Dive Wonderful

To celebrate the end of the exam period and the five year anniversary of it's sinking, a GREAT dive today. It? The Charlie Brown...former ocean going cable laying ship, and one of the ten largest wrecks in the Caribbean. It is almost 350 ft long, and sits at about 100 feet underwater. It was a nice break from school reality to dive there this morning. Just 4 of us (one dive master) and all experienced divers (I think I was the least experienced)...great time.

It is truly an amazing experience to dive such a huge wreck.  After tying up to the buoy at the aft of the wreck, we suited up.  We then backward entered into the water from our Zodiac and moved quickly to deflate our vests and descend. The current was amazingly strong today and pulled hard to get us to move away from the buoy marking the wreck. The quicker you go down, the better...I did. I've learned that if you don't, the struggle to swim back "up current" is hard work. What I didn't know is that in our position, the current was the strongest as it moves toward, up and over the wreck...I vaguely remember the principle of flow over a surface.

We swam over to the buoy chain line, and began the descent into the deep, deep blue. Then, there it was...the propeller at the end of the buoy chain.

Imagine the view from the back....a full football field in front of you, the massive ship laying on it's right side on the sandy bottom. IMPRESSIVE. MASSIVE. And it was so quiet.  I could only hear my breathing (thank goodness) and the sounds of the occasional beep of my dive computer. I strained to hear other sounds like a far off humpback (wrong season) or creaks of the ship. I don't ever remember a silence like this, but my mind was pretty fixated on the ship.  Among the highlights: penetration of the ship in the large hallway called "The Highway", a face to face with a 5 ft. barracuda (mostly teeth), schools of Horse-Eyed Jacks, nudibranchs all  over the surface and a drive-by with a turtle who came up to me to check me out.  I never tire of the beauty of this part of the earth below the surface. I'm thrilled that my biology background has come to some usefulness.

To me the Charlie Brown is Statia wreck diving at it's best. She is a wonderful addition to the artificial reef program here, as well as to my dive log.  I am so blessed to have the opportunity to dive here and truly enjoy what it has to offer. Beyond the recreation of it, a chance to relax after a hard exam period, and relish in the beauty that is life of the seas.