Back in Perth - Rotto Dive

Bit late with this post, but here are the photos from my dive last weekend. Sunday morning I woke up at 5:30 (toooo earrrrlyyyyy) to get ready for a dive on the UWA Underwater Club’s boat. The nine of us who were going loaded our gear into the Tantabiddi (the club’s boat) and set sail to Rottnest. It was a bouncy crossing, but I was excited to get back into the water. The first dive was at Swirl Reef – a dive site I had been to before. This was one of my favorite spots that I had been to at Rottnest so I was more than happy. The highlights from the dive were a couple Port Jackson sharks,

 the intricate caves,

 a fleeting stingray, and a cuttlefish (this squid / octopus type creature)! 

Got a video of it swimming away from us - I was filming and V, another diver, was busy taking pictures of it. Not as dramatic as the other octopus I saw from a few dives back, but if you look closely you can see it change colors a bit as it swims. 

Think this cuttlefish was injured because there were lots of scratches and bite marks on its body. Funny little creatures. Here are the other shots from the first dive:

Can you spot the fish?

This was in the cave... pretty incredible that there are any colors since barely any sunlight reaches this point.

The second dive we just went into this shallow bay since the wind was really starting to pick up. Mostly weedy but there were a couple nice rock formations.

By the time we left to return to Perth, the wind had really picked up and I was regretting not having had anything to eat. Contrary to popular belief, it is much better to sail on a full stomach than an empty stomach. As such, my empty stomach had me worried at one point that my “seasick-vomit-free since ’90” streak might be broken, but it all worked out. All in all it was a great day and just a nice reminder of how special it is being in Perth and Australia… not as if I could just go for a dive on a reef back at Hamilton. Seems like the vacation never ends … or until next week when I have my final exams! Eee! Pretty much my last day of classes today. Before our finals we have one reading week to prepare for our exams. Naturally, this seemed like the perfect time to get one last trip in with my friends so on Friday, I set off for Coral Bay with 10 friends. Coral Bay was one of the reasons why I chose to come to Perth and Western Australia (might have goten a little mixed up about the distances because originally I thought it was like an hour away … try 16 hours by car or a two hour plane ride) so I’m pretty excited to finally see it.  

Scuba Diving Round 2

After another very restless night of sleep, I woke up unsure if I should scuba diving again today, as my ears were still not feeling 100%. They weren’t hurting but remained unequalized - the way they sometimes feel when one is on an airplane. After seeing the great forecast for the day and receiving advice from my Psych teacher from last year, who is also a dive instructor, I decided I would give it a shot. I figured worst comes to worst (is it worst or worse?) I could snorkel and just enjoy a day out on the boat. After getting picked up by Becky, the really nice woman who has been giving me rides to and from the dive boat, the day began. I got buddied up with a man named Danny who was from Perth. I was a little worried that my slow pace and decision to not go as deep today would bother him, but he ended up being a great buddy – very patient and willing to go wherever. The first dive site was the Mini Swirl, which was part of a place called Stragglers’ Rocks. This was by far my favorite dive site so far. Not only was it really beautiful I felt very in control of the dive. There were these neat rock structures that spiraled down with several large caves underneath in the middle. This was a perfect type of place for me as I was able to slowly descend as I spiraled around the outside. Thankfully my ears were totally fine and we ended up going down to 14 M, which was more than I had anticipated I’d be able to do. At the bottom of the cave was this smallish Port Jackson shark, which is a bottom dwelling shark that is harmless.

Here are some of the other shots from the first dive.

Click for larger image

On the way up, I must have ascended a little too quickly as my ear started squeaking a lot. Content that I had made it through the dive with eardrums still intact, I surfaced and began to swim back to the boat. Before reaching the boat I blew my nose and saw that my nose had started to bleed. At that point it was pretty hard not to feel like my body was falling apart. Why am I melting!? Ahhh! After my initial shock, I remembered that when looking up advice last night for clearing my ears, I had seen that another common issue on dives was nosebleeds so I wasn’t too worried. Later when I got back to my room, I went online to see whether I could find any possible explanations. Turns out taking Sudafed before a dive (had some last night) isn’t the best plan as it can dry out the sinuses, which leads to nose bleeds when there is a vacuum. Oops!  

The second dive site wasn’t as good as the first – this one was a little more weedy and had these narrow cave type structures that didn’t look like they would fit me and my camera in – but was still enjoyable. I was able to go into one big one where I saw another Port Jackson shark. This one didn’t seem to like all the attention it was getting and ended up swimming out of the cave.

Overall, I was really happy that I went back out for another dive. The people I dove with invited me out for a beer afterwards, but seeing as I’ve done no work this weekend, I had to pass. Figured I would write this post and then get to work.