Scuba Geek

Diving with Hammerheads in the Galapagos June 27, 2006

Posted by Andy Carroll in : Travel , trackback

On Yorkshire Divers forum, adrianwd75 has written up a great report on his recent trip to the Galapagos Islands. The great thing about this report is that it not only provides the positives about what is the world’s top diving destination, but also some downsides, meaning that should you ever get the opportunity to go, you can read Adrians report and prepare yourself. As for the diving, here is what Adrian said about diving with hundreds of Hammerhead sharks near Darwin Island;

The buzz on the boat was very good..we had four top dive..the water temp had risen between 26 – 28c…I had bought my 1mm skin..so I took a load of weight off my belt and put my dry suit away..all I needed now was some coke to go with the rum I had..I will tell u now rum and fanta is horrible..ow and then we ran out of fanta..After one day at Wolf we do the 12 mile trip to Darwin…the Arch and Darwin itself are amazing.

We did eleven dives, even dive guides said there were lot of hammerheads about..they were wrong…there were hundreds…by dive eleven u could have got blasé. There were hammerheads below, above, two or three feet away…owww and five whale shark sighting…my first whale shark ..just came out of the blue straight at me. There is no doubt that the dive guided tried to find Whale sharks on every dive.

And also some of the other sealife he saw on subsequent dives at Cousins Island Dive Site;

What can I say about Darwin..if you like Hammerheads..it the place to be.
We also saw lots of dolphin both from the boat, diving and on the safety stops.. Mullet, Grouper, King Angelfish: black colouring with vertical white stripes and a orange yellow tail. Usually found near rocks at most snorkelling sites. Creole fish: Red belly usually found by reefs such as the Devil’s crown. Damselfish: yellow-tailed damselfish, sergeant major (yellow and silver body with dark stripes), giant damselfish (blue with large fins). Found throughout the whole archipelago. Flying fish. Usually spotted while cruising. Yellow-tailed Grunts, Moray Eels, Parrot fish: In the Galapagos, the types of parrot fish found are the blue-chin parrotfish, azure parrotfish, bicolor parrotfish, and the bump head parrotfish. There teeth have the form of a parrot’s beal. Concentric Pufferfish: Puffed up and usually found in shallow waters, there skin is poisonous. Yellow-tailed surgeonfish: They travel in schools. Yellow Bellied Triggerfish. Wrasses: Rainbow wrasses with multicolor stipes, sunset wrasses with orange to pink heads, and streamer hogfish with bumpheads; these three are the most common amongst the many assortment of these fishes. Rays: Cow-nosed rays, manta rays, spotted eagle rays, sting rays. And many Sea Lions…I had my fins attacked on one dive and watched two seas lions take huge pleasure in ruining a great formation of small eagle rays.

This looks like an awesome destination, definitely the dives of a lifetime.