Wolf Island
Monday
morning, we got up very early at Wolf Island, and dropped into the water well
before breakfast to photograph one of more odd looking fish you’ll ever see, the
red-lipped batfish. There were large numbers of them on the sandy bottom at 90
– 100’ depth. A few were shy and would half-swim half-waddle away when
approached, but a couple were more than happy to pose for a picture, which is
the one place where the broken camera didn’t bother me, as setting up for this
type of macro shot before we dove was easy. We also saw a few rays, and
several scorpionfish here, but the highlight of this dive were the batfish.
This dive and the checkout dive were the only dives actually done directly from
the Aggressor II, all the other dives were done from the tenders.
After breakfast, we moved around to the Northwest point of
the island, and dove in rough conditions, but the dives were simply awesome. As
soon as we dropped into the water, we spotted a squadron of Manta Rays (Modela
subspecies) cruising by. Once settled down by the rocks, there were Galapagos
Sharks and Hammerheads cruising by every direction you looked, with schools of
Silkies hanging out in the blue haze.
Our
third, and last dive at Wolf was the most outstanding dive of the entire trip.
We moved around to the NE side of the island to a site called landslide, and the
dive was simply electric! The current was very strong, so it was difficult to
hang on to the rocks, but the payoff was an unending parade of huge pelagics
swimming by mere inches away. A large squadron of Spotted Eagle Rays hung out
with us for 10 minutes, at times their tails would almost touch your mask.
Galapagos sharks cruised overhead, often sneaking up behind you (yikes!). They
would look at you with those cold, dark, black eyes, and would pass by almost
close enough to touch. The Hammerheads would also frequently sweep through,
right between the group of divers, so many that they were often forced to either
collide with a shark or go right over the top of a diver.
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