Dive at The Leap, Kurnell, NSW on Saturday 27 June 2015

Dive Details

Location

Date

Saturday 27 June 2015

Time

11:22am - 12:29pm

Details

The Leap looked amazing from the top of the stairs. There was almost no swell and the water looked clear. Sheree jumped in from the top platform and I jumped it from the low platform. While we were on the surface a large Port Jackson shark swam under us. We descended and swam at around 100° to the wall south east of The Leap. We descended the wall and the visibility was around 15 metres. The wall looked amazing.

We swam along the wall towards The Steps. Part way along we came on a huge stingray resting on the rocks. It's span was between 1 and 2 metres, closer to the latter. We approached it slowly and it gently swam off and over the wall. It was missing its tail.

We continued along the wall until it ended and had a quick look for pygmies on Pygmy Rock but none were obvious. Not far past Pygmy Rock Sheree pointed out a weedy seadragon. This was one I'd first seen about a month ago in the same area and since then has been to Seadragon Alley and back. I spotted another weedy a bit closer to the sand line. This was the same one I saw at Pygmy Rock last weekend.

We kept on going and just past Seahorse Rock we found "Pierre", the bot-bellied seahorse, at his new location. He was in the same spot he'd been last Sunday and on Wednesday.

We swam on to Seadragon Alley where we saw two more weedies, a male and a female. The male I have seen since March 2014 and the female since December 2013.

Just after Seadragon Alley we saw one of the juvenile weedies. I first saw it with Sheree om 10 May. We then saw the female with the wavy body.

Once we got to Big Rock we started looking at all the pale green sponges (Mycale mirabilis) for "Rosie", the pot-bellied seahorse, who had been seen in the area on Wednesday. She'd moved from The Monument where she ended up after the super storm. We didn't find her but I did find a pygmy pipehorse. This made up for not seeing one at Pygmy Rock.

We kept looking for "Rosie" as we headed towards the exit. We saw a crested horn shark on the way. We finished our safety stop over the boulders and exited at The Steps.

Buddy

Sheree Rose

Seas

Slight

Visibility

15 metres

Duration

66 minutes

Maximum depth

21.0 m

Average depth

14.4 m

Water temperature

17.8°C

Dive Profile from Citizen Hyper Aqualand

Tides at Botany Bay AEST

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

High

4:05am

1.32m

Low

10:13am

0.59m

High

4:51pm

1.56m

Low

11:21pm

0.68m

Video

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.