As I sat there drinking a perfect cup of coffee and soaking up the meager warmth of the winter Aussie sun, I was wondering how well I'd hold up on the dive. It's winter here, still not terribly cold, but the waters are 65 degrees, visibility is expected to be poor, and there's little warmth at the surface to look forward to before or after the dive. Well, at least it was a dang good cup of coffee, with a bitterness strong enough to tame any amount of cream. I swished away the visions of myself chattering mercilessly below the waves with a regulator in my mouth, and I headed over to the dive shop. They said something about having 5-mil thick wet suits - that sounds pretty thick I guess.This was a different sort of a dive for me. Most of the dives I've done involve going out a few clicks in a big boat with 20 other people. Today, we would suit up at the shop and make a short drive to the beach, where we would help the dive team launch a small Zodiac into the water from the beach. As I sat there listening to the dive briefing, I was looking at the Zodiac, realizing that there really wasn't going to be any relief from wet and wind until we were all the way done with the dive. Again, I swished away the chattering, submerged image of Don. I suited up in my 5-mil thick suit, hoping to start building up heat inside the suit as far in advance as possible. I noticed several folks had dry suits, and everybody but me seemed to have a hood. I inquired to the dive master, "Do those hoods make a big difference?" The Dive Master confirmed this and thankfully handed me a nice thick hood. As I slipped it over my head, he replied in his thick Aussie accent, "There you go mate, now you look the part."
A dozen fully suited black human seals loaded into the back of a truck, and we were on our way. You can tell they launch these boats 6 times a day. Within minutes, the truck is flying backwards down the sandy beach to launch the zodiac. We were quickly motioned to do as briefed. Everybody held onto the side of the zodiac and walked it out into the water deep enough to crank. The smaller of the crew pulled themselves aboard, then the remaining men helped push the boat a little deeper before boarding. The thick wet suit, I learned at this point, does the job. The chill of the colder waters was not going to be so bad. Once we shimmied on board the boat, we took our seat on the inflated pontoon-like hulls of the boat, and we were on our way.Sometimes you just have to realize, right then, that you are having one of those moments to remember. Skimming along inches above the water in the zodiac, my senses were overwhelmed with wet and salty winds, bright blue winter morning skies, and the beautiful Australian coastline set against a dark blue sea. Julian Rocks was our destination, and it took no time to get there. Again, true to our briefing, the boat pulled up to a mooring, and diver number 1 was instructed to slide on his gear and fall backwards into the blue. I was diver #3 this morning, and I was glad to be one of the first so I'd have a little longer to reacquaint myself with a mask and regulator. As predicted, the visibility was not great, maybe 5 meters or less. I've been diving in less visibility than that, so I knew it could still be a good dive, just so long as we could stay grouped.
We began our descent by following the mooring line down into the murky depths. I don't think it was more than 12 meters to the bottom, but with the poor visibility, that was enough to give the impression we were descending into nothingness. The only evidence that my fellow divers were waiting on me at the bottom was the proof of their bubbles racing for the surface. Once we arrived at the bottom, our dive master checked everyone for the ok sign, and we were on our way. I was immediately treated to the typical array of beautiful and colorful fish as I have seen on countless Caribbean dives. If we saw nothing more, I'd go home happy. No sooner had that thought bubbled to the surface than my dive master crouched closer to the sandy bottom and shined his flashlight on the large shark swimming right in front of us! My initial reaction was an odd mix of "holy crap" and "heck yes" and "can I get eaten" all rolled into one. "Heck yes" quickly dominated the other two. This was officially a shark dive, and we were just getting started.
He was not alone. With the visibility being so poor, I do not know how many sharks there were, but we frequently had two or three running their routes around us through the reefs. I estimated the length of several to be 10 feet, give or take my bulging eyes. I'd later learn that these sharks were Grey Nurse sharks, also called Sand Tiger sharks. The Grey Nurse shark is not to be confused with the more whiskery and wimpy Nurse sharks of the Caribbean. They are an endangered species here in Australia, once fiercely hunted by locals because of their (false) reputation as man-eaters. The Grey Nurse shark is what you picture when you think "shark". It is like a fighter jet of the ocean. It's mere sight commands respect and conveys speed and danger. Sometimes on a dive you will have that one great find, a single minute that makes the 45 minute dive stand out. Today I had way more than that minute. We would spend our entire dive with these amazing creatures. Sometimes they would surprise us from the side or go zipping past us in front. On a few occasions, we just sank down to the sand and let them give us their show. We were close enough to touch them, and one diver did just that. The shark showed is disapproval and shot forward, more in my direction. I was thinking how ironic it would be that he might start the ruckus with the tail and I get the teeth, but he zipped on by. Mental note: I erased my own thought that I might touch one after that. The front row seat was good enough.
With that as the main act of the dive, it'd be easy to forget everything else, but there was much more. As we circled Julian Rocks, we were treated to one Octopus, dozens of Carpet Sharks (aka Wobbegongs by the Aussies), and one particularly beautiful passage through a tunnel in the reefs where we swam through a soup of millions of tiny fish. Oh, and I did feel up one of the Carpet Sharks - so check: touched a shark. I never had a chance to think about the cold water or dwell on the poor visibility. In our small sphere of visibility to this undersea world, I felt for a moment more like an intimate part of their world.A little later on, as I was zipping along on the wrong side of road up the Aussie highway, I sipped on a water bottle and noted the neat hint of saltiness coming from my lips. I was reminded of a dive-crazy friend who once remarked that he didn't like to go too long without getting his taste of salt water. Today, I understood his addiction.
[editorial note: none of these pics are taken from my dive - just added for illustration. a few of these still do originate from byron's bay by others.]
