Dive at The Steps, Kurnell, NSW on 1/1/14

Dive Details

Location

Date

01 January, 2014

Time

7:34am - 8:44am

Details

We jumped in at The Steps. We could tell it was going to be a big high tide as it was still over an hour to go and the water was pretty much over the platform at The Steps. We descended to the sand line and headed towards The Leap.

We made a slight detour to look for "Big John", the orange form undescribed angler, and found it in the same location it was in on Friday. We headed back to the sand line and continued on our way.

As we passed the basket star it was open. I'm not sure if it was because of the early hour or all the particulate matter in the water (or both). Unfortunately, the particulate matter made the photos less spectacular.

We continued on and the going was a tough due to the really strong tidal current. We saw a weedy seadragon on the way and eventually made it to the location where I've seen "Dana", the red painted angler. After a bit of a look around, I located "Dana" very close to where I'd seen it on Friday.

We turned and headed back towards The Steps. It was much easier going with the current. We stopped at Big Rock to look for pygmy pipehorses and PJ found one before I did. I think it was the same one we saw on Thursday. After looking at the photos I see it has a crustacean on its head.

We swam on to The Steps. As we passed the basket star it was in the process of closing which suggests it may have been open due to the early hour. They are usually nocturnal feeders.

Before we got to Little Big Rock, I headed away from the sand line to look for "Robin", the orange painted angler, but could not locate it. I then swam back to Little Big Rock and PJ pointed out two mourning cuttlefish. At Little Big Rock I looked for the Okenia mellita nudibranch but could not find it.

We headed back to "Big John" where PJ left me for his safety stop while I looked for "Little Andrew", the orange painted angler, but to no avail. I then headed for my safety stop among the boulders where I met PJ playing with a giant cuttlefish.

I completed my safety stop and exited at The Steps.

Buddy

Peter Jaques

Seas

Slight

Visibility

5 metres

Duration

69 minutes

Maximum depth

15.9 m

Average depth

12.1 m

Water temperature

18.3°C

Dive Profile from Citizen Hyper Aqualand

Tides at Botany Bay AEDT

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

Low

2:11am

0.32m

High

8:45am

1.98m

Low

3:27pm

0.13m

High

9:23pm

1.46m

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.