Camera woes

Day: Friday, 4 May 2007 - Day Dive
Crew: Myself, Alisa, Wadean, Sam, Bol, Eng (Instructor) and Boatman
Dive Site: Mel's Reef @ Little Dale
Viz: Good ~10m
Max Depth: ~14m
Dive Time: ~45m & 60m

The poo's so excited! I was supposed to give her a wake-up call at 7.30am but she was up and ready by 7.40am. Unfortunately, i had to break the news to her that she has to spend 1 dive on her open water skills (clearing mask, fin pivot and whatnots which she totally loathe). We detoured to one of the MANY kwiky marts that's sprouting in Kg.Mata-Mata and bought bags of junk food and oily nasi lemaks. I cannot explain why junk food tastes extremely good after a dive.

Today, we headed out to Mel's Reef a.k.a Little Dale. The water appeared calm but thick dark clouds were looming all around us. Then rain started pouring to the right and kilometres ahead of Mel's Reef, everywhere except Mel's Reef. Ok great. Seems like we're lucky but we wouldnt know until we get into the water. During our ride, i found out that in Sam's entire dive history, he's only dived 3 times! I know it's his 1st time diving in Brunei but little did i know he only clocked 3 dives and that was ages ago. In the caribbean.



When we finally arrived about 25 mins later, Eng gave us a short briefing and paired us up. Sam and I, Dean and Bol, Eng and Alisa. And ofcourse, like any dives-must-have, Dean's BCD had to shut down on him - there was a leak so he benched the 1st dive.

The water was icky, mouldy looking green. It must have been the rain last night! Surprisingly, visibility is good, but what is there to brag about when everything is tinted in green. Since it's Sam's 1st dive, i thought for good manners sake i'll keep my camera aside. We swam along the reefs and i tried my best to spot and point out macro subjects to Sam. When compared to other reefs, Mel's Reef has amazing coral reefs and abundant marine life. We saw schools of fusiliers, parrotfish, angelfish, harlequin sweetlips, triggerfish, goatfish, baby scorpionfish, soldierfish, bannerfish, butterflyfish, even BATFISH that you dont quite often see at reefs.. and ofcourse, them nudis.

Our 1st dive was over really soon and hardly more than 10 shots. Nothing exciting.

Bol sacrificed his BCD to dean for the 2nd dive. So i told Dean to pair up with Sam, because I didnt want to swim around, I just want to stay put at one area and practice using my camera. And so did the poo, with my ixus800. My 2nd dive was rather miserable, i was having a hard time getting the manual settings right. Either my flash wasnt bright enough or it blinds out everything. Huge housing + small hand = not the right combination. I think the poo took better pictures than i did. Buuhuuu.

.Giant Clam.


.Ghost goby.


.Huge starry pufferfish and Eng.


.I do no harm. (Without flash, everything is dirty green)

.Anemone shrimp. You can practically see what they had for breakfast, lunch and dinner :P (One great example of overexposure >:|)

.Scorpionfish. Can you spot the monkeyface fish with flappy fins on the left?

.Beautiful blossom.

Nothing more to report other than my photos are the pits. Sam said i should just wear a snorkel, stick my head into an aquarium and practice. Right...