Belize Aggressor March 1991

 

Click here for a map of Belize

 

This trip was my first trip with the Aggressor fleet and my second on a live aboard dive boat.  I liked the idea of “Eat, Sleep and Dive”, the Aggressor motto.  Belize was a relatively easy destination to reach and has the second longest barrier reef in the world.  It seemed like a perfect way to enjoy a one week vacation.

 

The trip turned out to exceed my expectations.  The boat Captain was Clay Wiseman, a well known underwater photographer.  The lead divemaster was his wife Jeannie.  Both appear in the video - Clay using a mirror to get a gobi to display aggressive behavior and Jeannie in her trademark yellow wet suit.  This video is unusual because it contains a short scene of me underwater – I think Jeannie took that shot.  You can tell me because I was using a back mounted BC.  At the time this video was shot none of the major manufacturers were making harnesses for back mounted BCs on single tanks.  My good friend Denny McLaughlin and I had developed a “home made” harness for a set of SeaTec wings.  All the other guests were in jacket style BCs and thought I was some kind of nut.  I think at first Clay did too, but as the week wore on he decided that there was a method to my madness and started asking me about the features of this strange BC.  Later on when I met him again in Truk, he proudly showed me some of the features he had incorporated from our first meeting.  BTW every major dive manufacturer now makes a back mounted BC for single tanks – I guess I missed my opportunity to strike it rich.

 

This video starts with some nice footage of usually very shy jaw fish, contains nice shots of reasonable large groupers, barracuda, ocean sun fish, and a nice turtle scene near the end.

 

On the flight on the way home, I learned that all the land based divers had not been able to dive all week.  The wind from the east had made dive conditions to rough on the sites reachable by the day boats.  We never noticed on the Aggressor because the Captain had kept the islands and reefs between us and the wind all week so our dive conditions were very pleasant – another reason why live aboard diving is great!

 

 

Click here to learn more about the Belize Aggressor

 

Click here to learn more about Clay Wiseman