Sunday 22nd November

Dive 1

After a week of South Easterly winds, we were hoping for blue water at Stradbroke Island. We headed out to attempt the blue water drift again and find the large school of migrating Dusky sharks.

We dropped in at Turtle cave and there was a mild current. Unfortunately, the winds had not been enough to clean the water out without stronger currents the visibility dropped from blue at 7 metres down to green, murky water below and a cold thermocline.

We decided to continue on our dive anyway. We turned the corner at Turtle cave and were drifting for about 26 minutes before I saw a Sandbar Whaler below. Then we started to see Spinner sharks coming out of the murky visibility. They were fairly inquisitive coming within 3-4 metres for a look.

Nick was shallower trying to stay above the edge of murky water whilst holding the SMB, hoping the sharks would follow us higher but unfortunately they preferred to hang out in the terrible visibility below.

45 minute dive, maximum depth 26 metres.

Dive 2

We went to Manta Bommie for our second dive, as we anchored, we spotted our first Manta Ray circling the boat underneath us. The CCR divers hopped in with their scooters and quoted having one of the best dives they’ve ever had there. Apparently not only sharks like the scooters but Manta Rays are very interested in them as well.

I hopped in with a mission to find the Black Manta the boys had seen. They said it was North so I headed that way. The sand had moved a lot on the bottom since last diving this site due to some storms. There was an epic proportion of Bull Rays and large Sting rays on the site and over a dozen Leopard Sharks scattered on the sea floor and swimming by.

I decided to go for a big swim seeing as the current was fairly tame. I saw three Manta Rays but no Black Manta. I did have an amazing encounter with an adult Brown Banded Bamboo shark. It came swimming towards me and literally stopped on the sand in front of the camera as if it check its reflection. Then it proceeded to swim directly underneath me and start hunting on the rocks right beside me. It was amazing to watch.

I had dived all the way to the second North rock from the South rock of the dive site so now had a big swim back to the boat. I spotted another cool Jellyfish near the surface with small fish in it but was conscious of the time it was going to take me to swim back so thought I better get moving.

70 minute dive, maximum depth 10 metres.