Only did 2 of 4 scheduled dives today. A girl got decompression sickness and so we had to go back to Port to get her to a hospital and pressure chamber. Both dives today were at Rachel Carson reef, formerly Northern Escape reef. Rachel Carson is the author of Silent Spring and I wonder if the renamed the reef after her because of the condition that it's in. It was pretty non-exciting. The only fun thing we saw on either dive was a school of about six bumphead parrotfish. These fish are huge... up to 3ft long with big beaks, yes beaks, and a huge bump on their head. Pretty cool looking to see underwater. But other than that there was alot of algae and dead coral. Overall I would say that the GBR is not as spectacular as I thought it was going to be. At least parts of it anyways. Visibility was not so great (10-15m vs. 30m at Osprey Reef out in the sea) because of runoff and siltation from the land. As well as the algae. So all I gotta say is if you're into diving and want to dive the Great Barrier Reef, do it SOON! God knows what it will look like in ten years...
Rachel Carson reef was cool in one respect though... it was very labyrinth like, and was oneof the first dives David and I went without a guide, and got absolutly totally lost, even when we tried not to. Ah well. At least we found the boat eventually!
Bumphead parrotfish
Giant clam
I have no idea what this is, but it's pretty strange looking...
After dinner we celebrated one of the French guy's birthday. They even brought champagne for everyone!! Yum!
No comments:
Post a Comment