Fourth Diving Blog from Crystal Blue Resort, Anilao, Philippines January 20 through February 5, 2024

Here's my fourth blog from a wonderful, unplanned, unscheduled diving trip to the excellent Crystal Blue Resort (divecbr.com), thanks to the wonderful, generous Richard Salas who thought of me and the fact I'm retired when a last minute hardship cancellation opened up on this trip he had scheduled. Thank you, Richard! I'll start with some surface shots from our outings in Crystal Blue Resort Panga 1 which Audrey, also a very frequent Richard Salas dive trip participant, she'll be with Guy Foster and I and Richard on the Nai'a liveaboard dive boat in Fiji this coming September, and I shared on this trip. Audrey is both a great photographer and dive buddy but always has about 20 minutes more bottom time per dive than me! Below, some surface shots from our panga. Here's a shot of our masks, fins, and tanks all loaded on the boat for our dive outing:

Here's a sample of shore views from our panga at a few of the many dive sites we explored. Many of the dive sites have buoys for the pangas to moor to so that there is less anchoring needed. Mooring or anchoring is within 100 ft of shore and the dive profiles were very similar, start from the boat in around 20 ft of water, follow a steep slope out, typically following your guide whom is finding cool macro critters as you go, down to around 80 ft or so. Make your way back up the slope to your 20 ft safety stop, watching for your boat as you go.

Boarding the panga at the end of each dive was quite easy because you first passed up your cameras and tanks to the crew. Below: Audrey and Mike at the boat about to pass up their cameras and tanks. Audrey passing up her camera. Passing up a tank. Mike Bartick coming up the boat's excellent broad stepped ladder. Mike's coowner and host at Crystal Blue Resort, a champion of Black Water diving, author of the ebook "The World of Blackwater", he daily would give us helpful feedback on the photos we submitted from our dives and during Black Water Safari Week he gave us an excellent daily tutorial on Black Water Diving and its Creatures. I told him he gave me the college level Marine Biology class I never got to take because I realized that an engineering degree and career were more likely to give me the life and lifestyle I wanted....

Anilao has many fascinating invertebrates. Below is a small sample of the Echinoderms, sea stars, crinoids, brittle stars, sea urchins, and sea cucumbers and some of their co-inhabitats I saw. First is a Peppermint Sea Star, second is Watson's Sea Star, Yellow Sea Cucumber, Brittle Star, Raspy Sea Urchin, and a Variable Fire Urchin.

Below are some of the wondrous creatures living on and with the Fire Urchins and Sea Cucumbers: Coleman Shrimp on Fire Urchin

Zebra Urchin Crab on Fire Urchin

Below: Crinoid Shrimp

Below: Emperor Shrimp on Sea Cucumbers, from about 1/4 inch to 1 and 1/4 inches long.

Below: Elegant Crinoid Squat Lobster