Dive report - West Side, Sunday 10 May 2009

Sunday took us south of Tantabiddi on the West Side of the Nor'West Cape for our full day tour instead of to the more usual Muiron Islands.  The conditions looked like the Muirons would be decidedly average with a punishing trip across, so we opted for the better diving on the day!  It turned out to be an excellent decision.

On the way to our first dive site - Hole in the Wall - we came across a 7m whale shark! He nosed up to the side of the boat, then sank down, meandered to the other side, checked things out and then went on his merry way. Not a bad start!

Hole in the Wall was excellent with tons of fish, turtles munching away on the red bell jellies and gorgeous anemones filled to bursting with anemone fish and attendant damsels & porcelain crabs. This site is named for the large "cave" and this cave was densely packed with glassfish; the entrance and exits were totally obscured there were so many glistening fish. As we came out, the curtain would shimmer, then part and immediately close again after each diver. The soft corals along the wall here were glowing with colour.
WATER TEMP: 26C
VISIBILITY: 8m
CURRENT: none
SURGE: none
DEPTH: 18m

We hit Bowzer's Castle for our second dive and it's many coral fingers & valleys were filled with schooling fish. There were also quite a few white tip reef sharks cruising around. Inside many of the staghorn coral outcrops, leopard blennies hid out and tried to blend in. This site has some great overhangs and each had groups of fish just hovering underneath. Nudibranchs, eels, shrimp and other small critters populated every square inch of the walls along the fingers of limestone. Great dive!
WATER TEMP: 26C
VISIBILITY: 8m
CURRENT: none
SURGE: none
DEPTH: 16m