May 2008

With low season coming, dive shop business is also slower. Fighting boredom, I soon started using spare parts in all kind of creative ways.
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That was the signal that I needed a change in my life...

So I decided to go on a dive holiday. Well, my plan was to go on a Blue Bike Inauguration trip. But soon after I started I noticed that I got pretty dirty. That was annoying. And then my bike failed. Brutal force and fire were required to get it going again .
And when, after crossing two oceans and driving for several hours, my butt did not feel attached to the rest of my body anymore, I gave up. But I still managed to make exactly one picture of the amazing scenery

And then I decided I had enough and needed a holiday. So I settled down in Dauin, Negros and went diving. What a surprise, not?This is serious diver territory. No corals and big fish, but many funny critters
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So here we go again: underwater pictures. Let us start with a swimming frog fish, you can look right through its body

And here we have a yellow ornate ghost pipe fish, with perfect buoyancy control

And look at this Crinoid shrimp and the Pink Punk Crab

And a nice moray eel...

that was chased by these speedy flat worms

A midnight (strange name, i saw it during the day and the animal is not dark) snapper

And this is where i came for: the common (depressing adjective) seahorse

And then a Flying Gurnard, pretty special

and a nice nudibranch and the prehistoric looking devil fish, equipped with the optional antennas

And finally, we found a frog fish that celebrate the Netherlands-Italy slaughter with us, by wearing the appropriate colors...

Encore: The president of the Philippines, Arroyo, walked past our dive shop and went on a (heavily overweighted, I do not mean here, I mean she had too much weights, I do not want to be arrested) dive in Alona

Bye

Today internet was installed in my house! This will enable me to send you an endless stream of blog updates.

On many's request: TOP 10 of UW PEOPLE

Sander lost some dive gear

Sander with Turtle

Sander with Snake

Katja showing perfect buoyancy control (she had a good teacher)

Katja showing interest in dead trees UW

Katja lost in fish soup

Mmmm, not enough pictures for a top 10, then some Land pictures

And I still owe you a swimming whale shark from my trip to Donsol

and an other one

TOP 10 of FUNNY UW CREATURES (first one is new).

Indian Walkman: Officially a kind of scorpion fish, but I think it is a hybrid iron man terminator fish with bullets as eyes

Flamboyant cuttle fish with little baby: The only walking and deadly cuttle fish (like squid)

Blue ringed octopus: Also small and deadly

Robust Ghost Pipe Fish

Ornate Ghost Pipe Fish. The above two are family and disguise themselves: one as a leaf, the other as a small christmas tree

Scorpion Leaf Fish: Poisonous and flat: you can look through the eye

Mantis Shrimp: A shrimp that can crush a diving mask

Forsskal Slug: 10cm big walking snail-like animal

Snake Eel: moray eel family, always joined by a few shrimps