Chandelier Cave is an interesting dive that is located very close to the dive shops in Koror, Palau. The entrance is a small opening that is only about 10 feet from the surface of the water in an unassuming location along the shore near where boats are moored.
The cave consists of five different locations where there are air pockets at the top of the water. You can surface in those chambers and see the cave in air. We didn’t visit it, but the entrance to the “fifth” chamber is a small opening in the air pocket of the fourth chamber. If you want to visit that space, you need to take off your scuba gear and wiggle through the hole (in air) into the fifth chamber.
There are also haloclines in the cave where the fresh and saltwater mix and produce an eerie blurry effect. There are numerous stalactites throughout the cave which indicates that at one point it was an air cave (stalactites don’t form in water).
You need to be careful not to disturb the bottom of the cave since it is sandy and silty and can easily be disturbed which would ruin the visibility and make finding the exit tougher. Note that there is not a permanent line in the cave.
Outside the cave, if you look close enough, there is actually a lot of life. The divemaster pointed out a few of the very-hard-to-photograph mandarinfish hiding amongst the coral. I’m not really a small macro photographer and didn’t have the right lens, but managed to capture one of them:
If you are in Palau and are comfortable diving in this type of environment, I highly recommend going to dive Chandelier Cave.
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Those are some of the best pictures I’ve ever seen from you! Looks absolutely amazing!!!
Thanks, Mark! Diving in clear water with a lot of sunlight makes a huge difference. 🙂
I and a buddy were there i 1984,a week of diving Palau areas,then on to Truk (chuuK) for 2 weeks more.The cave was awesome.What our eyes saw had depth,almost like a good 3-D production.I shot 36 exposures of ektachrome slides.They all looked great but were missing that “deph of field” that only the eye can see,especially with very large Stalagtites and mites.I think if you brought some (3) small “Slave” strobes into the cave with your main stobe,you might be able to re-create that depth,like the eye sees.Place the the slaves behind the “tites” and “mites” about 10′ apart.Now use your camera and main strobe to set the slaves “OFF” ,re-creating some depth of field.A 3-D camera in a housing is the best solution,if possible to rent.GOOD LUCK & EnJOY ! it all !
Thanks for reading and for your thoughts & comments! If I ever go back, I would probably shoot with on-board flash and use video lights for the remote parts. It would be cool. I also have a 3D camera I could bring. However, right now, I don’t have any plans to head back to Palau. Maybe in the future. 🙂
– brett