Sunday, 18 April 2004

You might as well quit scuba diving now, said the guide, because you'll never have another dive like that one again. It was our first dive in deep water, after a final practice session in the pool, and the Heron Island dive boat took us students (along with 12-15 experienced divers) to a point on the reef called Heron Bommie. We dived to a depth of 12 meters (40 feet) and drifted with the current to Pam's Point; on the next three dives we'd demonstrate the skills we learned in the pool, from removing and replacing our weight belts to performing a controlled emergency ascent — but the first dive was simply a "fun dive," as the instructor put it, to get us used to the gear and the environment.

Large sea animals like sharks and mantas are a relatively rare sight when diving, I'm told — most people will make several dives before they spot anything larger than a big tuna. Diving at the Great Barrier Reef improves those odds, but nonetheless we hit the jackpot on our first time out: Two of the largest mantas anyone had ever seen, one with a wingspan of four meters (13 feet) and the other only slightly smaller; three white-tipped reef sharks, each about a meter and a half (4 to 5 feet); a regular riot of tropical fish, including several we could identify from the Finding Nemo aquarium; and enough coral to build a house. Our instructor, who had been diving for seven years, said that it was the biggest manta she'd ever seen; another diver on the boat said he'd been on 230 dives, and this was his best one yet.

I don't have any pictures of this epic undersea adventure, alas (the instructor sensibly suggested that I learn to dive first, and then struggle to master underwater photography), so you'll have to take my word for it: Heron Island is a great place to learn how to scuba dive. I do have some other photos of the island and the reef, including some taken from the air as we flew to the island (the helicopter ride is highly recommended), which I'll try to get online in the next few days.

- Posted by Scott Forbes at 11:27 am. comments.