Beata Virgo Maria – Known, But Rarely Seen
The weather, my good friend Arnaud, and great visibility allowed the mounting of a small search for “La Vierge (The Virgin)” – also known as “Our Lady of the Seabed”. The statue, located about 100 meters off Quai Rauba Capeu, sits at a depth of about 16 meters. The statue is about 3 meters tall, and was realized in 1968 by the sculptor Alfred Gualtierotti.
I first learned about it several weeks ago, and I had wanted to find it, but logistics, vacation, and weather conditions had prevented it. This weekend was the first moment when everything was just right, and we set out to search for it. Due to the excellent visibility, we were able to locate it within about 15 minutes.
It is a beauty of a statue, and stirs the emotions to look at it. I won’t say too much more on the subject, but will let the photos speak for themselves. Enjoy the photos!
Meeting the Virgin
Deep in Prayer
Plage de l’Escalet near St. Tropez – New Discoveries
Aguillette, Needlefish, or Garfish
A few weeks ago, I went to visit the small town of St. Tropez. The town itself is rich and full of pomp. Huge yachts, fancy cars, lots of celebrities all about, and expensive designer shops. Not exactly my kind of place.
The town was nice enough, I enjoyed to architecture and the setting quite a bit. However, the highlight was the nearby beach of l’Escalet. What a jewel. Clear water, beautiful sands, and a healthy ecosystem as far as I could tell.
I have never seen as many fish anywhere in the Mediterranean as I saw there. Huge schools of sardines and saupe were everywhere, and at times, I could hardly fit even a small part of the schools into the view of my wide angle. I took a bunch of video, and condensed it down to around four minutes.
While editing the video, I realized I had over ten solid minutes of footage of huge schools of fish. School after school passed my angle of view, and it was honestly hard to cut it down.The end result is below. I just want to say that I accidentally grabbed my chipped wide angle dome on the way out the door (I bought another one after I chipped my first one, and kept it for spare parts). It is fine for photos – it rarely ever shows, but for video, it shows almost all the time. I also had something on my lens on the interior of my camera, but once I hit the water, there was nothing to be done about it. Sorry for that and I hope you can enjoy the vid just the same!
Sole (flounder) and a grande vive (greater weever)
To my absolute delight, I finally got close to a bunch of species that I had either very rarely seen from a distance, or never even knew existed in my area. These included the aguillette (needlefish, or garfish), rombou, petite sole jaune (both are varieties of flounders), grande vive (greater weever), and what I think is a dragonnet, but I have not been able to get a positive identification on it yet.
I got some decent photos of all of them, and then immediately began researching my new discoveries online the second I arrived at home. It turns out that the vive (or weever), has a vicious poisonous sting that can cause intensive pain for up to two weeks. It has dorsal fins with spines that if touched, will inject their venom and make the aggressor wish they had never gone near.
I also learned that the aguillette (or needlefish) has been known to be attracted to flashy objects, sometime propelling themselves towards the object while airborne. In other countries, these fish are a huge danger to fishermen while fishing at night. They will occasionally hurl themselves out of the water towards the light source, and stick their shark points into whatever they hit, including people. Their sharp beaks can pierce arteries, organs, and flesh. I even read one report of a young man in the Mediterranean who was pierced through his nose and out the side of his cheek. A little bit of surgery later, and he was good as new.
However, such attacks are rare in this area. But this leads me to a huge question; why do I always seem to learn these types of things AFTER I go chasing after something with my camera?
As always, enjoy the photos!
Oh Beautiful Corsica! Recollections From Miomo 5-11.
Miomo, just outside of Bastia, is a pretty little village
A couple weeks ago, my girlfriend and I sneaked away to Miomo, Corscia for a short, but superb four day weekend. We boarded a ferry from the port in Nice, and settled in for a pleasant six hour commute. On the way there, we saw several dolphins playing in the wake of the boat, and reveled in the clear, deep blue of the sea.
The Corsican accent is pretty pronounced, and was at first, difficult to understand. It is a mix of Italian and French accents with a strange emphasis on certain vowels. I am funny with accents, I was told that by the end of our four days, I had begun to pick up the accent when I spoke. That was fine with me. I really grew to like the accent and the people by the time we left.
We stayed at the hotel : l’Ariana in Miomo, and the staff there were wonderful! I don’t usually call out places to stay in my posts, but the staff and the people were a cut above. They were incredibly accommodating and friendly. We passed quite a bit of time with the staff, just chatting, swapping stories and asking questions. If you are looking for great hotel in the area, this is the one. Just try to get a room with a view of the sea. I should also note the hotel itself was great too – featuring a pool, a wonderful bar overlooking the sea, and a pretty good restaurant to boot.
The water was exceptionally clear
I should also call out the little pizzeria down the street too (there is only one, you can’t miss it). The owner there was super nice to us when we arrived after close. He made us two pizzas to go, and packed up a bottle of Rosé, and even borrowed us two glasses so we could picnic on the beach. Thanks for the wonderful service and thoughtfulness! Oh, and the pizzas were great too. I highly recommend the “Miomaise”.
The absolute highlight of the trip was the boat trip back. We saw lots of rare animals and fish, including at least six or seven Mola Mola, or Poisson Lune. We saw more dolphins very close to Nice, a squid, and several whales. One whale surfaced several times very near to the ship, and we got to see it closer than I have ever seen before. It was incredible.
On to the photos. The water was cool and clear. The waters in the area aren’t very deep, so you have to get pretty far from shore in order to do any diving. Shooting conditions were pretty wonderful overall, but I didn’t really find much in the way of subject matter. There were a lot of fish, but they were pretty timid, and I just didn’t find a lot of little critters to shoot. I was hoping for some interesting nudibranch, or flabelline, or shrimp or something, but I searched in vain. We saw lots of things, just nothing terribly unusual. I took advantage of the clear waters to do some live action shots and had some success. I continued to utilize my simulated HDR technique to bring out the detail in the water. You can see the rays of light playing in many of the shots below.
Back from Corsica
The waters in Scandola were incredibly clear
We got back from Corsica on Monday night. All I can say is wow! What a paradise. We went scuba diving near St. Florent (Ludo Beach), The Cape of Corsica in the north, as well as near Calvi. We were supposed to have done one dive in Porto, farther south, but if got cancelled because of weather. The diving was good, especially near Calvi, but the best thing we did (and indeed one of the best things I’ve ever done on vacation) was to rent a boat out of Porto and cruise up the coast of the Scandola reserve, stopping to snorkel and freedive along the way.
The Scandola reserve is a protected nature reserve with no roads and foot access. The only way to see the area is by boat, and the only way to dive it is without a tank, as scuba diving is not permitted. The shoreline is absolutely stunning, the water was crystal clear, there were critters everywhere, and the water was warm and wonderful. If you are heading to Corsica, I highly recommend the town of Porto and a trip out to the Scandola reserve by rented boat. If you don’t have a license, that’s okay, you can rent a little boat that takes about an hour and a half to get you there, but it still leaves you a load of time to explore if you leave early enough. The next time I am in Corsica, I will be heading back to Porto/Scandola as quickly as I can.
Nudibranch near Calvi
The whole trip was amazing, and I have to say, I was amazed at the things we saw. Right away, from the boat we came in on, we saw dolphins as we arrived. They were jumping and playing next to our boat. We also saw a pod of dolphins playing near The Cape of Corsica in the north on our way to a dive. One thing I didn’t expect at all was to see a gigantic pod of whales on our way out, they were rolling parallel to the boat in the distance. I never thought I would see whales in the Mediterranean but we certainly did. In addition to those two marvels, we also saw rays, conger eels, moray eels of several varieties, nudibranch, barracuda, grouper, cuttlefish, several species of octopus, a triggerfish, and much more.
All in all, it was a fantastic week of sunshine, water, diving, and discovery. Corsica is truly a marvel, and I can’t wait to get back. If you are planning a trip, an want to go scuba diving, make sure to head over towards Calvi. Oh yeah, and one pro tip: if you see a wild pig on the island in Corsica, don’t feed them with your hands. Evidently, they will take everything you hand to them, even a finger or two!
[Update: For those of you who want to see where each shot was taken, I have attached geo-locationing to my shots on my flickr account here: http://www.flickr.com/photos/83275239@N00/sets/72157624429872639/map?&fLat=42.6194&fLon=8.9532&zl=10&order_by=recent ]
[Update 2: I have added the terrestrial shots to my other site. There are photos of Scandola and Piana there: http://www.w3rks.com/?p=63.]
Back From Thailand, Back to “Real Life”
The diving in Koh Tao was excellent. So was the snorkeling!
Well, if you look carefully, the title of the site has changed to “Snorkeling and diving savoir faire for Nice/Côte d’Azur”. That’s because we are now certified recreational divers!
Since we’ve been back, we’ve joined a local diving club, and will be going on our third dive in Nice on Saturday. I can’t wait. I now spend my whole week waiting for the weekend to go diving.
Anyways, the trip was wonderful. We went to Koh Tao, which means “Turtle Island” in Thai. The people there was great, the diving there was great, and it was very inexpensive to get our licenses. One of our instructors mentioned that Koh Tao is the second cheapest place in the world to get PADI certified (I think he said Honduras was cheaper). Indeed, it was half the price it would have been to do it here in Nice. Plus, the whole open water learning process was done in the sea, and never in a pool. On our very first dive in shallow water, we saw a reef shark and a great barracuda. All in the first 4 minutes!
New Heaven Dive School in Koh Tao
We got certified at the New Heaven dive school on Koh Tao, and it was a wonderful experience. The crew there were all incredibly hard workers, were incredibly safety conscious, and did it all while looking totally laid back! I have to send my thanks out to Abel, Jean Nicolas, Andy, and all the other staff for the great and educational time we had there. You can check out their website here: http://www.newheavendiveschool.com/
We got certified there in 3 days, and did a total of 6 dives while on the island. We saw so much while we were there; the aforementioned sharks and barracuda, eels, stingrays, yellow boxfish, porcupine fish, titan triggerfish, a banded sea snake, and so much more. I have uploaded a bunch of underwater photos to show off some of the stuff we saw. Check them out here: http://www.azur-diving.com/Thailand-Marine-Pics/.
I really want to go back. The whole trip was just surreal, and the Thai people were amazing. Before I bounce out for this article, I a throwing in a link to a video I made with snippets from snorkeling and diving. You can see Titan trigger fish, a white-eyed moray eel, a couple reef sharks, a white banded sea snake, porcupine fish, and lots more. Video is below, direct link is: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FqOfLWM-BDA
Port-Cros
Gorgeous and colorful Girelles can be seen at Port-Cros
We spent the last weekend in Port-Cros, which is about 2 hours west of Nice by car. Port-Cros is an Island that features a National Park off the coat near Hyères and Toulon. It is unique in that it features a 600 meter protected maritime zone around the island. The fish and aquatic life are remarkably preserved here, making for excellent snorkeling and diving.
The water was warm (at least in July), even though the lady at the port ticket office in Hyères warned us that the water was terribly cold off shore. You have to take a boat from Hyères to the island (get to the docks early if you want a good seat on the boat!), which takes about an hour. Tickets can be had for about 25 Euros per person.
Once you reach the island, you will have to do some hiking, unless you want to rent a boat. If you have your boating license you can rent, a 25 cc engine boat for something like 140-150 Euros for a half day. If you have no license, you can rent a 6cc boat for about the same. There is also a guy there that has a clear-bottomed boat that runs tours around the bay for around 15 Euros.
Port Cros had several different varieties of Jellyfish when we were there.
We hoofed it to the closest beach, which is called “Plage de la Palud”. It takes about 40 minutes to hike to the spot. If you move real fast (at almost a run), it’s doable in a little over 20. There is some climbing involved, but if you are used to hiking, it is not too bad. The highest altitude is 194 meters on the entire island, or around 600 feet. Decent shoes are recommended, since the path is a bit rough in places, but I did it in flip flops. There are 2 other accessible beaches on the island, but we didn’t make those, since they are quite a bit farther out.
Once at Plage de la Palud, you can find a protected, roped-off area, free from boat traffic to snorkel in. This area is really the jewel of the surrounding area, as there are lots of fish and critters to see. Interestingly, there is a Marine Discovery Hike through the area that has underwater signs with listings and pictures of different fish and plants to help you identify what you are seeing. I found this extremely helpful. Also note that at the port in Port-Cros, you can get waterproofed cards that will guide you through the Marine Discovery Hike.
The last boat back to Hyères leaves at 5:30 pm, so don’t miss it! If you miss it, you have to take a water taxi, which you’ll have to shell out more than 200 Euros for! We made sure we were back an hour early, and we enjoyed a couple drinks and some ice cream at the shops and cafes at the port, which was excellent to cool down and rehydrate at the end of the long day in the sun.
Dorade Royale photographed in Port-Royale
If you go, be sure to bring a good supply of suntan lotion, as there is not much shade, and a beach umbrella would help too. We rigged up a little lean-to using towels and sticks, and that helped a lot.
Oh, and an extra tip, since Hyères lies on what they call in french the “Presqu‘île de Giens“, which is basically a peninsula with a broad land mass connected by a very thin strip of land, be sure to plan for extra time when leaving. Traffic backs up pretty quick (5000 cars go through on busy days) around leaving time, and you might be in for a wait, especially during the high season. One good tip we got that saved us a lot of time was that there are two roads that traverse the narrow strip in and out. The westernmost road is less traveled, and therefore gets less backed up. It was still backed up for us, but the other way looked to be FAR worse.
That’s it, if you get a chance to go, I highly recommend it.
