On the Ocean Floor

I slipped into my wet suit which exposed only right above my knees and elbows, zipped up my aqua shoes, spit in my mask to clean it, and walked over the rocks until the water was deep enough to support my air tank.  As I started inhaling and exhaling through my regulator, my own breathing fills my head as I sink slowly underwater.  Did you know scuba was an acronym for self contained underwater breathing apparatus?  I could control my buoyancy by inflating my scuba vest or compressing it for which the weights around my waist would weigh me down underwater.  As a beginner, I could go about 15 meters deep.  But this was surely enough to explore Tulamben's sunken ship- The Liberty, an American shipwreck from WWII.  It was torpedoed by a japanese submarine in 1942 and sat beached until Mount Agung erupted in 1963 forcing it underwater about 30 meters or so.  We had a visibility of about 20 meters.  I never really got cold like expected..I think because of how exciting everything looked underworld! So many neon greens, yellow, red.  So much live coral and life! At one point our guide picked up a huge green starfish and handed it to me!  The coral was all housed by the ship.  We couldn't tell from his face, but a 6foot barracuda was suddenly visible not more than 3 feet away from us as his silver teeth caught the sunlight and thus my eyes!  Mason did not hesitate to go right up next to it but I kept a bit of a distance just in case.  We were also told there were a couple white tip sharks lurking the ship but our guide did not tell us about them because they were beyond the depth we could safely dive at.  There were about 25 hand signals that PADI (our diving certification company) recommends and uses.  The most common one is the A-okay sign, used extensively between yourself and your guide.  A few other sightings included little nemo burrowing in an anemone, a couple thousand silver fish swimming above us in a school,  angelfish, parrotfish, neon blue glow in the dark fish, and sponges! 

Barracuda!!



Can you find the fish?