Straddie Weekend
Posted by Ray @ 9:59 amSo despite all the difficulties, the SCUBA diving weekend trip at North Stradbroke Island was a blast. As promised, a photoset of the days.
The HMS Rubber Ducky
At least that’s what Ken, our skipper, called the boat. I’m sure it was named something more impressive, but none of us actually asked.
It’s a pretty small boat, but we all had a great time.
There was a really big leatherback turtle lazily swimming in the current. You can almost imagine him going “Duuuuude” a la Finding Nemo. He was pretty big, about a metre long. Too bad I didn’t get to see it - the turtles I spotted were smaller, or were hiding underneath rocks sleeping.
That’s not fair!
Speaking of things I didn’t see, this one really made me madly jealous. The two divers about 8-9 metres behind me managed to catch a glimpse of a couple of Grey Nurse sharks.
(The Grey Nurse shark is a winter-loving endangered species; the gully we were diving is famous for regular Grey Nurse sightings. This is just about the last chance for me to see them until next year.)
Lucky *@W)%&
The Grey Nurse is about 3 metres long, so it’s not a minor thing to see underwater.
Isn’t he cute?
The big stuff isn’t the only thing you see underwater. Here you can see a baby Moray eel, inquisitively poking its head out from the rocks it usually hides in. Moray eels can grow really large; I once saw one with a head larger than a fat chick’s thighs.
Moving on…
Whatcha lookin’ at?
Some kind of grouper fish. He looked grouchy…
Awwwwwwwww!
…unlike this pufferfish, which looked goddamn adorable. I wanted to take it home.
Karate Crab
Of course, you see some interesting things on the beach, too. Like this crab that was coaxed out of the crevice it was hiding in. Basically, you stick a stick down there, and when the crab kiap the stick, you pull it out. More likely than not it holds desperately onto it, and you can then molest it into position for photographs and what-not.
After all that, one of the guys decided to go swimming in a gorge. Which we all thought was a good idea until we saw it.
Outer view
Inside, a bit
The waves would crash into the rocks. It did not look pretty. Neither did the sign on the cliffs:
People have drowned here
So of course we had to swim in it!
Scramble down
What’s up, ya’ll!
And that’s how I spent my weekend.
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LOL! the eel and the puffer fish is so damn cute..esp the eel..it looks so innocent :D btw u guys are psycho swimming in a place like that..nice update btw, love the picts :)
Comment by Ki Ghin — Friday, September 9 2005 @ 10:19 pm
Awww…. Dude…………
I like all the fishes there! All look so adorable!
I luve Nature! woot.
Comment by Nix — Saturday, September 10 2005 @ 1:03 am
Great pics! Esp the moray eel. Hahah. So cute.
Comment by Gwen — Saturday, September 10 2005 @ 2:58 am
KG, Gwen: The eel can grow *huge*. Really big. And then they develop rows of sharp teeth. They ain’t so cute then, heh.
Nix: Haha, yeah, nature rocks. Nature can also kick your ass. But mostly it rocks.
Comment by Ray — Saturday, September 10 2005 @ 7:17 pm
whalao, the eel looks just like a gray kukujiao!
Comment by spartacus — Thursday, September 22 2005 @ 2:20 am
very cool pics…
Comment by Troy Worman — Wednesday, October 5 2005 @ 10:57 am
[…] If you recall, North Stradbroke Island is where we went diving a scant couple of months back. […]
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