-- Spoilsport, Friday, January 3, 2003 --

Dive #12 - Fanfare, Flinder's Reef (with Mia)

AMAZING dive. The best one yet, I believe! We saw: a large moray eel being cleaned by a cleaner wrasse (black, with electric blue stripe running the length of its body), a spotted ray gliding off into the distance, a porcelain crab sitting just under a large carpet anemone with a large group of fish in it (three clownfish, one large domino damsel, many juvenile domino damsels), a few more anemones hosting groups of clownfish and damsels (with juvenile clownfish! they were very cute). All this, and I forgot to put a CF card into my camera! It wouldn't have mattered, though -- I had a wide-angle lens on. :) After almost forty minutes, I couldn't bear not being able to take photos and swam back to the boat, cutting the dive short. I felt guilty, but Mia seemed to be ok with it. :)

Dive #13 - Fanfare, Flinder's Reef (with Leon and Bernd)

I swapped my dome port out for a standard flat port and a 50mm macro lens and swam directly into the sand channel between two of the fingers to find an "anemone" (it turned out to be a coral) that Walt had spotted on the dive before. It was roughly five inches in diameter, and had a swarm of 50-100 small, translucent cleaner shrimp climbing around on it. When I arrived, a large fish was sitting there, being cleaned, but it quickly swam off when I approached. We then went off looking for the porcelain crab, which turned out to have moved out of site under the anemone somewhere. I did, however, find a second, smaller porcelain crab, which I photographed. We were unable to find the moray eel, but Norm and Teri managed to find it from the directions I gave them. Funny how that can happen. :)

Dive #14 - Fanfare, Flinder's Reef (Night Dive, with Sharron)

The porcelain crab was out! I managed to get some fantastic shots. :) Using the 100mm macro lens was very, very difficult, even with the calm water.

When hanging on the safety-stop bar below the boat, I noticed a school of small fish hovering just above us, so I switched on my hartenberger light and pointed it straight up. The fish went berserk, swimming violently around in a large ball just above us. We watched for more than five minutes before surfacing -- the glittering of their silver bodies was mesmerizing.

22:40 - I must sleep. I'm tired! The sky here is amazingly clear. I must get out to stare at the sky at night sometime.

Little cleaner shrimp in a coral in the sand, at Fanfare

Little cleaner shrimp in a coral in the sand, at Fanfare

Juvenile porcelain crab with anemone, at Fanfare

Juvenile domino damsels, in anemone, at Fanfare

Clownfish and anemone, at Fanfare

Juvenile clownfish in anemone, at Fanfare

Clownfish and anemone, at Fanfare

Crinoid, at Fanfare

Tomato clownfish and anemone, at Fanfare

Crinoid, at Fanfare

Clownfish, domino damsels, and carpet anemone, at Fanfare

Little shrimp in coral, at Fanfare (night)

Crab, in soft coral, at Fanfare (night)

Feeding porcelain crab and domino damsels in carpet anemone, at Fanfare (night)

Feeding porcelain crab and domino damsels in carpet anemone, at Fanfare (night)

Porcelain crab in carpet anemone, at Fanfare (night)

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