Our first dive was back at Turtle Pinnacles, complete with turtles – though again, I spent most of the dive trying to stay clear of all the photographers, and just tooling around coral heads looking for eels. I did get some cute footage of a peacock grouper trying to nudge an eel into hunting, but the eel wasn’t in the mood to play.

I did not chase this turtle – he swam right over my head:

After the dive, the boat motored over near the entrance of the harbor, where a pod of dolphins was swimming around. A bunch of us slid into the water (with our wetsuits this time), but for quite some time the dolphins were elusive, diving deep down to swim under us, and then surfacing in the distance. There was boat traffic in the area, so it was a bit of a trick to keep one eye out for dolphins beneath you and another for boats on the surface!

As if a switch had been flipped, the dolphins suddenly decided they were feeling friendly after all. They started cruising close to divers in small groups, making shallower dives and staying in eyesight. Unfortunately, right about that time, the divemasters decided that the boat traffic was getting a bit too dangerous, and called us all back in. Oh well – at least no one got stung this time.

Wednesday night was a slideshow by the photo pros, specially designed to make everyone else in the room feel inadequate and talentless. No, really, it’s a wonderful event – Marty Snyderman and David Fleetham both presented shows that awed us all. Eric Cheng showed lots of shark photos and video footage, along with many of his amusing, trademark self-portraits. (Taken underwater – that takes talent.) The evening was topped off with some video highlights from Jeff Leicher, owner of Jack’s Diving Locker, whose work always leaves me green with envy at the same time it has me rolling in the aisles. There was some especially adorable footage of a monk seal playing with a floating coconut that was a serious crowd-pleaser. It’s such a privilege to have the chance to dive and work with all these guys during the Classic!