Bare Island 22nd December 2007

Dive No. 285. 10.45 am, 17 degrees, 57 mins, 14.9 max, 10.1 av
DM today was Dave Young; I buddied with Liz and Amanda and we ended up doing our own thing; there were a lot of beginners on the dive and it was good to get into areas where sand wasn’t stirred up to seriously compromise the visibility. On the surface, the water was 22 degrees, then 21, then 19 at around 4 metres deep and then we hit a thermocline where the temperature plummeted to a chilly 17 degrees! (And me sans hood!) There were jellyfish galore in the water and many of the divers expressed disgust at the feel of them sliding across their faces but it doesn’t worry me too much. There seemed to be a lot more jellyfish in the colder water. We came across some small cuttlefish and one giant one; two weedy sea dragons hunting together, a few nudibranchs, a large school of pomfreds and a largish school of drummer. Nice dive overall, despite jellyfish and cold water. We practiced safety-sausage deployment at the end.