Truk trip report

After almost 48 hours of planes, airports, and one hotel, I made it to Truk around 7:00 pm local time. I was asleep within a half hour, and woke up at dawn. As I was feeling fairly decent after the journey, I opted to check out the dive shop at Blue Lagoon Resort. It didn't take too much convincing for me to jump on one of the boats, so the Truk diving is officially started. We dove the Shinokoku Maru. It is a tanker that is sitting upright in about 110 feet of water. I did a brief tour of the medical table, and then spent the balance of the dive outside the wreck. The stern gun is so covered with growth, that I could not distinguish it as a gun. There were several areas with artifacts such as bottles and pans, but, the majority of the wreck is an assortment of corals, both hard and soft. Dive two this afternoon.
Ed

SOOOOOOOOOOO JEALOUS!!! We'll be there soon!

I remember that dive

Everyone have a great time on the trip and I'll watch the video again and imagine I'm there too

Keep the reports coming!! See you soon

I remember that dive

Everyone have a great time on the trip and I'll watch the video again and imagine I'm there too

We are going to miss you Butch....

I did a second dive this afternoon. We went to shark island, which is a shark cleaning station. Although I did not see any cleaning activity, there were about two dozen 3-4 foot black tip reef sharks in the area. A very enjoyable dive. Tomorrow's schedule is for the Rio, and one of the planes. We will be doing three dives, but the guide only mentioned the two spots. It is great to be in paradise, and it will only get better as the rest of the group shows up. Ed

Champing at the bit!!!

Oh man! I can't wait!!!!

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Oh man! I can't wait!!!!

We got out for three dives today. Our first stop was the Rio De Janeiro, a cargo ship that is on her side. We swam the hull, and dropped down for a look at the prop. Then we did some minor penetration to look at all of the cases of saki bottles. From there, we took a look at some artillery shells. The second dive was on the sankisan. That is a freighter that had the back half blown apart. We dropped into the first cargo hold and was able to swim from one hold to the next. We saw the remains of a truck, a lot of bullets, and thousands of small medicine bottles. On the deck, we saw the remains of a couple machine guns. The final dive of the day was on the Betty bomber. There is an opening behind the wing, and the nose is off, so you can enter a small hole and swim forward and out of the plane. The two engines are about two hundred feet from the plane. The Odyssey is presently tied up out from the resort, and will be getting ready for our group tomorrow. I am planning on one more dive in the morning, and will board the Odyssey in the afternoon. I am presently sitting at 478 logged dives, so if all goes according to schedule, I will log number 500 next Saturday on the San Francisco Maru. Ed

.... I am presently sitting at 478 logged dives, so if all goes according to schedule, I will log number 500 next Saturday on the San Francisco Maru. Ed

After a day spent touring Pearl Harbor I'm ready to get on to the main course. Looking forward to seeing you tonight Ed.

Hey Ed...here's to #500! And if your dive card is not full...I'd love to dive with you!

I wanted to bring this back to the top and see if anyone had a trip report from the Chuuk portion of the recent expedition!! I'm still working on my report. I have some more to do on it but wanted to see what others thought.

I also posted some pictures in the gallery. If you get a chance go take a look and let me know what you think.

Edited by Jerrymxz, 16 March 2014 - 01:40 PM.

On the way to Chuuk several of us arrived a day early in Hawaii to tour the historical sites in Pearl Harbor. Months prior we had made reservations for the boat ride out to the USS Arizona. Our reservation time was at 0930 so we had some time to tour the very thorough and comprehensive displays and grounds at the visitors’ center. One of the things I didn’t anticipate is the amount of time required to see all there is to see at the visitors’ center.

At our appointed time we boarded the shuttle boat for the ride out to the USS Arizona memorial. The memorial its self was stunning, to see the beautiful white exterior grow in our sight as we approached in the tropical morning sunshine is something I will never forget. Once on the memorial its self the gorgeous design of the actual building comes into focus. While walking in the open center section of the structure you have many opportunities to glimpse the sunken battleship that the memorial sits astride. When a viewing slot was available directly over the ship I walked up and was able to look down into the relatively clear water and view the Ship directly for the first time in my life. In the center of the main room there was a Park service ranger and a veteran volunteer talking about the ship and the events that lead to her demise around a display of a drawing of the USS Arizona and the memorial. After a few minutes of listening to the discourse I wondered over to the opposite side to look out over the stern of the sunken warship. It was here I saw the oil droplets that continue to emerge from the fuel tanks to surface and contribute to the oil sheen that has become synonymous with the Memorial. Toward the rear of the memorial prior to entering the chapel is a large hole in the floor where you can see down into the water and onto the deck of the Arizona without the glare of sunlight to obstruct the view. Entering the chapel at the rear of the memorial I removed my hat and stood in reverence for several long moments to absorb the significance of the place I found myself in on that Friday in February and to connect with the staggering number of names on that white wall before me. I made special notice of a small monument forward of the main wall. Engraved there are the names of men who were assigned to the USS Arizona, survived the attack and have subsequently passed away. Their remains have since been interred within the sunken USS Arizona in the company of their shipmates.

After returning to the visitors center we toured the USS Bowfin. She was a WWII submarine and since turned into a floating museum. The Bowfin is a much bigger boat then the German type VII-C U-Boat I’ve dove on off Morehead City North Carolina. We proceeded over to Ford Island to visit the USS Missouri and the WWII aircraft museum. Both of these are well worth the time and effort to see. Even after all the ensuing years a battleship is still a very imposing piece of hardware. In my humble opinion the United States should pull her out of mothballs and keep her sea worthy and partially mission capable to train new navy personnel, and to deploy as a symbol of American strength and grandeur. I’ll put my soap box away now. This day was everything I had hoped it was going to be. I want to thank the people who went along and made it even more special; Bill, Tim, Susan, and Fred THANK YOU!