Ecuador 2015-2019 – Isla de la Plata

I went several times in Ecuador, but I was never able to dive in Galapagos.

On the other hand, I found out that you can get great dives in Ecuador, even if you are based on the mainland. Isla de la Plata is an amazing island, very reach in marine life, that is part of the Machalilla National Park, in the province of Manabì. I dived there a few times with Exploramar Diving: https://www.exploradiving.online/. (They are based in Puerto Lopez, one hour driving from Montañita).

The first time I dived in Isla de la Plata, I was a clumsy open water. I did not have a lot of experience, but that consideration was not enough from refraining to dive in an unknown part of the world.

As I suffer from sea sickness, the hour navigation from Puerto Lopez devastated me. But it was July, manta season, whales migration season, so I could not be too distracted from the nausea.

While heading to the island, in fact, we bump into a whale. At that time of the year, whales comes from Antartica to warmer water for the reproduction season. We stop for a while to admire it, trying to get as closest as possible. I wonder why we don’t enter the water to dive next to it.

We continue for our destination and as soon as the boat stopped, I ask to jump into the water and start feeling better.

We descend very slowly, holding the rope, because there is a strong current. And while we are doing so, it arrives. It passes in front of my eyes. Slow, majestic and hieratic like a queen. The manta ray.

Wow.

Not even 5 minutes in the water, not even 5 meters depth and I have already seen a manta ray, the first of my life (and so far the only one). It is very close and I can see it very well.

To be honest I can’t recall the rest of that dive, because the manta occupied my mind for the rest of the time. At the end of the dive, sharing the comments with the other divers, I found out that the group of advanced divers spent all the 45-minute dive to play with the manta rays at a depth of 20 mt and something and I am very jealous.

In 2019, I came back to Isla de la Plata to dive with my sister, always with Exploramar. We arrive on the island and the DM is unsure about the best spot. He presents us with two options, asks us what we prefer, we have no clue about either of them, so we just pick one randomly, go there and jump into the water.

You can tell that the DM knows his stuff. In fact, wherever we look we only see sand. But he, he knows which wonders are hidden under the sandy bottom. Very carefully, very slowly, he starts removing sand from a spot and after a while we can clearly see the shape of… a guitar fish!!! Guitar fish is so rare that I’d never believe I would actually be able to see one during a dive. But, here he is, right under my nose.

10 minutes later, he unearths two giants stingrays, one of each looks like having a diameter of around 2 mt. They are really huge and I’m caught between stupor and a light fear.

Obviously, I left my GoPro onboard, so the images of that dive exists only in my head.

They call Isla de la Plata « the Galapagos of the poor men ». We might be poor, but those waters are not.

Pictures and video are courtesy of Exploramar Diving.