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  • Day 10

    Diving 2

    July 9, 2017 in Egypt ⋅ ⛅ 84 °F

    Day 2 was the start of the real diving. We cruised north 7 hours to the Brothers Islands in the middle of the Red Sea. First up was the smaller of the two, Little Brother. The current was quite strong and required a negative entry, in which one enters the water with a fully deflated BCD and descends rapidly in order to not miss the dive site due to the current. At around 30 ft, the reef provided enough protection from the current. The reef was in great shape but we didn't see any big pelagics on this first dive.

    Brittany skipped dive #2, so Nico buddied up with a 5-pack of dudes. He was thrilled to get the first glimpse of a hammerhead shark, one of the larger species (~12 ft long) with the distinctive face, which congregate in the blue near off-shore reefs. The shark was at least 10 meters away, but circled just below the divers for a little while. Seeing hammerheads was one of the goals of this dive trip.

    The third dive started on a wreck at around 100 ft, a transport vessel called the Aida which sank in the 1940s. The stern sits at 180 ft, outside of recreational dive limits, so we could only check out the middle half. From there, we swam along a beautiful coral wall. A juvenile Napoleon wrasse followed us the entire way, opportunistically looking for prey loosened by the bubbles. The wall was unbelievably colorful and abundant with marine life. There was also a scrawled filefish down below, and numerous cornetfish along the way.

    After the third dive, tuneage was bumping on the top deck and the bar was open for cocktail hour. It's great comradery to enjoy some cold beverages while watching the sunset after an accomplished day of diving. The Thai delegation was leading the party train, and had stocked up on hard stuff at the airport duty free, so we enjoyed chatting with them all night long. Probably a little too long since we didn't get the best sleep that night...
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