Sunday, March 16, 2014

Trip Report, Rocío del Mar. Revillagigedo. February 25 and March 07


One, two, three, four, five, six, seven ... we lost count of how many times a humpback whale was breaching right before us and then a few minutes later another and another .... it was amazing!

The past two weeks Rocio del Mar completed two trips to Revillagigedo Islands. Mantas (Manta birostris) have been very active around divers: great memories, great pictures, great dives, but the best, many smiles ... that's our best reward.

We were very happy to receive passengers from China, Singapore, Italy, Brasil, México, Canada and different cities from the United States. Everybody had an extraordinary time.

As usual we first visited San Benedicto Island. The 5 star dive sites "El Boiler" and "El Cañon" gave us incredible moments: In a single day two tiger shark (Galeocerdo cuvier)sightings, humpback whale (Megaptera novaeangliae) encounters on scuba, mantas (Manta birostris) on almost all dives. But please read carefully: these mantas were enjoying being close to divers, they really wanted to hang out with us and their were  4, 5 or 6 of them in a single dive for more than 50 minutes "flying" above us. It was magical!

Winnie with her nemo lucky hood.
She saw a humpback whale on scuba

These trips were not only good for diving. Our passengers really felt at home and shared good moments with Poncho (our chef) cooking different dishes from Singapore and China.

Our next stop was in Socorro Island. We enjoyed mantas, silver tip sharks, hammer head sharks diving at Cabo Pearce. Mantas were all over the dive site: at 15 feet, at 70 feet, we even saw one asking us to play at 90 feet.




Our final stop was at Roca Partida. This tiny rock in the middle of the Pacific is a giant dive site. It is for sure one of the best dive sites in the world. It is difficult to believe the variety of species and high density of their population around this rock. 
But the best is that in a single day of diving it is possible to see at least 5 of the 7 species of sharks that inhabit the Revillagigedo Archipelago.

Hammerhead sharks were at peace swimming around 90 feet and we had the chance to see big schools of them around the island several times.




Besides great dives we also had great weather. 
We spent two days at Roca Partida on each trip and enjoyed fabulous food on the top deck celebrating mexican taco nights and sharing with our guests one mexican tradition: the Piñata. It is common in México to celebrate birthday parties with a piñata full of candies and a delicious cake.









We believe everybody had a great time and filled their expectations of marine life encounters. Weather was great and we expect to keep having these great conditions during the following trips.

We want to thank all our passengers who dove with us and shared all these great memories. It is our purpose to make you all feel like home during your 9 days visiting these great islands full of life and magic.

We hope to see you back again aboard the Rocio del Mar.




Thursday, December 5, 2013

Trip Report, Rocío del Mar. Revillagigedo. Nov 22 to Dec 1, 2013

Rocio del Mar is back to Revillagigedo!!! 

Fantastic weather, good visibility ,79 F degree water temperature and lots of pelagic life to see!!

Happy to be back to Revillagigedo ... new season 2013-2014
This trip we enjoyed diving with a very nice group. Divers and friends coming from different parts of the world, different jobs, different ages, but all of us meeting with one single objective: our passion for the ocean, our wish to see giant mantas, sharks, and take with us life time memories and lots of pictures!


Danny, Kelly, Angelo, Phil, Brandon, Patrick and Holly all from the US were diving together with Guarani. Lanny, Peter L, and Peter R, from Netherlands, Baptiste, Time from the US and Alex and Marc from Barcelona were diving in group B with Gil. And Roberto, our new dive master dove with Elliot, John, Bill, Ruth, Cindy, Patrick and Brooke.

Nice crossing to Revillagigedo
Dive teams

Crossing was smooth and we had wonderful weather. Poncho cooked fantastic food and vegetarian passengers on board were very happy with the different choices Poncho had for them. Actually some of the meet eaters changed to vegetarian choice during the trip! Great job Poncho!!

Gear ready to dive: 6.45 a.m.

Finally after about 26 hours we arrived to San Benedicto Island, one checkout dive with turtles, white tip sharks (Triaenodon obesus) and giant lobsters at "Las Cuevitas" and we moved to "El Boiler" to dive with 3 fantastic and friendly Giant Mantas (Manta Birostris)


Friendly mantas at El Boiler, San Benedicto, Revillagigedo

Storm near Socorro Island, Revillagigedo
Our captain Lolo advised for some wind and rain the next days so we moved to Socorro during the night. "Cabo Pearce" was incredible. Mantas coming on each dive, small groups of hammerheads (Sphyrna lewini), silver tip sharks (Carcharhinus albimarginatus), octopus, lobsters, and more! The following day we moved to Punta Tosca, it had less activity but still some divers saw dolphins, mantas and more sharks!

Divers approaching to Punta Tosca, Socorro Island.


Kelly getting close to Galapagos sharks
Third day of diving we arrived to Roca Partida. Slow first dives, but with the sun shinning we started to see huge schools of hammerheads (Sphyrna lewini), big Galapagos sharks (Carcharhinus galapagensis), tunas, green jacks hunting small sandia´s fishes. It was amazing!!
But the best was still to come ....

Good dives! Hammerheads!
We spent the night at Roca Partida and it couldn't be better. The ocean was like a pool. Not wind at all, and silky sharks (Carcharhinus falciformis) came close to the boat to eat dinner :-)

Silky sharks approaching the boat

John getting ready with all his nice "toys"
Danny picking on Phil ... all time! :-)
Second day at Roca Partida one shark was missing to see and he didn't want to make us wait longer: a mid size whale shark (Rhincodon typus) was swimming slowly to allow divers to take lots of pictures and video. It was great!! Was the best of the day.


This is a happy face after seeing a whale shark!


Rocio del Mar offered a special dinner to celebrate Thanksgiving day with our passengers. We all had a great time and enjoyed fantastic dinner.

Our last diving day was at San Benedicto and we head back to San José del Cabo. 







A lot of feelings at the same time when we had to say good bye to Revillagigedo

It was a great trip. Great divers, great people, lots of great moments and memories. Rocio del Mar crew was very happy to have you all on board and we expect to see you all soon with us again.

THANK YOU ALL FOR SUCH A GREAT TRIP


Roberto, our new dive master

Happy Divers!

Beautiful smile ... thanks for sharing these days with us

Monday, September 2, 2013

August 17th, 2013 Charter

This video by Nanette Van Antwerp says it all.

Diving the Sea of Cortez


Tuesday, July 16, 2013

We are back in the Sea of Cortez

La Vela from Lolo's Cove

                         We are back in the Sea Of Cortez!!!!!!

On our first trip to the Sea of Cortez this season we were excited to welcome back some of our favorite Dive Masters, Bob Defeo and "Mayo" Ismael Hinojosa.  Bob is a veteran divemaster with Rocio del Mar and has been leading our Sea of Cortez dives since our first season.  Mayo, a favorite among our passengers, can't stay long.  He has become a daddy - again!  Congrats Mayo!
Bob, Brooke and Mayo

The Chicken Divers, who just a few months ago dove the Socorro's with us, are back again!  We hung up our chicken swag and were ready for them.  The entire group of passengers became fast friends and we were off.  Our second dive was at La Vela, one of my all time favorites and it didn't dissapoint.  The water was full of salps, jelly fish and La Vela itself was covered in Spanish Shawls!    

             
Spanish Shawls
Salps

Salps
Mayo - preparing for whale shark briefing
We've heard that the salps were quite tasty treats for whales sharks so the next day we headed to Baja de Los Angeles to look for our Whale Sharks.  We did our best and searched for hours - finally we found two.  We hopped into the water and were hoping for the hours of enjoyment we have come to expect from the Whale Sharks but after about 30 minutes our sharks left us and we were sent back to Rocio a bit dissapointed.  We quickly geared up and headed to another of my favorite dive sites El Pesacador.  El Pescador was full of life and we had a great time with Giant Jaw Fish, Spotted Jaw Fish, a ton of Sea Hares, litterally piles and piles of them and octopus.  
The group enjoyed themselves so much we decided to dive here again and do a night dive too.  But the creatures of the sea had different plans for us.  As we were suiting up for our night dive, our dive master Mayo jumped into the water to put on his wet suit, in that in-water upside down way he does in record time, when we looked next to him and saw a humbolt squid.  We pulled a  reluctant Mayo out of the water and cancelled the night dive.  Before we knew it we were surrounded by humbolt squid.  It was amazing.  We sat on the dive deck, passengers on their bellies with cameras in the water and it was three hours of humbolt excitement.  We even had a Bull Sea Lion come for a late night snack.  The squid must have hit the spot!  Humbolt Squid
Click the Link above for the video

We had some great dives at Sal Si Puedes (Get out if you can).  Our divers weren't intemidated in the least by the islands name and we continued to see a variety of Nudibranchs, Eel Sea Snakes, Garden Eels, Mexican Horn sharks and a thrill for both fish and diver was the Giant Jaw Fish.  I believe this fish missed us while we were diving in the Socorro's.  As soon as the giant jawfish saw us they were swimming out to meet us.  
Giant Jaw Fish
We had a wide variety of nudibranchs this trip and our macro photographs were ecstatic.  Along with some fantastic night diving full of crabs, horn sharks, lobster and don't forget piles of Sea Hares.



We had some amazing guests on this trip who were happy to share their experiences, such as Butch excavating dope lake, (that's quite a diving story), Dennis hiking Everest, Gene's amazing underwater videography and Bob's encounter with a Blue Footed Booby Bird (you'll have to ask him yourself about this).  




Our Fourth of July trip started out with our season with a trip that will be hard to beat!  Can't wait to see what adventures next week will bring.


Some Passenger Pictures.  
Marilyn

Dave and Lisa

John and Deborah

High tech scuba preparation procedure w/Chilli/Helen and me.

Bart and Helen

Spike and Chili

what it takes to film the humbolt squid!


I had a wonderful time with you all and hope you come back to dive with us again very soon!!!