We woke at 6.50am for breakfast, before jumping into the cool 25 degree waters in our 5mm wetsuits…

Tested the camera housings and ventured around the “Cod Hole” bumping into some whopper 150kg potato cod. Pretty cool creatures who were very friendly. Visibility was good and it was nice to get a decent dive in…. its been a while since we had a good one.

The next dive at the same site involved the cod being fed some pilchard. Although this goes against my “passive interaction” philosophy, these cod have been fed for 15 years and are naturally expectant of food now.

It was fun, and the big boys bumped my camera lens a fair few times…

Dive 3, was Pixies Pinnacle, a small pinnacle in the middle of nowhere. We saw a shark on the start of the dive…. just a small whitetip, and a flame file shell…. which you should look up on youtube as a photograph cannot do it justice… very cool.

Dive 4, was a night dive at Challenger Bay. We saw lots of cool stuff including Whitetip Shark, Octopus, Moray Eels, Blue Spotted Ray. The big thing about this site is the Jacks (Trevallys) who swim quietly behind you in large numbers looking at fish they can eat by using the light from your torch. You don’t know they are there until they zoom past you to munch on their next poor victim… It was a bloodbath!

Tired and hungry, we ate and went to bed to prepare for a rough crossing into international waters and “Osprey Reef”

So, we boarded our boat, which is pretty nice I have to say…

Our bedroom is nice and spacious (for a boat) and we unpacked all our gear and set up our dive equipment ready for 4 dives tomorrow. Unfortunately being the donkey I am…. my monitor on the camera housing was not working and it took me ages to figure out that it actually runs on batteries (read the f@*”ing manual as my course director would say). Luckily, some nice chap has given me half the batteries I need, and I’m currently negotiating with someone for the other 4.

So, emergency over. The internet on the boat has broken, but I have brought along my wireless mobile broadband dongle and while we still have a signal, I thought I would post this. It may not last so don’t get worried if you don’t get further updates.

Tomorrow, the first 2 dives are at “Cod Hole”, then lunch, then another dive at “Pixie’s Pinnacle” before finally a night dive at “Challenger Bay”. Best get off to bed soon…. cos we have to get up at 6.50am….!!!

Well,

The next 5 days are gonna be a true test of your patience. We leave on the Taka Dive boat tomorrow to head out into the Deep Blue…. here we shall be out of contact until the 7th of September when we return. Obviously its going to be a mega special report detailing our dives and shark feed etc… fingers crossed for some hammerheads (we’ve never seen them before)..

Today, we spent packing our cases, the camera equipment and also our dive kit. Its alot of baggage!!! We then relaxed by the pool for a couple of hours and then played ping-pong and tennis again. It turns out that I’m cooking tonight…. damm!! But Jen is washing up…! SWEET!

Anyway guys, thats it for the next 5 days. I wish you well, and see you on the 7th for a very special dive report.

Love to all.