Cocos, the island of the sharks

The greatest dive trip of my life was visiting Cocos in June 2004.

Cocos (real name in Spanish is "Isla del Coco") is a legendary destination for divers looking for big fish and sharks. It is one of the National Parks of Costa Rica and is located in the Pacific Ocean, 550 km (330 mi.) from the shore. As an isolated archipelago in the vastness of the Pacific, Cocos is a magnet to marine life and as you can see on the series of videos below, offers many of the most thrilling encounters in scuba diving: whale-sharks, manta rays, schools of Scalloped Hammerhead, dolphins and huge aggregations of fish such as Jack and Snapper. While the area has suffered from illegal fishing, it is still one of the very best spots for diving in the world.


Click the link below to watch the diveflix of Cocos:

Cocos, the island of the sharks



It is not easy to reach Cocos. The only way to visit the national park is by live-aboard. And as of February ’08, there are only 3 boats that can take you there: 2 from the Undersea Hunter fleet and the Okeanos Aggressor. And keep in mind that the crossing from Costa Rica to Cocos takes some 36 hours on each way... so that's 3 days of steaming in total. It is truly a trip for serious divers.

My Cocos cruise was on board the Undersea Hunter. The crew is very experienced and well-prepared – they need to be, since the trip is way out in the ocean – and resources such as the fast skiff boats and Dolphin rebreathers for rental are as good as you can find in live-aboards. The boat is not the most spacious, cabins and living room are tight, but I have to say is a fine boat and they run a world-class operation. In fact, the boats have been rented by professional videographers, including for the making of the IMAX movie “The Island of the Sharks”. While I do not have first-hand experience with the Aggressor boat, reports are mixed and the perception I have is that it is a notch below the competition. When I plan my next trip to Cocos, I will look for the Undersea hunter again.

The diving in Cocos is spectacular but it is for advanced divers only. The dive sites are deep – divers will often reach close to or beyond 140 feet (40 meters) – and currents and wave action can be a concern. On my trip, all the passenger divers on board were very experienced, including a few professionals such as Leroy French. I would recommend this trip for the very passionate diver who already has logged a few hundred dives and who has actual experience with deep dives and currents. Having said that, the way the dives are set on a Cocos cruise, you are never alone. The divers are divided in 2 groups of 6 to 8 persons and 2 dive masters guide each group.

There are basically only 2 seasons in Cocos: the "dry season"and the wet season (running from June to November). While the water is clearer and calmer on the dry season, there are more big fish on the wet season. Most notably, the schooling hammerheads tend to rise in number as the wet season progresses. According to the Undersea Hunter crew, the months of July and August offer the best chance to find massive schools of sharks and big pelagics, but at the same time that's when the sea can be the roughest and it might rain - heavily - every day of the cruise.

There is a lot more to write about Cocos. Stay tuned to future posts that will cover diving with rebreathers (a great idea in a place like Cocos!) and detail the dive operation, the sites and the encounters with the great pelagics of the Pacific.

Snorkeling with Whales in Tonga

If diving in Cocos was the best dive trip I've ever done, the most thrilling encounter was snorkeling eye-to-eye with a couple of Humpback Whales (Megaptera novaeangliae) in the crystal clear waters of Tonga, South Pacifc in August 2005. For a few magical minutes, my life centered on slowly swimming towards the largest living creatures I've ever seen and filming the event.



I came as close as 6 feet from the whales - an intense experience! Between trying to savor every detail, keeping the video camera steady and being terrified once I came real close... what a rush! It feels like a dream now... After a couple of minutes of allowing my presence and checking me out - and the whales really look at you, eye-to-eye - the two giants calmly, silently, initiated a descent to the blue depths of the Pacific.

So I had the good fortune of a close encounter with the Humpback Whales, one of the most charismatic and fascinating of all marine mammals. For me, it was a fleeting but very satisfying dive experience. To get as close as I did to creatures so magnificent, on their natural habitat, on a sunny, beautiful winter day in the South Pacific and sharing the tale with fellow divers later on that same evening on board a comfortable boat... such are the rewards that modern day recreational diving can offer. But, as is often the case with many of the best nature encounters, it doesn't come easy.


Whale watching has grown into a billion dollar industry, allowing everyone from nature enthusiasts and serious photographers to ordinary families to get closer to cetaceans. But for scuba divers, close encounters underwater with whales are hard to come by. In areas where whales aggregate, such as Hawaii, diving is often off-limits, as it is prohibited by the authorities. As far as I know, there are only two places in the world where a diver is allowed to actively pursue underwater encounters with the Humpback Whale: in the Kingdom of Tonga, South Pacific, and the Silver Banks off the Dominican Republic .

On my trip to Tonga, I spend 10 days on NAIA, a live-aboard based on Fiji that steams south to Tongan waters from July to September to meet the whales that congregate in the waters near the Haapai islands. If you are flying to Tonga, you will probably first reach Fiji and then take a short 2 hour flight to reach Tongatapu, the main island of Tonga. The Kingdom of Tonga is a tranquil island nation with a little more than 100, 000 inhabitants. English is spoken everywhere. The Tongan people are friendly and really live in their own mellow island time. We will have more to say about this little known Polynesian nation in future posts.


The future of the Humpback Whale and other species of cetaceans is far from secure, I regret to say. The increase in public awareness in the last few decades has allowed for remarkable successes, but continuous activism and further research on the whales will be necessary to protect them. Please refer to the links below to visit the sites of worthy organizations that are active on the advocacy and research of whales and other marine mammals.

• The Ocean Alliance is dedicated to the conservation of whales and their ocean environment through research and education.
• The Pew Whale Conservation Project.
• The Whale and Dolphin Conservation Society.
• The oldest whale conservation organization in the world, the American Cetacean Society protects whales, dolphins, porpoises, and their habitats through public education, research grants, and conservation actions.

Welcome to diveflix

Hi everybody,

if you like diving, marine life and underwater video, then this blog is for you. I've been an avid diver for more than 20 years and I am excited to share my experiences and images. The main goal of this blog is to entertain and educate by sharing my underwater video archives filmed around the world. Another goal is to to write daily about my passion: the marine environment and its amazing creatures.

My postings will be at times upbeat and other times gloomy. On one hand, I will try to convey the excitement and emotion of good diving and encounters with sea life, when life is beautiful and all is well. On the other hand, the natural environment is under enormous pressure from climate change and human interference. Much of the richness of life on earth is being wiped out as we speak, including at our beloved coral reefs and dive sites. We need to write about all those unfortunate developments as well. We can't afford not to cover the degradation of the oceans... now that I think of it, promoting the organizations and initiatives that are fighting for the seas will be a priority here.

For this initial post, I am adding a short teaser video with some of the best dives I've made. From the sharks and manta rays of Cocos to the humpback whales of Tonga; from the sea lions of California to the colorful walls of Fiji; from the crystal clear waters of Hawaii to the coral gardens of the Caribbean and shark diving in the Bahamas... we will cover all this in more depth as I publish the blog.



I will love to hear from you. Post your comments and they will be read and answered. Thanks for reading this first post and I hope to see you come back often. Happy diving!