfish safe at Home Jack over a huge coral head Our great Oceana adventure has taken us to the outer edge of the Great Barrier Reef, straight out from Cairns. We signed up for a 3day/2night dive trip with ProDive Cairns. Our boat is pretty fancy with lots of showers, AC in the rooms, and wifi! How about that? We have 32 people, almost all backpackers, from all over the world. Most passengers are here to become open water certified divers, a couple are doing their advanced course, and a handful like me are just doing fun dives. The boat motors to one patch of reef, usually less than a mile long, and we dive after mooring. Then the boat moves on to another reef, unless we can do two different dives on the same reef. Our trip is 3 days long so we will get a maximum of 11 dives in. It is a pretty intensive way to really explore the Great Barrier Reef in a short time. The fish life here is amazing. The variety is huge, which is a big difference from my home of Hawai...

A beautiful swallow tail slug Gloomy Nudibranch in the sand   Magic Island, Oahu   One exciting thing about exploring a new island is finding new wildlife. Even though Oahu is less than 100 miles away from Maui, there have been underwater wildlife sightings here that have never been seen in the waters off Maui. Almost all of the fish are the same, but what we are looking for can be a whole new ball game. Nudibranchs. In the definitive underwater invertebrate guide book, Hoover's "Hawaii's Sea Creatures, a Guide to Hawaii's Marine Invertebrates", many of the more rare nudibranchs were spotted here on Oahu. And many of those were found at Magic Island. So that is where we headed for our next exploratory Oahu dive. Leaf Scorpionfish Saddleback Butterflyfish   We started our dive in the Magic Island boat channel in about 5ft visibility. We have found this muck to be good nudibranch habitat in the past, but after finding only one gloomy nudibranch...