Dive at The Monument, Kurnell, NSW on 3 August 2014

Dive Details

Location

Date

3 August 2014

Time

9:07am - 10:30am

Details

It was another weekend with rough seas but the seas had settled enough to make The Monument a good choice. The Leap and The Steps were diveable, just, but the exit at The Steps would have been messy.

I walked in at the bay around the corner from the flagpoles and descended to the sponge garden. Despite the rough seas the visibility was at least 5 metres and extending to 10 metres in places. There was a lot of particulate matter in the water but I could easily see the sand from the sponge garden.

I headed south east along the top of the reef, up the slope and over the wall to the area where "Honey" and the other pot-bellied seahorses used to be. I checked around that whole area looking at the sponges for seahorses but found none.

I came back along the sand line and the wall, again looking for seahorses and anglers. At the end of the wall I came up over the reef and followed the reef along checking out all the sponge covered boulders. At around 20 metres past split rock I found "Oliver", the orange form undescribed angler. I am amazed how easy they can be to spot at times despite their excellent camouflage. This angler was upside-down in the side of a rock and I spotted it from 5 metres away.

I followed the reef all the way to the corner, swimming passed the two bommies. It was a lot colder on the corner and for the rest of the dive. Once around the corner I followed the base of the wall until the rocks on the sand/mud thinned out. I then swam up the wall and along the top of the wall until I came to the break in the kelp and followed the shallow wall along towards the beach. When the wall ended I swam south over the sand and exited on the rocks next to the beach to the west of the flag poles.

Seas

Surgy

Visibility

5-10 metres

Duration

83 minutes

Maximum depth

13.4 m

Average depth

9.9 m

Water temperature

15.0°C

Dive Profile from Citizen Hyper Aqualand

Tides at Botany Bay AEST

Note that tides at dive site may vary from above location.

High

12:22am

1.40m

Low

6:44am

0.52m

High

1:14pm

1.44m

Low

7:23pm

0.68m

Camera gear

Camera

Nikon D7000

Lens

Nikon AF Micro-Nikkor 60mm f/2.8D

Housing

Ikelite 6801.70

Lens port

Ikelite Flat Port 5502.41

Strobe

2 x Ikelite SubStrobe DS161

Photographs

Depth information, where present, indicates the depth of the camera when the photograph was taken and can be used to approximate the depth of the subject.