11-Mile Reef & Cocos West

Last Saturday morning, Nick and I woke up in the fives (ooof!). We picked up our buddy Zack and drove a few miles south to Agat Marina. We loaded up on a dive boat and took an hour-long ride through heavy chop out to 11-Mile Reef, which was, as you might have guessed, 11 miles off the coast of Guam. You've seen over the last 11 months that there are a plethora of dive sites within a 5-minute boat ride of shore that we can easily reach from our own boat on our own schedule. So why go to the hassle, expense, and commute to dive this particular reef? Feast your eyes on this:

And no, I am not referring to my underwater superhero diver posing abilities. I'm talking about the unbelievable clarity of the water SIXTY (six, zero) (60) feet down. To give perspective to those who haven't taken the SCUBA plunge yet, you would be lucky to go anywhere in the world and get this kind of clarity within 10 feet of the surface on a sunny day. So to be down this deep and get such amazing visibility is well worth an 11-mile trip and earlier alarm clock. This reef is in the middle of the deep ocean. Spill off it in any direction and you go from 90 ft. to 1,000 ft. deep in just a few hundred yards' distance. Pretty amazing spot. And since narrating a dive with words is no fun, I'll leave the commentary up to Nick's ever impressive underwater photography.

100 ft and clear as day! White Tip Reef Shark... largest shark I've seen near Guam. 

School of barracuda, each 2-4 ft. long

 Dive bubbles

Cocos Island West Drift Dive

Pin cushion sea star (Nick is balancing it on his finger)

The pictures from our second morning dive further demonstrate the impressive visibility at 11-mile reef. A little closer to shore, this drift dive was done in the much shallower more accessible waters between Guam and Cocos Island. While we saw a lot of great wildlife and had a great 72 minutes under water, you can see the pictures aren't nearly as vibrant.

 Zack with a bright green sea star (it looks bright green in person and would probably look bright green at 11-Mile Reef). 

Nick achieving perfect neutral buoyancy (despite the backscatter)... ohhhmmmm

After honing his inner underwater chi, Nick took some stunning macro shots:

Crazy crab

Sea urchin hiding amongst colorful corals

Lion fish - One of the only poisonous underwater regulars (also very skiddish and slow)

 

I never thought worms were pretty until I saw these... 

Christmas tree worms in every color. Beautiful! And also very fun to harass.

A funky spotted eel (that's not the actual species name... but maybe it should be).

No question, lots of really beautiful things to see, including some fish species I'd never seen before (fish are the hardest to capture... because they swim...). 

We got back to the dock around noon, cleaned up our gear and with a whole Saturday afternoon ahead of us, we rallied and, you guessed it, headed out for a round of golf at Windward Hills. Two world class dives in the clearest blue ocean, 18 holes in the breezy rolling hills of the island ranges, followed by Nick's steaks on the grill and homemade rosemary sweet potato fries. Now THAT, my friends, is one heck of an awesome Saturday.