Diving Group 6 - Maish, Rafhaan, Izman and Dhafeena                                

In what was the second diving trip intended for students who had at least one recorded dive, Saturday April 20^th turned out to be a day full of surprises. After meeting at the usual location, Maish, Rafhaan, Izman, Ms. Eda and I took the speedboat to Hulhumale where Dhafeena joined us around half an hour later.

Once at the diving school, we were informed that there were two trips planned for that morning, first to MaaGiri and then to Kurumba, which represented an opportunity to do some snorkeling on the first reef and diving on the second or (even better), to dive twice on that day. The boys decided to go for the two dives while the girls went for the one-and-one option.

While Ms. Eda and Dhafeena went snorkeling, the four of us jumped into the water and were almost instantly rewarded with the sight of a honeycomb eel that was just swimming along the reef, but decided to go back to its pit once we got closer. That would be the first of many eels that posed for the camera on that day.

The first dive went very well and I was surprised to see how, although it was just their second dive, all three of them took no time in equalizing and managed to swim horizontally for most of the time. At the end of the dive, Maish even managed to successfully remove his mask and put it back on while underwater. During our time in the water we saw many eels, a lobster, different types of anemone fish and also a very white lion fish.

At the speedboat

Maish on diving gear

Izman and Rafhaan are ready too

Some fish

A honeycomb eel

A Maldives anemone fish

A Clark´s anemone fish

Maish

Rafhaan

Maish again

All three of them

Before going to Kurumba´s reef, we managed to spend some time snorkeling and jumping off the boat. At that time we even saw a turtle resting on sand several meters under us, which made us regret not having our tanks on to go and hang out with it for a while.

Once we arrived to Kurumba, all six of us went diving along its well preserved and vertical reef. There we saw many more eels, different kinds of fish and the highlight of our dive: two blacktip sharks fighting for some food from a rather large group of fish.

Last Saturday´s dives will most likely be among the candidates to the “best dive of the club” award. Our final sight of the day, a Scottish history teacher of Billabong High diving along Kurumba´s reef, will probably become the key factor in convincing the judges to vote for it.

Maish and Izman on the boat´s roof

Jumping into the water.

Walking on water.

A hidden eel

A not so hidden eel

Based on Dhafy´s sign, I´m guessing they´re all watching some eels.

Rafhaan and Dhafy

One of the two blacktip sharks we saw that day.

The shark with some food in its mouth.

Dhafy and the star fish.