Day 10: Dive

I booked 2 boat dives with my friend and was pretty psyched about it since I got the confirmation. I read up about the dive sites and found out that they were really good. We drove down to Rosebay only to find out the skipper of the boat was sick, as such there will be no boat dive. They compensated with 2 shore dives free and I manage to get a refund for the boat dive, could not reschedule as I will be leaving on Friday.

Drove down to Manly and did 2 shore dives at Shelly Bay. The dive master mentioned "There are blue ring octopus, don't go touching them as they are very venomous". I think I heard that they can kill people. *Faint*. The deepest was 7m and the surge was pretty strong. It sucks having to walk down to the beach and back up after the dive (Think I am too pampered by the Live on Board). Marine life is very different from South East Asia diving. I got to see many different fishes which I have never seen before. Saw a HUGE school of catfish and REALLY regretted not having a camera. Saw 2 squids about 1.5m, that was damn awesome. Manage to octopus, large gorupers, cowfish, pipefish and sharks from afar. I also manage to see an Angel shark, it really look more like a sting ray. Did not find a Sea dragon or Webblegong though *Sigh*. The dives were great as I have not seen such marine life, but the coral life is bad (maybe cause it is the shore) and the water was 20 deg; I was really freezing even under a full 5mm suit. The group had 4 other divers and they all had bad bouyancy and kept kicking up the sand and silt which created bad visibility. They are like to cluster together and kept barging in to see things. It was really a culture shock for me. One more thing, they dive really fast; which means no time to find the small critters.

Since I drove 2 other divers to Manly and back, they treated me lunch. We had a really good beef burger near the dive shop. I went back to my friend's place to rest and went to the Art museum. I was floored by this place and really wished I could have more time. Will probably visit this place one more time before I leave. Had pasta for dinner and the serving was HUGE.

Good and bad day I guess....no boat dive but at least I got free shore dives and lunch....