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travel Socorro

THIS PAGE: Scenes from
a dive with Solmar V off
the rocky islands of the
Revillagigedos Archipelago

FAR LEFT INSET:
Hammerhead shark

I was in the middle of the critters.
encounter photograph- During the evening,
ing these sleek swimming when we all relaxed and
machines. showed our day’s work,
About this time, the I was accused of tel-
other divers, who stayed eporting to another reef!
loyal to their watch, were My fellow dive com-
rewarded by a large panions had no idea
school of hammerheads octopus, sea stars, sea
in the distance! What an cucumbers, sponge and
awesome experience smaller fish could be
it was, especially if this found on the reef. My
was one’s first visit to the the reef, including the fish! Once the presentation was also full of turtles, green
Revillagigedos. excitement was over, we swam with morays, yellow guineafowl puffers, and
for. Behind these smaller critters I noticed On another dive to this mantas and more sharks on our way aggressive pairs of damselfish.
several big silver-tip sharks and a huge same site, once again with my wide back in. Another site commonly visited, and
manta! Realizing my wide angle lens was angle lens on, we saw more schooling Once the novelty of the big animals well worth the wait if weather is unco-
of little use for this octopus, I scurried off hammerheads, but too far to photo- at the site wore off, I put my 50mm lens operative, is a place called “The Boiler”.
to join my companions who had already graph. A tiger shark however, came a on and stayed in the 18 meter (60 foot) Coming within meters of the surface, a
abandoned their posts. Within seconds, bit too close, causing everyone to “hug” range photographing an array of smaller block-shaped pinnacle causes surface

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