Online Dive Log: May 2010

Most of Sydney sites are closed out due to bad weather but Camp Cove is nearly always available as a dive regardless of conditions.
I forgot my camera so no photos today. My buddy was Phil, the DM was Damien and his buddy was Dave.

First dive we went the usual right (nor-east) direction- few interesting swim-through's, and an octopus with an eel. The visibility was quite poor and the area itself was full of boats due to Jessica Watson's return through the heads from her solo voyage around the worlds.

Second dive- We took a 240 degree heading from the beach until we hit a reef and then followed the reef in a South-westerly direction. quite an interesting dive but again visibility was not great.

A wet and miserable day is a great day to go diving and this was a great day to go diving.(wet and miserable)
We put our gear on board the dive boat at Forster Dive Centre and drove 40 minutes down the coast to Sugarloaf Bay where the boat picked us up for a 20 minute trip out to Big Rock. It takes the boat over an hour to get to the dive site and in a effort to reduce sea sickness the dive operators use this drive- cruise method of getting you to the site.

The Dive operators were a very professional outfit and I liked their approach to dive safety and their excellent briefings. I would recommend them to anyone intending on diving this area, here are their details:

Dive Forster @ Fishermans Wharf

NSW Australia

Phone 02 6554 7478

We did 2 dives on Seal Rocks. The first dive on the imaginatively named "Big Rock" and the second on the equally imaginatively named "Little Rock". The 2 rocks collectively are called Seal Rocks because of the huge Seal population that used to live here. Unfortunately the Seals were all shot by local fishermen because they were eating their fish, so today there are no Seals on Seal Rocks. This area is now a marine sanctuary and fishing is not permitted, although we did see spear fisherman on our return voyage and the Dive Operator stopped and told them he would report them. This led to a hasty disappearing act on behalf of the spear fishermen.

From Left to Right- Me, Gab, Jeff, Danielle, Su-Ann & Brett

Here are my buddies from Abyss, We had a great weekend and the weather came good on the Sunday when we took this picture.

Grey Nurse Shark

One of the funniest moments of the weekend was on the second day on a dive called Spot A. The Grey Nurse Sharks are very timid despite their ferocious appearance and they will rarely approach the divers. As can be seen from my video above, they keep their distance and will quickly disappear if they perceive any threat. One medium size shark (about 2M long) slowly swam towards the group of divers in front of me. I saw Jeff seize the opportunity for a good photograph and start to move towards the shark, fully expecting that it would change course at any moment. The shark kept swimming towards him and with mouth agape swam inches over him. By this time Jeff had started flapping and retreating, the shark was just showing us who the boss is in this environment I guess. I was laughing in my reg and we were only in 12 M of water so I wasn't narked..
Here is the photo Jeff took as this was happening , amazing!!

At Spot A we came across numerous Wobbegongs and they were out cruising looking for food. Normally, in my experience, Wobbegongs are viewed still in a cave or hidden under rocks but at this site they were swimming in open water.

Wobbegong (Carpet Shark)

This picture was taken at Spot A by Jeff. There were many wobbegongs and they are well camouflaged in this environment. They can be easily knocked or kicked with fins if you don't notice them and they will give you a bite if they are threatened.