Down at Crystal, I got a coffee and water and caught up with some mails. Half an hour later, the morning boat was back and Si, Nath & students. Their first dive was a 'Chumphon' which apparently was stunning and the 2nd dive at Green Rock where Simon got badly triggered for around 10 minutes on his 29 minute dive, wearing his brand new fins, which he'd only picked up this morning. There were holes and various bite marks all over them. Check out the pics I've never heard of a Trigger being so persistent. Si was not happy and on top of that, had a splitting headache.
Simon's account: " I took 2 students down to 20m and headed towards the coral, delicately avoiding the notorious Trigger Pits (their nest). Once past and along the coral, we started noting down different kinds of sea life as part of their course. In the distance, I noticed a big Titan Triggerfish swimming... no problem, plenty of space between us, but for safety's sake I warned my 2 students and we backed slowly away. All of a sudden, the "Trigger fin" went up and the battle was on. He belted through the water and I knew immediately he meant business. I put my fins up and started swimming away slowly at first, trying to keep myself in between my students and this bad boy. He got a couple of hard bites to my fins before circling back round to get a attack position on my body, but every time he went for me, I pushed my fins in the way. 10 minutes of swimming backwards, with the Triggerfish attacking me, and keeping an eye on my students who were sh"tting themselves (like me!).... it got the heart pumping. I used half my air!!!
Finally he left, and after checking that my 2 students were okay, I looked around to see him coming yet again for another go...and then eventually he left. Then I examined my fins.... my brand new fins.... destroyed!
My new fins!
Damage from bites!
My finger through a hole!
The rest of the dive was an attempt to get back to the coast but after being surrounded by 5 other Triggerfish, I ended the dive after 30 minutes, and had a long surface swim to the boat. Not a great dive, but what an experience!"
What an exciting morning, mine seemed rather dull as I'd just started trying to enter some of the Coral Watch Data for Nathan. All was going well until I tried entering the lattitude and longtitude of dive sites. For some reason it wasnt accepting the data that I'd been given by Nathan so I'll have to put that on hold for the moment.
My afternoon was spent painting, making signs out of odd bits of wood for 'Junk Yard' with a few others while Simon kept an eye on his students whilst they completed all their knowledge reviews for their Advanced Open Water.
This evening we're meeting friends at 'Hippo' for a meal. It won't be a late one as we're on the 7am boat.
2 comments:
Sounds like he meant business, let's hope that tomorrow you get a good quiet relaxing dive!
That big boy must have a rubber fetish, ha ha.
Take care, I think the trigger fish has been wrongly named, with teeth like that JAWS is a good name.
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