Another full day of diving

The day started out with a beautiful sunrise.

After breakfast we loaded the boat with 15 SCUBA tanks and headed out to our first site (FR9). Lots of installation of settlement plates on the first dive, and the rest of the dives were spend drilling holes and prepping them for plate installation on Monday.  No diving on Sunday since the staff gets the day off, including the skipper of the boat we use. We also don't have our daily laundry service or food service. Don't worry, we don't starve. There are tons of leftovers for us to grab on our own.

Here is a photo showing the transect line and two holes that are drilled, epoxied, and marked so they can have settlement plates installed on our next trip out. They have pink flagging attached so we can spot them easily on our return.

During one of our surface intervals between dives, we were surrounded by a large pod of melon-headed whales. They were tricky to photograph, but here is one that is OK.

Melon-headed whales

Peponocephala electra

And here is just a pretty picture of a small fish. Still not much time for underwater photographs, but I am starting to take my camera with me just in case there is a short break in the task at hand.

ringtail wrasse

Oxycheilinus unifasciatus