Saturday, April 15, 2006
a big blue day
the forecast for today was the best out of the weekend. light offshore breezes and not much swell, then a change. so we decided to head outside the bay to take advantage of the conditions and try and find some clear water after the big swells last weekend.
we went a place called spider cave. the cave is fun, and not dangerous, even when there is some swell. and if you are good at finding things, there are little spiders living in the sponges on the rocks down near the sand line.
as we got there, we noticed that the water was blue, could be quite a bit clearer than inside, but a cloudy blue, so maybe not that clear. the boss asked if wanted to go for a dive. woohoo! i run around, find all my gear, find my camera, and beat the customers into the water. the boss asked if i could see the bottom from the surface, i said i couldn’t, so she said “swim closer!”.
:-p it’s an oft repeated joke but usually we tell it to the customers. only a few metres down though and i could see the bottom. at 27 metres i lay bottom under the 18m shot line, and could see the boat and divers jumping in quite clearly. took a few divers into spider cave, chased some fishies around, blinded them with my flash, and headed back out to where i’d last seen the shot line. i figured with visability this good, i’d be able to see it. i got out to the right depth, but no shotline, drat, then i spotted an eagle ray sitting on the sand. it was even clearer out there, he was over 20 metres away from me and i reckon the visability was more than 35 metres.
it swam away, then i looked at my computer, oops, 1 min and i’m gonna have to do a deco stop. so i swim back up to the cliff face and do my safety stop there, watching the other divers milling around and checking out the fishies.
i pop up to see that the boat has swung around and the swell has picked up considerably. oops. back on the boat and it’s a bit of a panic to get the anchor up and move away a bit before 80 tons of steel starts bouncing off the rocks.
beautiful clear warm water. i love my job
the forecast for today was the best out of the weekend. light offshore breezes and not much swell, then a change. so we decided to head outside the bay to take advantage of the conditions and try and find some clear water after the big swells last weekend.
we went a place called spider cave. the cave is fun, and not dangerous, even when there is some swell. and if you are good at finding things, there are little spiders living in the sponges on the rocks down near the sand line.
as we got there, we noticed that the water was blue, could be quite a bit clearer than inside, but a cloudy blue, so maybe not that clear. the boss asked if wanted to go for a dive. woohoo! i run around, find all my gear, find my camera, and beat the customers into the water. the boss asked if i could see the bottom from the surface, i said i couldn’t, so she said “swim closer!”.
:-p it’s an oft repeated joke but usually we tell it to the customers. only a few metres down though and i could see the bottom. at 27 metres i lay bottom under the 18m shot line, and could see the boat and divers jumping in quite clearly. took a few divers into spider cave, chased some fishies around, blinded them with my flash, and headed back out to where i’d last seen the shot line. i figured with visability this good, i’d be able to see it. i got out to the right depth, but no shotline, drat, then i spotted an eagle ray sitting on the sand. it was even clearer out there, he was over 20 metres away from me and i reckon the visability was more than 35 metres.
it swam away, then i looked at my computer, oops, 1 min and i’m gonna have to do a deco stop. so i swim back up to the cliff face and do my safety stop there, watching the other divers milling around and checking out the fishies.
i pop up to see that the boat has swung around and the swell has picked up considerably. oops. back on the boat and it’s a bit of a panic to get the anchor up and move away a bit before 80 tons of steel starts bouncing off the rocks.
beautiful clear warm water. i love my job
