Wet Suit City

Find a comfortable entry to the left of the lagoon, and, if the currents allow, make your dive to the left. This is good shot of both Airplane Wreck and of Wet Suit City.

We were diving here in Aug of 2011. We had stayed at the old Sunset Waters Resort/Divers there many times before it went out of business. The diving was still great. I forgot how easy it was. You can now park at the beach, gear up at your car, and walk in. Very short swim out of lagoon and to the airplane. We went to the left out of the lagoon. Very nice elephant ear sponges and purple stovepipe sponges. A turtle hung out with us for a while. He liked the sponges too! We had 4 divers. 2 dove while 2 watched the truck. Great beach to look for shells during surface intervals.

Actually to get there, you have to go west on the 1st road south of main street that states Sta. Martha. The previous entrance is locked. The new one goes right by a school and then past the 'ruins.' Pretty sad to see what used to be a beautiful resort. Very easy entrance, but lots of locals. Beware of your belongings. Very neat for pictures of the abandoned resort. Was there in May of 2011.

11/25/2009 Sunset City is closed as of Summer 2009. Place was cleaned out/deserted/pilfered though, dive shop closed. No one at the beach on a Wednesday afternoon. Looked like a nice beach, probably crowded with locals on weekend. Did not dive. To get to beach, look for driveway to the right of the former office and take down to park right at the beach.

I also know this site as "Harry's Hole;" it is the "house reef" in front of the Sunset Waters Resort. Nine of the twenty dives I made here were at night. Entry is very easy in the man-made lagoon. Numbered markers make UW navigation easy, particularly at night. Great reef life, and a good chance to see octopus and seahorse. There are a few pelagics, although I occasionally saw a hawksbill turtle and one young eagle ray. Ask about the seahorse(s) at the Sunset Divers' Shop (on site). You can rent your tanks there as well. The hotel staff will allow you to drive down to the beach to drop off your dive gear, but you must first ask at the desk. Great macro opportunities for photographers. Be wary of unpredictable current (could be East or West, and sometimes strong). If a strong current is running east, you'll be diving toward "Mako's Mountain" which is nice, too, but strong surf in the spring makes the western part of the reef a little bit shabby in places. The airplane wreck is much over-rated, but it makes a nice landmark for ending your dive. See recent pictures of the reef life at my web site www.geocities.com/amy_laz . You may want to eat at the resort restaurant, as the food is really good and there is often live entertainment at dinner time.

Great dive. Dive this site at night!

The farther we dived to the left on this site, the worse the reef looked. In fact, after about 25 minutes, the reef looked like someone had done his best to clear the area of coral. We dove this at 60 feet on the way out and 30 feet on the way in, and there were large sections of the reef that appeared to be dead without any chance of recovery. The dive definitely is better if you stay closer to the entry point.

Man, did I ever find out why they call this Wet Suit City! I don't Even need to look in my logbook to remember this one. It was my first experience with fire coral. Funny that I had seen lots of fire coral in pictures, but I didn't realize it would be so small and innocent looking in real life. It took about 2 seconds after brushing my hand against it to realize, wow, this is probably fire coral! The pain wasn't as intense as getting a sea urchin spike in your hand, but it got my attention. The pain went away after about 15 minutes, and life was good again -- so wear your wet suit!!! Anyway, the dive was really neat. We went down to about a 100 feet since it was the first dive of the day. Sea fans, sponges, and moray eels. The best was the garden eels. Way cool creatures! I think I used up most of my air just laying there waiting for them to poke their little heads out of the sand. I gotta get a camera! There were a lot of Grunts in the area looking for handouts, too. They seemed pretty aggressive, maybe because this is a resort area and they are used to people handing out food. If you're gonna feed the fish, wear gloves, they will bite you to make you drop the food! We saw a great Spotted Drum in the shallows, and did our safety stop watching him flutter about. So, underwater, you will have a good time- guaranteed! This is a resort here, but we laid out on the beach after the dive anyway. I don't think they minded. There is a dive shop there, so you can get more tanks if you want to dive some more in the area. Also, there are boats overhead, since there is that small boat launch nearby, so listen for motor sounds and surface carefully. Dive-On, Dude!