OK, it is official. I am addicted to the massages here. It is going to be really hard to go cold turkey when I leave after daily massages. Hopefully if there is a long enough layover in Manila on the way back I can get a massage at the airport, just kind of wean myself off them slowly. Massage is apparently the national pastime in the Philippines, and they are really good at it. Now I have had professional massages before, but this is amazing. They start with their hands, traditional techniques. Then add forearms and elbows. Next thing you know there are knees digging into your back as well. Then they bend your arms and legs in ways that I am sure were inspired by submission techniques from professional wrestling. The whole experience is incredibly relaxing, and I even fell asleep during my last massage.
On to the diving. Today was a four dive day. First we went to Siquijor Island (pronounced: cig-E-whore) for three wall dives, then wrapped up the day with a night dive. Siquijor is amazing. The dive sites there all start with colorful coral reefs, full of the usual array of fantastic critters, then the walls drop off to about one hundred and fifty feet. It is a zen experience to float over the edge and the slowly drop off into the abyss. Our first dive was Peliton Point North, then Tambesan Point, and finally Peliton Point South.
All along the wall we were seeing more different and colorful nudibranches. There were titan triggerfish patrolling and looking quite mean (we kept our distance, titans can turn nasty). And just amazing coral formations outcropping from the wall. At the end of each dive we spent time exploring the reef atop the wall. Here we saw blue ribbon eels, a juvenille blue ribbon eel, which is black, and a very friendly turtle that kept swimming back towards me no matter how I tried to move to let someone else get close to take a picture.
For our night dive we went back to a site from yesterday, San Miguel. Jen and I decided since it was night, we would leave our cameras behind and just enjoy the dive. A couple of other divers did bring their cameras. Of course this meant we would now see something we really wanted to see. Sure enough, five minutes into the dive we come across our first flamboyant cuttle fish of the trip. Despite not having a camera, it still took five minutes to pry Jen away from it so we could move on. More frogfish, an orangutan crab, sleeping lionfish. Hopefully we will find that flamboyant cuttlefish again during the day so we can get some pictures. Stay tuned.
Todays picutres are commensal (spelled wrong) shrimp on coral, another nudibranch, and a blue ribbon eel.
More to follow.
-Matt
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