Wednesday, 6 March 2013

Finding Nemo

So we missed Nemo (blizzard) back in Boston a couple of weeks back, but tried to search for him anyways when we were in the Great Barrier Reef on Hamilton Island for a couple of days. Mere and I had planned on Scuba diving in the outer reef, which is supposed to be a lot more vibrant and alive, unfortunately the swells were too big and our trip was cancelled.

So we had to 'settle' for diving about an hour boat ride from Hamilton Island. We also had to reschedule our snorkeling with Mere's mom and Aunt to the day before:

Mere had her own little tour guide for snorkeling. She probably swam 10 meters with this guy leading the way inches from her face.

Some of the more colorful reef we saw



A butterflyfish (total guestimate)

We didn't find Nemo, but I did spot his cousin - a Black Clownfish (Young Neezy)

This guy was on our boat but went scuba diving. With a mustache like that, you're pretty hard core. I thought he was going to jump in the water with no gear and holding a knife in his mouth. Fortunately for all of you, Mere snapped this picture before he took his trunks off to sport a tiny budgie smuggler.


The day after snorkeling, Mere and I got our Scuba on in a spot called Coral Gardens:

 Mere looking very ninja-esque pre-dive



Me being the amateur giving the 'let's go up' signal instead of the I'm good (which is the 'ok' signal with your hands)


Unfortunately for us, there was some heavy rain during the days prior to the dive, so we didn't have the best visibility (3-5 meters). We still ended up with some good photos though:

A pack of angel fish 



 A school of some type of fish


 A red-breasted wrasse

 A parrot fish, which you could hear chewing on the coral with his teeth


There are some impressive coral structures when you dive down deep. Or at least there were. One of the guys on our dive wasn't certified so he had to be dragged around by the neck by our dive master. He probably single-handedly killed a quarter of the reef by flailing his arms and legs on the ocean floor and on the coral.










Coming up on the blog:

Hunter Valley Wine Country and driving in Australia
The Gay and Lesbian Mardis Gras Parade in Sydney
and
The perils of Gumtree







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