With our sleep deficit replenished we started to the next item of the agenda early in the morning Reaching the diving center at 8:00 a.m. we drove the boats out to the open sea to observe lemon sharks. A fantastic sight which justified the early start. It was so beautiful that we spontaneously added a 2nd dive. That way we saw incredible numbers of sharks (blacktip, lemon and nurse sharks) which sometimes came very near. Didier fed some anemonefish here, and he obviously enjoyed it!
In contrast to the lemon sharks, which showed less interest, the blacktip reef sharks responded sensationally well to the JBL food MariPearls we had brought along with us. A large titan triggerfish was so interested in the food that it bit into the tin. Its incredibly strong teeth made Roland worry about his fingers and let go of the tin. On this occasion you really noticed the strength and agility of the animals. They lost their natural shyness completely where food was involved. At a depth of 20m the feeding tests were not working out as well as planned, since the red snappers kept stealing the tins. They bit and shoved the divers so much that we gave up. Actually this is a good feedback for the food, but we had hoped to carry out the tests with more species. Nevertheless it was a funny sight when we were surrounded by the fish until the tins couldn’t be seen anymore. The sharks kept themselves discreetly in the background, yet could smell the food and swam progressively closer circles around us.
Around noon we went back for a meal and then headed out for whale watching in the afternoon. Unfortunately we couldn’t find any humpback whales, but we did find sufficient numbers of pilot whales instead. A group of 30 eagle rays swam passed us too, and impressed with their size and elegance. Having spent the whole day in the water, almost everyone got sunburn. Back onshore we were able to find some day geckos, close by the hotel, where they were not really normally found. This Phelsuma species normally lives in Moorea. It looks like the more familiar Madagascar day gecko.
Around 5 p.m. we took the boat back to Papeete. There we spent the night knowing that the flight would be very early the next day.
