Dive #587

Notes

Relaxed Sunday shore dive, entered the water via the northern steps closest to the restaurant. Tide was coming in at the time, so needed to surface swim out for a couple of metres before descending. A couple of minutes after descending, DM found a small moray eel in amongst a patch of sea grass. Swam a bit further — the usual clouds of sardines around the 5–6 m depth mark — and found a banded sea snake near the edge of the reef. Headed north along the wall and saw a school of squid hanging around at 15–20 m. Turned at around 30 minutes and the current was noticeably picking up with the tide incoming. First it was felt as a subtle pull taking you away from the wall, but when we turned around it was clear we were going against the tide. Soon after turning, there was a large turtle at around 10 m depth with around 5–6 remoras attached to its shell. It was trying to clean itself using a sand patch beneath a rock — may have been trying to remove some of its attached hitchhikers. Continued south and 5 minutes later saw the turtle again, gliding below us at around 20 m depth. Turned westward, heading into the shallows. Near the exit, we were attacked by an anemonefish trying to protect a baby (around 1 cm long) that was hiding in the anemone.