Bare Island, Western Side, Saturday 27th October 2007

Dive no. 278 52 minutes, 15.1 metres max depth, water temp=17.This dive was much better than any of our group thought it would be. There was a bit of a swell coming in from the north east and the tide was very high when we entered at the “ramp”. Despite the north east swell and breeze, there was a medium-strength current coming from the west. Liz and I headed off to the sponge gardens with a retinue of divers as Peter (divemaster) sorted out a logistical problem on shore. Usually when I’m leading the pack and heading west at Bare, I experience slight trepidation at what seems like an endless expanse of featureless sand and this time was no exception but, again as usual, the reef suddenly loomed out of the nothingness and we were in a wonderland of colourful sponges and weird critters. We’d already passed a shovel-nosed ray lying half-asleep in the sand and I was taking a video of the mass of jellyfish that had suddenly materialized when Liz beckoned excitedly with her torch – she’d found a weedy sea dragon (it might have been the same one we saw at the exact same spot last week). It was nice to watch him feed as he slowly glided over the sandy bottom. There was a plethora of multicoloured nudibranchs, including some strange filigreed ones. Later I found a crested horn shark lying on a sponge (see pic) and there was a pair of black-reef leatherjackets on the way back. The current from the west made the return trip into a drift dive of sorts, which was nice. The only downside to the whole dive was that we missed a Red Indian Fish that a few of the other divers saw and Liz was devastated that Peter and Carolyn saw an Eastern Blue Devil Fish, which we also somehow missed (Liz has never seen one, whereas I’ve been lucky enough to get a glimpse of one under a rock ledge at the north eastern side of Bare, off the mainland).