Latest Dive Reviews

Sep 15, 2012 - Mistaken Cape

"The weather was too good so we canned the trip to the Monument and instead headed north to the east coast of Maria Island to further explore a nice dive that was found on a prior weekend just to the north of Mistaken Cape.

The day was beautifully calm as 5 of us plus a borrowed TUDC member to man our boat headed out to the outside of Maria. Once we sorted out the sounder and got the shot set it was time to all jump in and do our first dive of the day. We dropped down onto a large wall that ended somewhere near 40m covered in colourful sponges and Zoanthoids. Schools of Butterfly perch joined the usual locals to greet us on the bottom as well as some nice sized crays who were eyeing us carefully. There were some very large boulders which created some fun swimthroughs and there was a noticeable current running from the north. We swam around to the exposed part of the wall and quickly backtracked on the sheltered side as the current was much stronger there. We made our way back up to the bommies that we started near, found our shot and spent about 10 minutes decoing on O2 before heading up to the boat. The new ropes along the sides of the boat are very handy for holding onto and hanging gear off - thanks Richard.

We had a deadline to get back to Triabunna by 2pm so we dropped off our TUDC boat driver onto their small flotilla - Thaks George and headed back around to the Troy D for a short, easy dive with remaining air. On the way there, we pulled into Darlington for lunch. The waters in the bay are shallow with quartzite sand which reflects upwards and makes the water look almost tropical and the fringing white sandy beach and sunny day made us feel we were already at Truk Lagoon.

After a quick run to the D, we found a buoy, had a bit of a sound and figured the rough direction to the wreck from the buoy's location. Being really rushed for time, we jumped in and headed in the approporiate direction but lo and behold, someone had moved the wreck so we ended up swimming around the sand for a while before saying bugger this and heading back to the boat and hightailing it back to Triabunna to scrape it in just before our deadline. Our second tank of fuel ran out about 50m from the boat ramp which was a bit embarassing. Lucky we had another one to go I guess :)

Anyhow, a great day on the water with James, Brando, Justin and Peter.

Thanks James for the photos"
By Drew