CNMI - Saipan 2017 (6 of __)
2017 April 27 - Saipan / Obyan Beach
(Day 3, dive 1)
There are two ways to dive Obyan - either from the shore or from a boat.
If there’s a choice, I’ll take the boat.
This was the first dive of the second day with Cmlc Artha (3rd day of diving on Saipan tho). We got ourselves loaded up and headed south. This time not as far as Tinian but we did cruise for a little while because Obyan Beach is actually south of the airport.
It’s a nice dive as well but on this day we had a bit of current. It wasn’t terrible but it did make an easy dive more of a chore. I didn’t get much video that wasn’t wobbly so it’s a short and sweet one. Lots of coral and then sandy spots. Again, nice, however not my favorite of this trip.
Many areas of Saipan still have remnants of the war scattered around different parts of the island. Some pieces can be found on land while others are below water. In either case, you’re not supposed to handle them because there are undetonated pieces that are still capable of exploding. In your face!
藤澤珠紀 (Tataki) was the DM for the rest of my CMLC trips!
Fumio O. dove with CMLC on the first day I was there. He’d end up diving everyday I dove with CMLC but he didn’t do the PMs.
Another woman joined us this day. I think her name was Matsuo - it was written on all over her gear. Some days she did 2 dives, some days she did 3.
We were also joined by another couple who had close to 1000 dives. They were very nice too. Everyone was cool actually. Eventually I would see the latter two out of the water and in the sky because they were also on Delta flight I took from Saipan to Tokyo.
You can watch this video on www.livejournal.com
2017 April 27 - Saipan / Agingan
(Day 3, dive 2)
After Obyan Beach, we decided to go for a spot with a little less current. We headed west and then a bit north around Agingan Point and dove there. This spot is the closest point to the island of Tinian.
On land, there are ruins and other artifacts of an ancient Chamorro village. During WW2, it served as a Japanese defensive post. Apparently there’s also a 17th century wreck here (the Spanish Galleon Nuestra Senora de la Concepcion) but I didn’t notice!
I really loved this spot but I ended up taking no images and very little video.
The reason is because this spot is desperate for a clean up crew.
So much fishing line and lead weights of all sorts of shapes and sizes.
There are glass bottles and other random objects too, from wheels to just plain garbage. However some of it is now a part of the reef since coral has grown over it.
I did find a couple of nice and shiny beer cans which ended up topside.
By the time I came up from this dive, my pockets were full of small weights, lines, and other junk. Also some sharp little hooks too.
Again, I really did enjoy this site. But I said before, it really needs a group of people doing some good clean up work. It’ll take time. The plastic lines are really tangled up into the coral.
You can watch this video on www.livejournal.com
2017 April 27 - Saipan / Mysterious Sands
Day 3 / dive 3.
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Cmlc Artha hooks up a great lunch at their shop after you dive with them in the morning. You don’t have to be booked to dive with them in the afternoon either. It was a bento box with some salad, veggies and a meat of some sort. The first day I had beef, the second day it was pork belly, and the last day it’d be chicken! They even had some extra stir-fry as well as kimchee which they offered the divers too!
After having an awesome lunch we set out again with 藤澤珠紀. We headed out to the boat and stuck around the west coast. This time to a site with a sandy bottom and a pile of rocks where we spied a number of rays. We crept along the bottom so as not to chase them away. We saw quite a few during the dive.
Lots of sand, and lots of rocks and coral spread out made for a relaxing dive.
It was nice seeing the rays. Also spotted a small lion fish (pterois) which I learned is native to this area of the Pacific. I never realized that. I know when I went diving in Belize and some other areas divers would actively hunt them because they’re harmful to native fish and the environment. They happen to taste really good too.
However most of the ones I saw during the week of diving off Saipan were too small to be much of a meal!
You can watch this video on www.livejournal.com
2017 April 27 - Saipan / Bakudan
Day 3, dive 4
Bakudan. I found out it means ‘bomb’ in Japanese. I only found one mention of it online in English in someone’s blog. There’s supposed to be a bomb at this site that one can check out but I don’t recall seeing it.
Anyway, it’s a nice dive site. Peaceful with pretty coral and some sandy spots. Spotted a nice turtle chilling out on the rocks.
Incredibly blue water too! It’s a shallow dive as well so long bottom time!
Again another great dive with CMLC Artha and Mr T! (tamale)
You can watch this video on www.livejournal.com