31/1/2007 - Drought is broken

Unfortunately I'm not talking about the lack of rain in Australia, but ust thought I'd let you all know that I finally got a dive in, my first one in over 6 months!!  It hasn't been all bad, I went out freediving for paua (=abalone) twice (it is illegal to take them on SCUBA here in NZ or even have the equipment in your car/boat).  Anyway a few of us marine people at work have put together a list of those interested in diving, and last Sunday 3 of us met at Breaker Bay on the South coast of Wellington.  The weather was reasonable - breezy (but when is it not in Wellington?! ) but warmish (water temp about 15deg) and we picked the top of the tide, when current would be minimal.  The vis was about 3m, so unfortunately I spent most of the time trying to keep my buddy in sight, but we did see a few crays and paua (great to see them thriving only 10min from the capital city!), and plenty of wrasse-like fish hiding amongst the  kelp and macroalgae.  I will have to get a decent NZ fish ID book to help me with their names.  a stand out was an ascidian (sea squirt) with a super-long stalk!  Towards the end we got a bit lost and had a bit of a surface swim back to shore, but all in all it was great to get out again!