On Wednesday February 9, 2011 my dive buddy Rob and I went diving at Mari Pampun. This dive site has several things to offer. You can dive shallow and enjoy the hard and soft coral or you can dive deeper and go to the car pile. We normally combine the two in one dive. During the first part of the dive we visit the wrecks and when our bottom time is up at depth we swim back shallow. But doing this we always miss the large pontoon that is at the end of the car pile. Our dive computers don't allow us to visit the pontoon at the end of the first leg of the dive because we started too deep too early. So this time we decided to just visit the pontoon. And it was worth is.

On Sunday February 6, 2011 there were no cruise ships moored at the Megapier. A good opportunity for a guided dive organized by Trunkdivers to Tarpon City.
As you can see in the picture, this dive site is very close to the harbour entrance. For that reason diving is only permitted if authorized by the Curaçao Port Authorities. Because this large tanker came into the harbour guided by three tugboats we decided to wait before entering the water.

Baya beach is close to home, so it is one of my favorite dive sites. But not only because of the location. It is really a nice and diverse dive site. Of course there is the wreck of the tugboat. There is also a steep wall and there is the pier where you at the end of every dive can wander between the supporting poles till almost all your air is used up. These poles are fully covered by colorful sponges.

Because the cruise season has started and because it is forbidden to dive at the Superior Producer wreck when a cruise ship is moored at the mega pier the only chance to dive this wreck this week was on Sunday morning, January 23, 2011. So it was quite busy at the dive site. Several dive operators had organised a dive there. So had Trunkdivers. I joined that dive to take some pictures of the wreck.

Every year the water around the islands in the Caribbean warms up. As a consequence the algae that live together with the coral and that give the coral their colors move away leaving the white coral behind. A dangerous development because of the symbiosis between the coral and the algae that is disturbed in this way. If this bleaching holds on for a long time the coral will die. Luckily most of the time the water cools down in winter and apparently the algae move back (or new algae move in) to the previously white corals and everythings looks normal again.