In August I was lucky enough to spend sometime in  Sydney with Jayne Jenkins, the Australasia Vice President. What better time to break in a drysuit than the middle of winter?! Jayne and I headed down to The Bower  (one of Sydney’s dive sites in Manly) for my first ever drysuit dive with the Waterproof Draco suit. It was a wonderful feeling being snug inside the suit, dry and warm for an hour long dive. The conditions in Sydney have been quite dirty since the big storms a few weeks ago so visibility was limited but we still saw an array of local creatures including Banjo Rays, numerous stone fish, huge blue grouper and an octopus.

Unfortunately the weather wasn’t fantastic during my stay, but it didn’t stop me from diving at sheltered spots inside the harbour. The local dive shop, ProDive, were kind enough to take me out. We dived at both Chowder Bay and the Quarantine site just inside North Heads. Macro was the plan for these and I managed to get some good video of cuttlefish, octopus, flatheads and many seahorses perched in the nets at Chowder. I got a few great shots with my Olympus Pen-2 despite the silty conditions.

Due to the rough oceans outside of the heads, my plans to see the Grey Nurse sharks and Port Jacksons was abandoned. Ocean World at Manly stepped in and offered me a dive in the aquarium to see the creatures. With no fins and extra weight we jumped in the tank and hopped along the bottom like astronauts. The Grey Nurse Sharks were much bigger than I had expected, and being accustomed to visitors they would pass unnervingly close to my face! It was a wonderful experience and enabled me to appreciate the beauty of much of Sydney’s local wildlife that I am yet to see on my dives; rays, tuna, wobbegongs, Port Jacksons, turtles, batfish and more.
After an introduction from  Todd Tai of  MiVision, MAKO Eyewear were kind enough to meet with Jayne and I about  sponsoring the Scholarship.  We  explained the scholarship which they must have liked as they were generous enough to give me a great pair of glass polarised lens sunglasses for my travels. These will definitely be handy during my trip to sunny Papua New Guinea!

 

 

While in Sydney I also took my GUE Fundamentals course with Liam Allen at Dive Centre Bondi. I really enjoyed the challenges of diving with completely new techniques; I felt like an Open Water student again, floundering around. The focus on trim and buoyancy makes it a great course for any diver, even if there is little intention of continuing on to tech or cave diving. My new Waterproof drysuit and Fourth Element undergarments were a critical component during the long training dives and carrying out the skills in the suit has made me more confident with my buoyancy in general. It was a challenging course in the sense that as a PADI Open Water Instructor I have had the PADI techniques and ideas drilled in to me since I began diving, so letting go of some of my automatic responses was difficult! The GUE Fundamentals course was a great way to get an idea of the technical side of diving and after gaining skills as a foundation I am interested in gaining more training and applying my new skills on my travels.

I had a very eventful week but the highlight of my visit was getting to spend a few evenings with Ron Taylor; renowned underwater film producer. Ron and his wife Valerie have worked in the underwater film industry since it began in the 60’s, they were the first to film Great White sharks in South Australia in 1966 for the film Great White Death, which Ron was kind enough to give me a copy of. It was very interesting to talk to Ron about the changes in the spearfishing, diving and underwater film industries. He is a wonderful story teller and has had enough incredible experiences to never run out of amazing tales! A full (long) list of Ron and Valerie’s achievements is on their site: http://www.ronvaltaylor.com/

I am very grateful to everyone for their generosity; Sue Crowe of Tabata Australia for her generous sponsorship of the scholarship, Waterproof for their wonderful suits, ProDive for a Sydney diving experience and Kris Lim and the staff at Ocean World for showing me some of the local wildlife. Also to MAKO Eyewear the sunglasses will help save my eyes when on the ocean. A huge thank you to Liam Allen and Dive Centre Bondi for my new GUE skills that will play a big role in my attitude towards diving. Thank you to Ron Taylor for all the wonderful stories and encouragement and of course Jayne and Colin for connecting me to all these amazing experiences.