The Leap looked fabulous from the top of the steps and the water looked quite clear. I bumped into Dom at The Steps while I was suiting up and he said that the visibility was not great once you got deeper than 6 or 7 metres. I was hoping that enough of the tide will have come in before I dived, although it was only going to be around an hour after low tide.
I jumped in from the low ledge and descended. Initially, the visibility looked OK but as I headed to the sand line at 60° it gradually got worse. By the time I reached the sand line the visibility was only 3 to 5 metres. There was also a lot of kelp between the rocks which made navigation a lot more difficult.
I started towards The Steps in hunt for "Alex" the painted angler. Despite the poor visibility I was able to locate the original rock on which we saw it. From here I carefully checked each rock looking for "Alex". Eventually, I found the exact location we had seen "Alex" two weeks ago but it was not there. I checked some more rocks but did not find "Alex".
I continued on towards The Steps. I was now looking for the red algae in which Eddie had a photo of a pipefish. The poor visibility made finding anything but the basic rock formations very difficult. Eventually I got to Seahorse Rock without finding the red algae. I did a quick check of Seahorse Rock and then went to the rock behind to find "Rosie" and "Bob", the pot-bellied seahorses. To my great disappointment, neither "Rosie" nor "Bob" were visible on top of the rock. I looked around the sides of the rock and found "Rosie" on the side furthest from Seahorse Rock. I then looked around the surrounding rocks but did not find "Bob". I wonder where he is.
I swam on a bit further to look for "Lucy", the pot-bellied seahorse. She wasn't on her usual rock but I did manage to find her on a nearby rock where we have seen her before.
Moving on, I was looking for the orange painted angler that Eddie had photographed but I did not find it. I ended up at the next seahorse location and found "Southern Cross", "Pierre" and "Richie". There was also a small reaper cuttlefish nearby. I wonder if it is the same one we sometimes see.
I swam on towards The Steps. I swam a but faster now but was still on the lookout of anglers or anything else of interest. I stopped at Big Rock for a quick look for pygmy pipehorses but didn't find any. I then went to the hollow where Sheree had found the two pygmy pipehorses but could not see either.
I swam to the basket star at the sand line and then up the reef to find the other pygmy pipehorse, swimming past the other basket star. I located the rock where Di had shown me a pygmy pipehorse a few weeks ago and fairly quickly spotted a small white pygmy pipehorse. After taking a few photographs of it, I looked to see if there might be a second one and was pleasantly surprised to find a male only a few centimetres away. This was an unexpected bonus.
After the pygmy pipehorses, I made my way back to the sand line and then swam to The Steps. I did not find anything interesting along the way. I stopped near the Plesiastrea colonies for my safety stop and exited at The Steps. |
