|
Felipe’s Place
 OldProvidence Island, Colombia
|
Max Depth: Over 150ft/46m
Average Viz: 91-100ft/28-30m
Entry Type: Boat
Bottom Composition: Sand
Aquatic Life: Plenty To See
|
Rating: 4.25 by 4 divers
Winter: 76-80°F/24-27°C
|
|
|
|
Felipe’s Place is a boat accessible salt water dive site, located in OldProvidence Island, Colombia. This dive site has an average rating of 4.25 out of 5 from 4 scuba divers. The maximum depth is over 150ft/46m. The average visibility is 91-100ft/28-30m.
It’s the diving site par excellence in Old Providence and St. Catalina, named after Felipe Cabeza, who described, explored, and popularized it, just as he has done for many dive sites throughout Providence reef barrier. The tour, with different difficulty levels, which can be decided according to experience of divers, takes 10 minutes in a boat ride from the dive centers; signaled by a buoy, anchored on a coralline shoal at 35 ft of depth where immersion begins. The bottom is a terrace covered by a dense community of soft coral (especially Pseudopterogorgia) which forms a vast garden in perpetual and harmonious movement, inside of which rigid pillar corals (Dendrogyra cylindrus) and beautiful sponges stand out. Clouds of small reef fishes move about and take refuge in the coral labyrinth and in innumerable empty spaces and bends on the bottoms, where the minute coral reef diversity is hidden. Fifty meters further, one descends smoothly towards a channel of white sands flanked by hills covered in the stony coral that for about 60 ft is dominated by star coral (Montastrea annularis, M. cavernosa and M. franksi) which adopts, in those that incline most strongly, the typical form of roof tiles (shingle reef). In its steepest parts, the channel has small walls of vivid colors. After a slight ascent, one arrive at the edge of a cliff which descends from 60 to more than 100 ft and constitutes, together with the final part, the most attractive of the submarine flight. The cliff wall, concave, deep blue, descends to a white sand bottom, 50 ft lower; innumerable sponges, soft whip and black corals and sea fans, projecting from the wall change the perspective. In a cloud up, you discover that the wall is covered by the most impressive reef life: algae and encrusted sponges, corals, crabs, small fish which swim up side down, sea urchins and lobsters. In the surroundings, the possibility of observing turtles, barracudas and sharks increase. After advancing 150 ft alongside the wall, where one can descend to a 120 ft depth, a large fissure appears, evidence of millennial erosion. The fissure is a deeply carved fissure which forms an ascending strait between narrow walls, with impressive light contrasts, which leads you from 80 to the 40 ft of the departure platform.