Diving - The adventure continues!

Diving in the Azores 2016

For our summer holiday in 2016, we visited the Azores, an archipelago in the Atlantic.

Of course, my primary motivation was to do some interesting diving and the big lure to the Azores is Blue Sharks and Manta/Mobula Rays.

When we arrived, as you can read here, the island of Faial was experiencing the tail end of a Hurricane and it turned out that this was affecting diving quite badly.

Indeed, the first day I dived, on a local reef, my fellow divers had dived the same place the previous day because the wind prevented them reaching any of the more interesting locations even quite close in.

The first dive was at Baie De Entre Montes, just beyond the harbour end and featuring a sloping stone wall, onto boulders and then a sandy bottom.

We took the rib and dropped in to about 6-10m of water and then descended the rocky slope onto the boulders.

There were plenty of Wrasse and similar fish, including a Moray who refused to reveal more than his tail and plenty of Blennie type fish and others around the boulders.

Unsurprisingly, the fish here were not unlike those often seen in Lanzarote, where I’d been the previous autumn.

The highlight of the dive was a couple of decent size, but not remarkable, Groupers and what looked, to me, like a huge Scorpion fish, resting on the sandy bottom under a rocky outcrop, although the guide said he had seen even bigger.

After about 45 minutes, I was nearly through my 12L tank and indicated this to the guide, but he urgently beckoned me to look at something small, which turned out to be Sea Horse, which rounded the dive out nicely.

I reboarded the rib, with a convenient ladder, we really should get one for the club rib!

The next morning was a little calmer and Norberto himself of Norberto Diver took us out to see the only wreck in Faial, which is a purposely sunken barge! It had little of note in itself, but Norberto took us off to the sandy bottom away from the barge as he’d spotted Barracuda hunting amongst shoals of fish.

We watched them for a while and then I realised I had only 100 Bar left - It’s possible my reg had been pressed upon on the boat as I’d left the air on, something they don’t usually do - and had to return to the barge.

The others joined me after a few minutes, spotting a small octopus on the way and, as I started to ascend, they swam off the barge again to look at a couple of small Eagle Rays, but again I didn’t see them.

This was a bit of a disappointing dive, although the Barracuda were good to watch and the clarity of the water was remarkable - How can the same body of water in the English Channel be murky green when it’s gin clear blue water in the Azores?!

The forecast wasn’t good for the next couple of days, so we hired a car and explored Faial and nearby Pico. After a bit of confusion, when I was booked onto the Tuesday Shark Dive after explaining I couldn’t dive again until Wednesday, it was arranged that I’d do the shark dive on Wednesday afternoon and both Mandy and I would take the long trip out to Princess Alice Bank in the hope of seeing Rays.

The weather was lovely when I turned up for the Shark Dive on the Wednesday afternoon and we took the rib out, with a Canadian couple, a group of French divers and Portuguese artist who was free diving.

The previous day, when I was originally slated to dive, they’d had to wait 4 and a half hours to see any sharks, but our wait was shorter.

They put some ‘chum’ (fish scraps and blood) into the water to try and attract some sharks, but as soon as we arrived we knew a nearby boat already had Sharks nearby and in the end, after no luck luring our own we motored over to these after an hour.

I was last in, but the Canadian woman called “Big Old Sharks down here!” to her husband as she bobbed up from rolling in and, indeed, as I dropped in I immediately saw the unmistakeable shape of a 2.5+M Blue Shark, probably the sleekest shark in existence.

There were 3 sharks when we arrived and to say we got up close and personal is an understatement.

The water under our boat was, apparently, around 200M+ deep, so they dropped lines to around 30M to give us a reference and to hang onto if we wished.

The Sharks circled us and the chum bucket for a whole hour, with a fourth sharking joining the original 3 after about 40 minutes. At times the sharks nudged us and they passed within touching distance repeatedly.

This was my first open water experience of sharks, only really seeing White Tip Reef Sharks in Indonesia, either resting or some distance beneath us, but I didn’t feel any fear as the fish seemed interested in us, but certainly not aggressive. The white around the Sharks’ big eyes made it clear they were looking at us as we went by and more than once they approached head on to me as I took photographs, I wondered if they could see their reflections in the lens?

Eventually, all too soon it seemed, it was time to get out, but it had been a remarkable experience and Thursday’s trip to Princess Alice was going to have to be something special to match it!

Our hotel was obviously used to early risers as breakfast was available from as early as 6:30, but 7:30 was early enough for us to have a good breakfast and be ready to leave at 8:30.

The trip out to Princess Alice Bank, a seamount rising to around 35M from a 300M seabed, was 45 miles and took a little over 3 hours. It was a little choppy, but one or two people were really quite ill.

However, I was fine and Mandy seemed OK by the time we arrived.

Norberto led one group of divers and asked for people to come to the bottom to check the anchor. He said it was about 35M and we’d not stay long, returning to 10-15M to watch the Rays. I went with him and we descended the anchor like to a rocky reef, which is the top of th seamount.

The light here was almost as good as it’d been in 10M on the first dive and the fish, blennies and Wrasse were more or less the same. As we started back up, I checked my computer and saw we’d been to 41.1M, which at this time was my deepest dive!

On the way down we’d spotted a huge group of Rays swim past, Norberto reckoned around 30 and I certainly have over a dozen in frame in one shot I took.

Therefore, I had high expectations of the rest of the dive, but whilst we did see quite a few Rays, the majority were a little way off or deeper and then tended to come in 2s or 3s.

It would be unfair to say it was a disappointing dive, but I had to accept that it hadn’t matched the Shark dive the previous day.

Fortunately, we did two dives at Princess Alice Bank and the second was certainly on a par with the Shark Dive. Before we went in Norberto excitedly called Mandy to get her snorkel and get in the water as a group of 10-20 Rays were just below the surface. She did get in and says she saw them, but by this point she’d actually started to feel quite sick and, unfortunately, when she got out she was really quite unwell while I was diving.

I dropped in and after a short spell at around 25M as Norberto rechecked the anchor, spent most of the dive around 10-15M.

On this dive, however, the Rays came in groups of 1s, 2s, 3s and even 20 or so and they were around my depth for the greater part of the dive. Indeed, once or twice these majestic beasts were within touching distance if I’d wanted to and it was wonderful to see how they gracefully fly and twist and swoop in the water, looking a bit like an aquatic Vulcan Bomber!

This was the dive I’d hoped to experience when I booked the trip to the Azores and, as with the Shark Dive the previous day, met and exceeded my expectations and even my hopes!

The Sharks in a way had been a bit of a bonus, I didn’t really know what I wanted or expected from it, but if I’d only done the first dive at Princess Alice Bank I wouldn’t have been disappointed, but I would have probably felt I had unfinished business with the Rays.

Whilst I’d love to see them again, I felt I’d got the full experience I’d hoped for after the second dive!

When I started diving, I had 3 targets; Dive the wrecks in Scapa Flow, Dive with Manta Rays and dive on sunken ancient ruined temple or some such (I’m not sure such a place even exists as I picture it, outside of barely remembered episodes of Voyage to the Bottom of the Sea!) - The trip to the Azores crossed off number 2, leaving just the mythical ruin to find, although the original three now have plenty of company on my diving ‘to do’ list!

If you get a chance, dive in the Azores, I thought it was wonderful and would love to go back.

As well as being great diving, the people were so friendly. Norberto is a bit of a diving legend (especially, it seems, in Germany) being featured in many dive magazines and called “The Sea Wolf” in one. However, he was in fact one of the nicest, most helpful, enthusiastic, knowledgeable and down to earth people you could imagine and I’d recommend his outfit to you if you do decide to dive in Faial.

The rest of the team were friendly and helpful too, so you’ll enjoy yourself whoever you dive with here!

Read some more of my diving experiences, by clicking the icons below.

 

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