Trip Report : New Years 2008/2009

The Global Dive/Pacific Hideaway New Years liveaboard trip has been booked out since .. around september/october.
as its guaranteed that there wont be any training, all the instructors and divemasters get their name on that list as soon as the trip is confirmed.

ritchie and i took off from auckland on tuesday the 30th as soon as we could.  the problem with travelling around new zealand during holiday time is that the roads are absolutely congested so you have to time your departures and arrivals correctly.  we had a pretty good run until we got just south of wellsford where there was a horrendous accident.  silly peoples – i wish kiwis would be a lot more careful in their cars and on the road especially around the holiday season which we so ironically call ‘the silly season’.

we arrived in tutukaka safe and sound and headed straight down to the marina pizzeria.  this is one of the best places to eat in tutukaka.

we were spending the night on pacific hideaway before departing the next morning so we hung around putting our gear away and waiting for the others to arrive.  finally everyone arrived and we had a few glasses of wine and lots of giggles before bedding down for the night in anticipation of the trip out to the Knights and the great diving to be had in the morning.

wednesday morning we all woke super excited.  the weather was amazing and the forecast for the next couple of days was that it wouldnt change – it was going to be hot, calm and there would be no rain at all.

heading into the Poor Knights Islands Marine Reserve

we headed out to the Knights and looked at sites we might want to dive.  we wanted to do something different, so Mark headed us out to Freds Pinnacle on the eastern side at the base of Tawhiti Rahi.

arriving at the islands, we were greeted with amazing visbility

dive one – freds pinnacle
max depth = 24.4m
bottom time = 43 mins
there was a bit of surge and water movement around the pinnacle and its not really the best site for newer divers, but i dived with marcia and shane.  marcia had her camera so we werent really going to go very far and i was showing shane bits and pieces so that marcia could take some shots.  i missed the octopus though!!  he was cruising around in the rocks just underneath the kelp.

dive two – middle arch
max depth = 20.6
bottom time = 50 mins
i jumped in and headed off for a dive with lala and simon.  we headed down into the arch and cruised along the wall to the back where there are some boulders and its not quite as deep.  simon and i sat in awe as a big short tail stingray cruised through showing off its turning ability and amazing buoyancy skills.  we swam into bernies cave and i took simon up into the air bubble.  for the rest of the dive, i just hung to the back cruising around nice and slowly and checking out the eels and the nudibranchs that are still just everywhere.

lee and alex chilling out on the top deck reading 'ask polly' !?!?!?!

dive three – blue mao mao arch
max depth = 13.5
bottom time = 66 mins
ahhh blue mao mao, i never get sick of this dive site as its different everytime.  sometimes there are loads of fish and sometimes its just bright and blue.  marcia and shane and simon and i headed off over to the side of the arch and then dropped down and i led them into the arch.  in true marcia styles, she bought a friend – a wrasse followed her and nuzzled her along the side.  i dont know what it is with this women, but the wrasse turn into little kitty cats when shes around.
we all cruised into the arch and took a nice long time to get down to the end.  simon and i came up on marcia and shane – shane had a black angelfish smooching him silly.  he could hold his hands out and the angelfish would rub its body along him.  the angelfish are nesting and laying their eggs at the moment so we need to be careful not to lead them out of their areas for too long otherwise wrasse and other fish might eat their eggs.  their white ear spot can be turned on and off at will and may be a sign of aggression.
simon and i swam in and out of the arch several times.  we found a beautiful tamja verconis laying its egg rosette and then .. oh no!  i needed to pee, so back to the boat for us.

a perfect new years eve sunset over tutukaka

i decided to end my diving day right there.  there were no students on board, no more work to do.  marcia said she would join me in a glass of wine, so a glass or several of wine we had.
anna and andrew and lee and alex went for a twilight dive (alex had to get her dives up so she didnt really have a choice) and lala and simon decided that they were going to be under the water at midnight.  the rest of us managed a very feeble 5, 4, 3, 2, 1 ….. zzzzzzzzzzzzzzzz.  we hit the sack early in anticipation for some great diving on new years day.

and we were not disappointed.  after a light breakfast and some lovely fresh coffee, we headed up to cave bay.

dive four – cave bay
max depth = 24.4
bottom time = 63 mins
anna, marcia, shane and i decided to dive as a team.  anna and shane took the lead and marcia and i hung to the back with me playing spotter for her amazing underwater photos (which are going on the wall in my living room when i can get a copy of some of them).
we set a very relaxed pace and enjoyed most of the dive in the sunshine with very little water movement.
there was some amazing life on the walls – a tamja verconis nudibranch hanging out on a piece of kelp and later on in the dive there were two of them hiding in some black encrusting sponge, quite a few small green finelined nudibranchs and my favoourites – a firebrick starfish and a blue spotted triplefin.  i’d have to say, it was my favourite dive of the year (so far)!

south harbour on new years day - the place to be

anna and marcia and alex head out to ngaio rock

dive five – hmnzs waikato
max depth = 26
bottom time = 25 mins
shane and i decided to go for a little cruise around the wreck.  not a long dive but it was to be shanes first wreck dive so it wasnt going to be too hard either.  we dropped down the mooring block line – and the visibility was fantastic.  certainly the best that i have seen in a while.
we cruised around the wreck and found two really big crayfish.  shane was ecstatic but still doesnt realise the size of him and his equipment and there was no way i was going to let him try and get down that hole to try and grab them.  whilst the wreck isnt in the marine reserve so you could legally take a crayfish from there – its not really sporting.

on the way back into tutukaka, the boys decided they wanted to get all cave man and do some hunting and collecting.  we stopped near the rocks outside of wellingtons bay and let them go for it.  lala came back with three!!  andrew and shane reckoned they swam to argentina and back and they still came back empty handed.

a huge thanks to mark for taking us out for the night.

skipper mark with a new years beer in hand

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