Diving in red tide can be very interesting…When heading out to the dive sites this morning the ocean smelled quite fishy and as soon as we were about 10 minutes out the water turned milk chocolate brown, like the Willy Wonka Chocolate Factory river. In places it was separating and was a pretty blue with streams of brown. At Tortuga, our first pick for the day the water was a rich chocolate color at the surface but as soon as we dropped down about five feet the water was clear and a pretty blue color, but dark. Right away we saw a white-tip reef shark swim by, the eels and an octopus were out hunting. In the places where the red tide was separating the sun light could shine through and it was very mystical. At Punta Argentina, our second dive site, conditions were the same but the cleaning stations were quite occupied as a school of spade fish and ten huge milk fish were busy being cleaned by the butterfly barber fish. We saw several southern sting rays racing by and many schools of grunts. We were in a clear spot and then it got dark and when I looked up a huge cloud of red tide was above us, it looked totally cool. One of our instructors said she decided to go through the wall of red stuff and found a clear patch with a sand bed that had at least six white-tip reef sharks swimming around. So they sat there in thirty feet of water for like ten minutes watching as the sharks circled them. So, like I said diving in red tide is very mystical.
Bobbie Jo
