Our final days diving was at the sea grass meadows of Marsa Shouna. There had been talk on the boat of the chance of meeting the illusive Dugong at this site. Thought to have inspired sailors stories of mermaids, these huge grey hoover mouthed monoliths spend their days basking in relatively shallow waters consuming massive amounts of sea grass. Distant relatives of the elephant, they evolved over millennia to feed in the sea and spend their lives moving from bay to bay seeking out the tastiest patch of greenery. The chances of meeting a Dugong (also known as the sea cow) is rare and part of every scuba divers bucket list.
I was bubbling with excitement at the thought of hunting for a mermaid. The dives were to encompass the north and south sides of the bay with the second and last dive along the reef wall in the south and then out into the meadows to search. We arrived at the site and the dive guide explained that the boat crew had seen no sign of our elusive sea cow. He explained that although still possible it was highly unlikely that any Dugong were in the area but there was still every chance of finding green turtles in the meadows.
We descended for our first dive to domes of hard coral at about ten meters. These huge mounds of coral growth created a network of chasms that wound into the distance framed by columns of bubbles stretching up to the vaulted roof of wavering water. I hovered for a while to observe a pair of masked butterfly fish who languished next to the coral.
Butterfly fish are monogamous and are usually found in pairs. They circled each other nose to tail spinning a figure of eight in a short chase, mimicking each other in staggered harmony. This dance continued for many minuets in a mating courtship repeated daily to reaffirm the pair bond.
I drifted on floating through this dreamscape, Picasso-esque parrot fish pecked at coral crowns while above me two titan trigger fish fought in the blue no mans land of open water.
This dive culminated with a final encounter with a lion fish waiting patiently next to a green fan coral for unwary glass fish. The lion fish is a veracious ambush predator which can swallow many smaller fish whole. It’s covered in poisonous spines that can deliver a painful sting to any blundering diver and is known for following the light of a diver's torch on night dives.
Dive two, I plunged into the warm weary water. At this point I had dived two or three dives a day for the last five days and was beginning to feel fatigued as my body felt the effects of processing the excess nitrogen in my blood. My sinuses were heavy and throat sore as the cold I’d suffered at the beginning of the trip took its toll. I felt languid as we descended to around twenty meters along the reef wall. The plan was to follow the reef to our left before following the sloping sand to the sea meadows and the hunt. I had some trouble equalizing (releasing excess pressurized air from the ear cavity) and had to ascend a few times to clear my ears but to little effect. I tried to keep five meters above my buddy as I wiggled my jaw and swallowed to try to relieve the pressure in my sinuses. She noticed me pinching my nose and shaking my head and ascended to check on me. We hung at fifteen meters for a while and suddenly I felt a slight release. I indicated that my ears were clearing and we descended slowly rocked by the tide.
My head cleared somewhat and we finned along the wall. The cratered reef rolled by spotted with the red mottled branches of Christmas tree coral. As I nosed about in the nooks and crannies of coral caves I spotted a Moray eel lurking in a crack. I approached slowly as this fearsome looking eel opened and closed his mouth to display his teeth. I have met Moray before in Thailand and have never felt much fear of them as they always seem to stay in their cave. I kept my hands clasped together at my chest, to prevent this reef predator from mistaking my any of my fingers for a fish.
I hung in the current taking pictures of my new friend, as I kicked my fins to leave the Moray surprised me by slinking from his cave through an opening deeper in the reef. I moved up and over the lip of the coral to see him swimming away. It’s rare to see Moray swimming in the daytime as they’re night hunters. We followed at a moderate distance until he disappeared into the hollow heart of the reef.
As we moved on the coral began to get patchy, opening up to wide areas of sand spotted with colonies of anemone. Clownfish darted in and out of the stinging tentacles their faces smiling up at the sun.
In the sand shaded background I became aware of an alien. The wavering skirts of the cuttlefish drew my attention as its brown and mottled white skin camouflaged with the sand. Cuttlefish can blend with their background reflecting the changing colors of their surroundings. I attempted to heard our otherworldly friend back towards the reef hoping to see this chameleon of the sea shimmer its skin through the myriad colors of the coral, but it wasn't to be. The cuttlefish darted away along the avenues of sand.
The sand gave way to patches of light emerald-green as the gradient leveled off to around eight meters and we sculled gently through the water. I became excited at the thought of what we may find as we searched from left to right through the sun drenched water. Every now and again we came across deep hollows in the sand around a patch of sea grass which alerted me to the fact that something had rested while grazing. The grass was short and evenly cut in places while other areas were left long and uneven. I knew that green turtles were very selective in their eating habits and this encouraged me in our search.
Time beat on in the warm shallows. The sun illuminating this green flecked meadow that seemed to stretch on into eternity. I became despondent as my buddy indicated that we had reached a third of our air supply and we should return to the boat which was close by. As the hull of the boat appeared in the distance I spotted a dome of green brown to my left. Slight plumes of sand drifted up from around it and my heart raced as I recognised the profile of a turtle. My buddy had moved about three meters ahead and I finned wildly to catch her up and tugged on her fins. As she turned to me in irritation I put one hand on top of the other and wiggled my thumbs in the sign for a turtle. She asked if I was sure and I nodded insistently and pointed before starting away. In my dash to catch up with my buddy I had lost sight of it but had not lost my sense of direction and within seconds the turtle hove into view. We slowed and I breathed out slow and deep to calm myself so as not to disturb the grazing animal. I checked my buoyancy and dumped a little air from my BCD so that I hovered just above the sand on the wind of my breath.
I used my fingers to quietly creep closer to the turtle who was still oblivious and only a few meters away. I hardly breathed letting slow deep breaths escape through my teeth to reduce the noise of my regs. Her eyes were gentle, that’s the first impression that I got as I watched her chewing slowly on the grass. The turtle noticed me and I stopped dead my approach, now only two meters away. She was nearly as big as me and much wider her shell patterned like the sun shimmering through waves onto the sea floor. Her eyes made a mockery of my concerns and in them I thought I saw the wisdom of acceptance, the epitome of living in the now, of just being. I may have anthropomorphized this gentle giant, she may have just been happy to have found some food but in that moment I was truly happy. I was smiling so wide that I nearly lost the reg from my mouth and this was one of those diving memories that will never fade for me. A true communion with nature!
After what seemed like an age but in reality was no more than thirty seconds she lifted her head towards the surface and slipped slowly into the green haze and on into the blue horizon.
For the first article in the series follow this link: https://steemit.com/travel/@raj808/scuba-scribe-diving-the-red-sea-1
For the second article in the series follow this link: https://steemit.com/travel/@raj808/scuba-scribe-diving-the-red-sea-dealing-with-narcosis-2
If you enjoyed this article please follow @raj808 for poems and many more scuba diving trip blog posts to come.
All pictures apart from clown fish image are original property of myself. Clown fish image is a free to use stock photo, for verification please follow this link: https://pixabay.com/en/clown-fish-anemone-red-sea-sea-1268677/
