Tuesday, November 3, 2009

Diving on the Great Barrier Reef

Nov 1 2009

.Well I was the only one dressed for Hallowe'en.  I wore the classic dagger thru the head . It was a big hit.  We had to explain the NA fascination with the holiday.


We did go on a shark dive against our better instincts, but when in Rome! We went down and sat on the sat on the coral in about 50 ft of water.  The guide, wearing the chain mail gloves, signaled for the feed bucket to come down.  The bucket was filled with tuna heads on a steel chain.  The sharks started circling immediately.  According to the guides, they were”only white fins and reef sharks”, ferocious enough for me! The sharks started attacking the heads, using the classic head thrashing motion to get the food off the chain.  I looked around for a sacrificial victim in case the sharks swam at me.   My adrenaline was running.   It took a long time for the sharks to get all the food off the chain. Potato cods and lots of little fish were swimming around waiting for scraps.   The potato cod even managed to get some away from the sharks.  I scanned the horizon for the big ones – hammerheads and ocean sharks, but they didn’t turn up.  The guide was crouched against the coral head keeping his head down and all appendages out of sight.  But the video photographer was swimming in the midst of everything.  We bought the video.  You will have to come to dinner for the viewing.  I don’t intend to repeat this adventure.   
Then we went on a regular dive. We definitely found Nemo.  The anemone fish are so pretty nestled in the frilled anemones.  

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