Saturday 22 March 2008

North Wall dive sites

We had a somewhat bumpy ride around the headland but it was well worth it as we all geared for a our first dive on the North Wall this year.

Blue Pinnacle is a beautiful dive with a panoromic swim through into an azure blue abyss. A gyre of horse eye jack circled slightly above us as we then headed East down the wall. The vis was excellent, as we spotted a lobster that would feed at least four people and a large crab that would probably do the same. A 5ft green lobster layy exposed at about 70ft for us all to see. The top of the wall was teeming with spawning parrot fish and creole wrasse. Four eyed butterfly fish fought for territory.

The surface interval was longer than anitcipated, we tucked inside the reef at Stingray city moorings and listened to diving stories (nightmares?) as told by Terry and Adam (Gibbons) so it was 1.35 mins before we eventually got back into the pool at Eagle Ray Pass. Almost immediately we saw an Eagle Ray above us, Ben raced to get a shot. Julia, Rhonda, Terry and myself watched as the Ray almost decided to come back towards us, change her mind and headed out over the wall again. We saw her again (I think) later on in the dive. We saw three turtles, one huge girl, who had 2 remora under her and some big barnacles on her back. At the top of the wall there was a slight current but this only brought more fish out to feed onthe plankton, especially the Bar Jacks. It was all good.

What a lovely way to start the Easter holidays, 2 great dives with ya mates..cant ask more than that, except of course, if we had ALL of our friends with us this day..Get well soon, Jenny and Sian. Peter and Jack...step away from the household chores! Pippa, "wha'appen in Cuba girl?"Happy Easter everyone