Cody joined me today for his first dive in his new drysuit. We were going to repeat yesterday's dive albeit a bit closer to high tide. It was calm again.
We got in through the channel in front of the flagpoles and swam out on the surface to the start of the East-West wall. I thought I had the right spot but when we descended we were out on the sand, we'd gone out too far. The visibility was around 10 metres and the water temperature around 15°C. I checked on Cody and he was fine so I headed south to the wall expecting he was right behind me. When I got to the wall he was not. I waited at the wall waving my lights out towards the sand. He didn't appear so I started along the wall in case he was ahead. I went slowly to allow him to catch up if behind. Eventually he caught up to me.
As we swam I spotted a reaper cuttlefish with prey. I then spotted a juvenile red painted anglerfish. I took some photographs before we moved on.
We swam to the area where the male pot-bellied seahorse and female White's seahorse had been. We looked around the area but couldn't find either of them.
We continued to the area where I saw "Sandy", the female great seahorse, yesterday. She was on the same red chimney sponge so I didn't even have to search for her.
We followed the base of the wall to near the end. I found the large orange red-fingered anglerfish in the same spot it had been yesterday. We then looked for pygmy pipehorses on the adjacent rock. We found one of the males first and then I spotted the white/gold female. We then spotted the other male. We couldn't find the cryptic female.
We looked at the large Carijoa rock before cutting the corner and heading to the NW-SE wall. On the way down I spotted a small orange red-fingered anglerfish. I think it might be the same one I've seen previously in the area.
We swam along the top of the NW-SE wall and then dropped down near the rock where the grey red-fingered anglerfish is often in the gap. It was not there today or at least we couldn't find it.
We continued along the reef past Split Rock and on to the slope below Seahorse Rock. I found the brown female White's seahorse out in the open on the slope.
We headed to the top of the Deep Wall and to the rock where the pygmy pipehorses have been. I found the female low down on the rock near the sand and the male was attached to an alga that was flapping around in the surge.
We dropped down the wall and swam on to the pot-bellied seahorses. I found "Gilligan", the small light brown male, and "Virgil", the large dark brown male. We looked around for "Ginger", the large orange female, but could not see her. While we were looking I spotted a large juvenile weedy seadragon on the sand in front of the seahorses. I took some photographs of the weedy before going back and looking for "Ginger" again. I eventually found her at the south--eastern end below the rock on the sand partially hidden in algae.
As we swam on I spotted the large dwarf lionfish in the orange finger sponge. We stopped at the orange red-fingered anglerfish before heading for the shallows.
We ascended to 5 metres and did our safety stops as we swam to the exit point. We got out on the shelf and waded out.