Hilma Hooker, Salt Pier, Bari Reef (Bonaire Day 2)

The next morning we headed to the Hilma Hooker. There was, not surprisingly, a "lot" of traffic on this site. A bunch of cars pulled up as we were getting in. There were some tarpon and biggish barracuda on the wreck. We went counterclockwise around the wreck, with Rob posing me for various pictures. We also did a brief swimthrough of the hold. Then we headed up to the propeller. Near that, on the hull, I found a slug! It looked like a mini sea hare. Rob independently formed the opinion that it looked like an Aplysia. It was really tiny, and Rob was shooting wide angle, so I don't think we'll ever know exactly what it was. We then headed up the reef and south, where we saw the usual stuff. Eventually we turned the dive and headed up the slope.

In the afternoon we went to the Salt Pier. It has a nice easy entry -- not so much slippery broken coral to negotiate. We knew this would be a shallow dive, so we planned to save gas for a night dive. I was expecting this site to be like Town Pier, with lots of macro life on the pilings. It was, in fact, a bit different. Instead of tiny critters all over, it had bigger corals and sponges growing on the pilings. There were also tons of fish loitering under some of the piers. I couldn't believe how many fish there were at this site. Unfortunately we missed one of the piers by accident (the on Benji had told us was the best :( ). This can happen when somebody doesn't let the leader lead the dive. In the shallows there was a bait ball that pelicans were diving into. The dive had a decent current, which pushed us along on our way out (south).

After that dive, we had plenty of gas left for a night dive on the house reef. The highlights of the night dive were two tarpon following us and using our lights to hunt, a small octopus out free swimming, and about 5 basket stars that were open. I was super excited about the basket stars. I couldn't believe it when I just kept finding more.

For dinner, we went to Pasa Bon Pizza. I was craving veggies, so pizza worked well. They have a black kitty there who I played with a little.