The Grotto with Nick

Nick and I decided to plan one last trip together out here right before we head back. We had loads of options of where to go, but in the end, we decided to settle on the simplest possible place... Yes, back to Saipan. Nick has never been before, and I during my previous two visits, I thought the diving and history were a combination he would really like. We had also planned to take a short hop to an even smaller island closer to Guam called Rota... but a week out from our trip the tiny little airline called to tell us all flights were cancelled for the rest of the month because their plane was broken. Apparently that can happen? So we canned Rota and just went to Saipan. After we arrived (30-minute flight!) and got settled, we went straight to the island's premier dive destination, The Grotto:

Always nice when you see one of these guys in the first five minutes of the dive.

I dove the Grotto two years ago when I went with friends, and I remember our guide saying how much different it is to dive at night. So we made a point of diving the Grotto at night and weren't disappointed:

yum yum :)

There are some massive turtles that head into the Grotto's caves to sleep... this one was 4-5 ft. long. Apparently there are some that are even bigger that we didn't see!

Sleeping Napoleon wrasse

parrot fish

Our first minute into the night dive when we were still in the first Grotto cave, Nick was filming a turtle we sighted immediately. As our flashlights swirled around the dark waters, we realized there was a shark... no two sharks... also swimming around! Glad this was not my first night dive with sharks because in this small of a space, that could have been a little crazy :)

 

And yes, the turtle actually ran smack into the camera while Nick was recording :)

More of Nick's impressive macro shots

Pretty gorgeous stuff! The Grotto was well worth the trip back to Saipan for me, and I'm so glad Nick got to dive it before we take off. More to come from Saipan...