Snorkeling at the Twin Tanks

Yesterday Adam and I went snorkeling with Paul and Diane to the Twin Tanks, which are these huge tanks that were dropped into the ocean at least a hundred years ago. No one knows how they got there but now they are covered with coral and many marine creatures make them their home. It was really cool! I saw many different species of fish (including parrot fish, a sting ray, sea urchins, fire coral, gargonians, brain coral, flamingo tongues (which are parasitic gastropods that feed on sea fans), and lots of other interesting sights. I have been looking forward to snorkeling and diving in the DR since I heard that I was going there. Hopefully this will be the first of many trips because Paul and Diane just moved from Spain to set up a dive shop at Ceyba Park, which is right down the street from us. The Twin Tanks is going to be one of their dive sites. Also, next week I´m going with Darien to La Caleta Park just outside of Santo Domingo to check out the lobster houses that are there. ReefCheck with the help of a Peace Corp volunteer has put in about 100 lobster houses there and we are going there to learn how they are made, where they are put, and how to capture the lobsters.

Here´s a photo of Ceyba Park. This place is very odd. More than 10 years ago they started builting this multimillion dollar community but they never were able to get it off the ground. Each of the houses were supposed to cost over a million dollars. The owner and the architect visits every once in a while, but they are so rich that it doesn´t really matter that it is just sitting there. This photo is of the two cascading pools that they have that overlooks the private beach.















On the way to the dive site we met up with a group of fishermen that had killed a spotted eagle ray. When asked if they were going to eat it, the fishermen replied that the people eat everything, which is true. It´s categorized as near threatened by the IUCN Red List. Sorry I don´t have any pictures of beautiful fish that are alive to counteract this picture. Guess I need to get a waterproof camera.