I had planned a late afternoon dive at Bare Island but when I got there at 5:30pm it looked rough and murky so I came to Camp Cove for a night dive instead. I waited as long as I could before getting in but it was still quite light.
I got in at the beach and followed the shoreline to the north. I was hoping to see the large striped angler but it was not there. I went all the way to the sand area where we used to see the Euselenops luniceps. I turned and came back along the shoreline. On the way back I found a medium sized giant cuttlefish under a ledge. There were a number of mourning cuttlefish around, too.
When I got back to the beach I started swimming across the face of the beach in and out of the seagrasses. The surge here was quite strong and it was stirring up the bottom. I spotted a pair of eyes sticking out of the sand. When I got closer I noticed it was a small hammer octopus buried in the sand. I then came across a rock flathead in the seagrasses.
On the edge of the sand I found a large tiger pipefish with parasites on its snout and neck. Near the pipefish was an encrusted cup with a small yellow striped angler in it. The angler came out of the cup and was moving with the surge. A southern dumpling squid swam by and I followed it for a while. It didn't stop or bury itself.
As I was thinking about calling the dive I spotted a snake eel in the sand. I managed to get a few photographs before it submerged completely. I waited for it to resurface and while checking the spot I thought it submerged I saw a tiny striped pyjama squid sitting on the sand. The surge made photographing it difficult and I would have loved to have been able to show some scale.
The surge was getting quite strong so I finished the dive getting out at the beach. I was quite surprised how calm it was at the beach considering how much surge there was underwater. |
