Another fantastic day of diving from Roca Partida!

May 28th Dive Report
Good evening divers out there, I am glad to report again a fantastic day of diving from Roca Partida! The wind has not left us since yesterday so we’ve been careful getting in and out the zodiacs as the waves kept hitting the side of the boat, but guess what? It was worth it every single time!
First dive in, water temperature was 76F/25C and visibility got somewhat better to 100feet/30m, the north end of Roca Partida had a thick school of Jacks from 10 to 70feet deep and as we left them behind sharks started to show up. Several Galapagos sharks swam fast and close by the divers almost like posing for the pictures, and just a bit deeper, gently cruising escorted by small steel pampanos , big silver tip sharks in several directions. A bunch of yellow fin tuna flashed their silhouettes in and out the area showing muscle and forcing all the fish to back off fast. Just around the corner we were passed by a huge chevron giant pacific manta at about 130ft/40m, then it disappeared into the blue. To finish this awesome dive we glimpsed a school of around 25 hammerhead sharks, not to mention the 8 White Tip reef sharks patrolling the shallow waters at the end. 
After a nice and long surface interval we hit the rock again and it was even better! Starting at the south end this time we were after the jackpot! On our way down a Giant Manta showed up to try to lure us out of our plan for the dive but we endured, a few minutes later while carefully searching the blue off the southeast point we spotted a massive group of hammerhead sharks, but as we were getting close two bottle-nose dolphins got down from the surface and with a belly dance, they almost made us forget why we were there in the blue. Soon enough the dolphins went away (back in the boat we found out they just reunited with the big pot of around 20 dolphins entertaining the other group of divers at the north point) and we could finally pay close attention down to the mesmerizing circular swimming pattern of a school of more than 100 hammerhead sharks, man, what a rush! Oops, time to get shallower, our 28% EANx didn’t allow us to stay down any longer near them.
After lunch and a nice siesta we explored the rock once more, and the Yellow Fin Tuna came back for a while, fat and fast as usual! The second half of the dive was starred by a friendly Giant Black Manta, he kept coming back and forth to say farewell to all of us. Safety stop and…barbeque for dinner!!
Adrian Belinchon
DIvemaster On Board Solmar V