July 9, 2006 - Poor Knights Again
Well I had another great day at the Poor Knights again. This time I was accompanied by Daryl Morse and AndyNZ from Scubaboard.
Daryl got hold of me a few weeks prior and mentioned he was in town from Canada for business. That set the ball rolling and to cut a long story short...At 0530 Sunday morning we were on our way to dive the Knights.
We steamed out to Northern Arch for the first dive and surprisingly had rather calm seas. We got to Northern Arch and jumped in just shy of the arch. We dropped down to 30m and swam through the arch. We had some down and up currents battering us about but with 25-30 metres viz and stacks of schooling fish in the archway...who cares?
The second dive was the one that blew me away.
Riko Riko cave again. This time lets try it with 60+ metres of visibility!
We dropped onto the sand at the cave entrance and slowly made our way in. We came across a photographer lying on the bottom taking some pictures of a pretty neat looking carpet shark. After watching him for a while we moseyed into the cave to be met with the best viz i have ever seen in New Zealand.
Swiming up to the back of the cave were a huge school of Bluefish just hanging out, and plenty of sponges all over the place. The sponges and other growth in the back of the cave resemble what you would find at a depth of about 200 metres. The reason for this is the limited light that penetrates back that far. Because of all the sponges and other filter feeders, the viz in the cave is usually afr in excess of what you would normally get elsewhere.
Swimming back out we could see 3 divers crossing the cave entrance in midwater, about 50-80 metres in front of us. We could also see both side of the cave entrance, which is 80 metres across!
I just hung out in midwater for about 10 minutes marvelling at the viz.
Definantly the best I have had in New Zealand and definantly worth waking up before sparrows fart for.
|
|
|
|
About Me
The fascinating and sometimes humorous exploits of a Kiwi Dive Instructor and all round Divenut.
Friends
|
