Solomon Islands Diving from nicolaoutdoors on Vimeo.

UNDERWATER GALLERY

ABOVE WATER GALLERY

Right now, I’m suffering a bit of reverse culture shock after returning from the Solomon Islands. It’s pretty hard to integrate back into the city with the cars, people and the general pace of life and I’ve had many ‘what am I doing here?’ moments …

We stayed on the island of Uepi, a barrier island of the Mavoro Lagoon in the Western Provinces. The Mavoro Lagoon is reputedly the largest saltwater lagoon in the world. It’s a double barrier–enclosed lagoon, bordered by the volcanic New Georgia and Vangunu Islands on one side and a double line of long barrier islands, of which Uepi is one, on the other. The lagoon contains hundreds of tiny islands all covered by coconut palms and rainforest and fringed with mangroves or coral reef. Most of the islands’ villages are dotted along the coast of New Georgia, with Seghe being the main settlement and location of the airstrip (a mown strip of grassy land on which chickens roam).

Mavoro Lagoon

Uepi is uninhabited except for Uepi Island Diving. On one side is the lagoon, where baby sharks cruise the shallows, chasing large schools of juvenile fish and sea cucumbers and mantis shrimps bury in the sand. On the seaward side is a deep marine abyss, “The Slot”, reaching  the oceanic depths of 6000ft/2000m. The lagoon and The Slot are linked by a passage between Uepi and the Chrapoana Island. The passage is deeper than most other entrances to the lagoon and large quantities sharks and pelagic fish can be seen riding the current.

Cabin on Uepi

A typical day at Uepi might start with a pre-breakfast swim with manta rays, who regularly visit a cleaning station in the lagoon. After breakfast you might swim alongside a coral-covered wall that drops away to the oceanic abyss and cruise along with hammerheads and eagle rays. Afternoon might be a dive into the passage where you’ll almost have to part the fish to see the water and grey whaler sharks are never out of view. We also dived a World War II plane wreck, a tuna boat wreck (My camera wouldn’t work on this spectacular dive but there is a great shot HERE), a sinkhole with a tunnel through to the sea, sea caves and caverns, swimthroughs and endless vertical walls as well as the beautiful Penguin Reef, which is reputedly used as an example of pristine reef by the BBC film unit.

grey whaler

We took a huge number of photographs and video…. It’s hard to choose a few that capture the beauty either above or below the surface. Highlights were pygmy seahorses (even smaller than I expected!), nudibranchs, manta rays, heaps and heaps of sharks, crocodile fish, basket stars …

Clown anemone fish

Loch Ard Bay from the air, April 2002: Muttonbird Island in the front-left, Loch Ard Gorge and beach in centre-back and the recently collapsed Island Archway on the right. (Photo by 'Roffy')

Way back in February 2006 I visited Loch Ard Gorge for the first time. The water was calm and clear. Ridiculously calm and clear. I departed from the Great Ocean Road with two plans forming in my mind. First, to get a kayak that would be easy to carry down the steep coastal paths and launch in order to travel under those beautiful arches and second, to dive on the wreck of the Loch Ard.

Exceptional calm in Loch Ard Gorge (February 2006)

In the following months I sourced a charter boat that takes divers to the incredible Arches site as well as to the Loch Ard, when weather permits. Also, on a trip to Canada in March, I investigated inflatable kayaks and later in the year I received the Innova (Gumotex) Helios II. Then we waited and waited and waited for a string of northerlies that would bring the calm conditions that I’d encountered on my first visit…

Eventually, in March 2008 we took a trip down to Port Campbell. The water was calm, but not like before. Even so, we launched from Loch Ard beach and paddled out the choppy entrance and through the archway in Muttonbird Island. Pretty soon we got uncomfortable in the swell and surge and thought we should get back through the entrance before things got much worse.

Kayaking through the arch in Muttonbird Island (March 2008)

I’ve been hoping ever since that we’d be able to go back and travel through the rest of the arches and explore the coastline. But it’s changing so fast. In April I took my parents along the coast and saw how huge the waves can really get. After seeing the pounding waves and how much some of the rocks had eroded, compared to my photos from a few years before, it was not too much of a surprise to learn last week that one of the archways had collapsed.

Island Archway, March 2008

Island Archway, May 2009

Island 'Archway' June 2009 (Photo by Glen Hunter)

Juvenile Fish (click image for more)

A few photos from recent dives.

And, since I received a new dive light for Christmas,
a 2 minute video of some of the wonderful creatures that swim about at night!

Blairgowrie is nudibranch wonderland. Practically every time we dive there, I see a species I haven’t seen before. This is good because nudibranchs are some of my favourite things!

One nudi, two nudi, three nudi, four …. Click on any of the pics or HERE to go through to the gallery, where you can see them bigger and also see crabs and seahorses, worms and rays and all the other amazing things :)

We had a great weekend at Portland, about a four hour drive west of Melbs. We primarily went to dive, specifically to see leafy sea dragons as we only get weedy sea dragons this far east. We didn’t see any but we saw so many other cool and unexpected animals!

Staff at the Portland dive shop were friendly and directed us to several dive sites. The first dive was along the Lee breakwater. It is a short clamber on the rocks to get in (and out) of the water, and fishing line and hooks (both active and old snagged ones) are a hazard. I was snagged while getting into the water and twice along the dive; once the hook actually caught my fin and the fisherman was yanking hard probably hoping for a large snapper. Having got in without a dive knife, I was lucky enough to find one on the bottom and was able to use it to free myself.

Visibility was pretty poor after the north winds last week that left thousands across the state without power. Still, we saw lots of fish, nudibranchs, plenty of rock lobster and best of all a giant cuttlefish that developed quite a crush on my very bright fins. It hung around changing colour and texture and followed us for quite some time.

Another Easter in a share house with our friends, Rod and Vanessa.

We had hoped to surf on Friday, but the swell was huge and so we all took a walk around Cape Woolamai. Later we attempted a snorkel but the swell had stirred the bottom and I couldn’t even see my own feet! The bad ‘vis’ also put paid to the night dive that Rod and Vanessa had hoped to do. Bad for them but good for us as, instead, Vanessa cooked up a huge feast of Blue Grenadier.

Saturday we paddled a little, snorkeled and cooked a Greek feast of αρνί κλέφτικο, Γεμιστά, χαλλούμι and salads. Sunday, we got up early to catch the 8am low tide to dive at Smith’s beach. We had a great dive, the highlight of which was four Port Jackson sharks sleeping on the bottom.

After cleaning the abalone we had collected that morning we returned to Smith’s beach to play in the surf for several hours until exhausted :) Monday we all rose early again and drove to Inverloch for two dives with S.E.A.L dive services. The first was not so spectacular (almost all the divers missed the main wall) but the second had a good, low wall and plenty of large crays (unfortunately just out of reach; though several were caught by others). Also unfortunately the swell had picked up and a very, very strong surge at the bottom made photos impossible. We stopped at a few beaches close to Inverloch but plagues of biting flies drove us away quite quickly. Tuesday, Ross and I snorkeled and played in the surf until it was time to pack up all our toys and come home.

Cradle Mountain, Tasmania

photographs:

Cradle Mountain

Mount Anne

Tasman Peninsula (underwater)

Tasman Peninsula (land)

Freycinet National Park

Flowers & Plants

movie:

Blow Hole and Cave

We left Melbourne on the Spirit of Tasmania and sailed overnight to Devonport, Tasmania. Arriving, tired but not (too) sick we picked up the groceries that customs disallows and headed to Cradle Mountain. Starting from Lake Dove we climbed Marion’s Peak and approached Cradle Mountain via the Overland Track. Spending only a shirt time at the very windy summit we returned via the Wombat Pools.

That night we camped at the Cosy Cabins Campground and in the morning headed south over the Highland Lakes Highway all the way to the Tasman Peninsula in the south-east. We checked in with the EagleHawk Dive Centre and went to explore. The next two days were spent doing four dives, two from Port Arthur (including one under the cliff of the Island used for juvenile prisoners), one under the famous Totem Pole and one in the giant kelp forests of Fortescue Bay.

We were lucky enough to have a friend in Hobart to visit en route to our walking point in the South West. After a feed, warm bed and rest we headed to the South West to make an assault on Mount Anne, the highest peak in the area. We climbed over 1km vertical from the trail head, passing over Mount Eliza and all the way to shelf camp for spectacular views of Mount Anne and Lot. With a diversion to the Mount Anne saddle in the morning, and bad weather approaching we returned and drove back through Hobart, stooping briefly at Russell Falls, to visit another old friend.

The last stop was Freycinet National Park. We found wonderful camping on the Friendly beaches and the next day paddled south down the west coast of the peninsula from Coles’s Bay to Hazard’s Beach. The last day we walked up to the classic WineglassBay lookout in amazing sunshine and along Wineglass Bay beach in a heavy downpour. Returning via the circuit track it was time to drive to Devonport for a motel-stop to catch the day sailing back to Melbourne.