New Years Eve we welcomed in the New Year with a private function for the
staff of Bayview Caravan Park & Holiday Village at the back of the Lodge.
Chris put on a brilliant fire twirling show and, for his efforts, I don't
think there was a hair left on his hands. He made it look easy but using
the same motions as a long poi I know how difficult it can be when you are
doing doubles .. up, over and around ensuring you don't set your hair or
skirt on fire. I think this was the first New Years ever where the cops did
not have to arrest anyone for the night. I snuck off to bed once all the
kissing & hugging was over .. I needed a bit of a catnap before the 7:30am
call to rise & shine for our New Years Day dive.
On the way down to the beach at 8:15am we came across a few party-goers who
were still at it. We were the only boat out that morning.. and due to that
we were able to pick and choose what dive mooring we wanted, which was
fortunate as the winds were still a problem. Knowing the glass bottom
boats would not be taking snorkellers out till sometime in the afternoon we
decided to dive on a couple of their more regular snorkel sites just to see
what was there.
Dive #7 was way out near where the open ocean broke over the reef wall.
Fish every where zooming around left, right and centre. As I was feeling
lazy I just sat on my knees in the sand watching all the activity for a
while - it was like being in the middle of a busy road crossing. This spot
had some lovely staghorn formations ... each being nibbled on, the algae
that is, by the convict surgeon fish, numerous types of parrotfish and
various wrasses of all shapes, sizes and colours. Slowly finning over to
the reef wall itself I was surprised to find the sand had been totally
sucked out from this area so there were many small caves and ledges to
check out. Found a family of spotted sweetlips in one cave. Lots of blue-
spotted orange stingrays here trying their best to hide headfirst under the
ledges. Many of the damsel fish were grunting and doing their best to
attack you if you came anywhere near where they had laid their eggs.
A small manta ray came by .. don't know what it was doing on this side of
the bay as normally they only cruise up & down the waters between Maud's
Landing, Oyster Bridge and the main coral porites dive site further north.
Dive #8 was at a spot closer in to shore where the Coral Bay Adventures
glassbottom boat frequents on a daily basis. The fish here (schnapper,
spangled emperor, fusiliers, sargent majors and blue-green chromis) had
obviously become accustomed to being feed as they were around the boat as
soon as we moored. This site was very pretty .. stacks of different types
of coral reaching up towards the surface. Again many large flutemouths
(all three colours), schools of various types of surgeonfish were skirting
around many of the staghorn coral patches. Came across a dinner plate
sized turtle slowly cruising along popping up now & again for a breath
above. Saw three different types of pufferfish. The larger ones always
have that funny comical look on their faces when you corner them for a shot
and they don't know which way to go.
Today things were back to normal in Coral Bay. The dive shop was open for
business and the various skippers were motoring out in their dingies to
prepare their vessels for passengers. That could be anything from a manta
ray/turtle/dolphin snorkel, dive trip inside or outside the reef, fishing
charter, out for a sail, a fishing charter or a 4-wheel drive and kayak
adventure.
Dive #9 we were back at Eel Bommie. I spent 85mins uw at this site .. one
of my favourite spots. The wobbegongs were still sleeping in the same
caves we saw them in during the previous dive here. Took lots of piccies
of a beautiful black & white firefish. Found a very pretty large cowrie
shell lying in the rubble which I was lining up to take a piccie of before
I realised the beautiful creature I expected to pop out any moment to show
its lovely mantle would not be - as it had already been eaten. On turning
it over a spotted a very small hermit crab had taken up residence. But, as
the shell was way, way too large for it, the crab could not move the shell
so I scrounged around in the broken shell area for a small shell for it
leaving that shell turned over right next to the now turned over cowrie
shell in the hope the hermit crab would realise the smaller shell was more
suitable for it. I finned off checking out all the new sponges that had
started to take over many of the coral bommies here. Very surprised when I
chanced across a baby numb ray that was rolling to & fro in the swell -
unfortunately dead. Never knew numb rays existed in this area so that is
one thing I will have to check up on with the WA museum folk when I get
back. Found quite a few nudibranchs out on the crawl which I photographed
to death .. atleast they don't run away giving you a tail-end view.
There is one particular anemone that for the life of me I can not figure
out why it exists in the middle of the sand and rubble where it has no
protection at all. The anemone itself is still quite small but it is home
to two large clarkii and 3 baby clarkii, plus a family of dominoes. Yet
there is a large anemone literally of the same type as that one (adhesive
anemone) that is in a very protected area but has nothing on it. No
anemonefish or shrimps. Go figure! I have been tempted at times to take a
net down and try and catch all those on the swell-swept anemone and move
them over to the calmer more protected anemone .. but nature has its own
way of dealing with things. So I continue to marvel at how the clarkii
continue to breed, put up with all the wrasse picking and poking at the
rocks around them, and cope with the copious amounts of sand that drift
across their anemone daily. I shot my last two shots of slide film on the
anemonefish .. had been hunting around for the large baler shell that is
resident in this area but it had disappeared somewhere else. Yep, you
guessed it .. while I was finning back to the boat there it was .. the
baler shell out in all its glory trumpeting along under the damn boat.
Bugger .. no film left.
Dive #10 - north of Asho's Gap. The Ningaloo Reef dive shops boat -
Exmouth Dive - was already diving off Asho's Gap so we swung a big arch
around them to get to the north end mooring to ensure we did not connect
with any of their divers. Lots of coral heads just under the surface of
the water here so a bit of a tricky weave in & out before we were safely
moored. Off we all went in the hope of seeing the sharks again on the
cabbage patch coral .. quite a bit of a swim to get over to the main bommie
but once were were on that side and had seen the sharks it was easy in the
current to cruise back slowly down the western side up & around a few of
the bommies on the northern dive site. The vis was certainly a lot better
this time and there were more fish out roaming about. A very large school
of sailfin tangs were dancing around us at one point as we drifted along.
All the anemonies look healthy with lots of orange anemonefish in
residence. Every now & again a large sweetlip or grouper would appear near
a coral bommie and once it realised we had sighted it would disappear in to
a gap in the coral. There is one turtle in particular that is a regular
here .. it is missing one front fin so had a bit of difficulty swimming.
When it was still a youngin I recall watching it crash in to some of the
tall coral formations that happened to be in its path before it built up
enough momentum to get above them. Now that it has become accustomed to
all the divers and snorkellers that frequent the northern end of this dive
site it slowly takes its time chomping on sponges and any jellyfish it is
lucky to catch instead of bolting for its life. As I did not have the
camera with me on this dive I was busy picking up drupella snails .. the
vermin of the sea on this side of the pond. I don't think they have this
pest on the Great Barrier Reef ... guess they have their crown of thorns
invasion now and again while we have the drupella snail. I think about
400+ of them are now RIP in the local tip. The CALM ranger came over to
chat to us while we were unloading the dingy and I promptly offered my
bucket full of drupella snail to him if he wanted them, as technically you
are not supposed to remove ANYTHING from the marine sanctuary area (Asho's
Gap falls within that zoned area) but being a pest he was quite happy for
me collect and destroy them.
Tomorrow is my last day of diving and the weather looks like turning
nasty ... weatherman is sitting on the fence on whether what is coming down
and across the western coastline is going to turn in to a cyclone. They
have put out a warning that it *may* turn in to the cyclone .. nothing
definite yet. Fortunately the bay area we are in is not prone to
cyclones - it always seems to wipe out Exmouth at the lowest point .. but
the cyclones that hit the Gasgoyne region normally goes inland to less
populated areas and trashes a few of the cattlestations in its path on the
way before dying out.
Viv
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