In January 2010 Mick Todd, my Australian dive buddy (Mick
will claim, my mentor) and I drove about one thousand seven hundred kilometres
from Sydney to Port Lincoln. This
coastal city is by Boston Bay
at the southern extremity of the Eyre Peninsula, South
Australia. We democratically split the driving. I drove ten kilometres - Mick the rest.
Mick and I had gone to Port Lincoln in the hope of seeing
Great White Sharks and en route we detoured south of Adelaide
to photograph Leafy Sea Dragons at Rapid
Bay. We were out of luck with the Great Whites
although had seen many Bronze Whaler Sharks. Now it was time to head home to Sydney.
Or was it? We had to be back in Sydney
by lunchtime on a Sunday. If we got up early enough on Saturday morning, there
would be time for one more dive, if we then drove non-stop back to Sydney. And just two hours south of Port Lincoln was Hopkins Island, home to numerous Australian Sea lions. Dive on.
Excited, I woke up at 4.21
a.m. Mick stirred and went back to sleep again. I woke him up again
at 4.45 a.m. and shortly after we met
up with Brenton Hage, skipper of Brynda, our vessel for the morning. Once
aboard Brynda, we quickly set off south in the darkness, later to be treated to
a glorious sunrise over a marvellously flat sea. Mick missed this. He was fast asleep again.
Reaching Hopkins Island,
Mick woke up and we were soon in the shallow clear water. We could see Sea
Lions basking but getting close to them was not easy. They clearly intended to
keep at a distance but fortunately the occasional Sea Lion seemed to be curious
and would briefly check us out. I had my Nikon D200 with a Tokina 10-17mm lens which
proved ideal in these conditions. I was having such a good time I forgot that
we were on a tight schedule. Fortunately Mick did not and after 101 minutes we
reluctantly got out of the warm water.
This had been an outstanding dive, my first with Sea Lions.
Perfect conditions to see them in – how lucky were we?!