Reports

WILD BLUE DIVE REPORT CONTEST

Alright dust off that camera and you could win!

We'll draw one report a month and the lucky diver will get a $50 vouchar in the mail.

So get out there and let us know how you went, especially the visiblity.  The more reports you send in the more chances of winning!!

Send them in to reports@wildblue.co.nz

MATAURI BAY 31.01.2012

Hi Matt

Happy New Year. Managed a good few dives up in Matauri Bay in January – nothing big but simply beautiful diving. Had a special dive around Kauri Cliffs using the new Rob Allen reel fitting on the Effesub 1.2m gun.

Family were on the beach and boat anchored, so opted just to use the reelgun and 1m string off the base of the gun for fish. Stumbled upon a work up of gannets and thousands of baitfish in a gut at 10m below a 5m drop off. Worked this spot and pulled off two snapper (4 and 6.7kg) and a 15kg kingie.

Shot a good squidy on the weedline – all bundled up on the 1m string on the base of the gun. Great stuff.

Enjoying the reel gun when doing the shories as it provides greater freedom when snooping. The 3.5m Sporasub suit is warm for a 2-3 hour stint during the summer months, and is a magic fit. Like the camo. Used it to pick up the 4kg snap pictured on a Matauri Bay coastal dive.

The Sporasub watch is great particularly in provide an appropriate recovery time between deeper dives – improving diving safety.

Dono

TI POINT 28.01.2011

Hay Matt

Went out on Thursday afternoon to Te Point .

Viability was around 8m, 10m in some areas. My brother shot 4 butters before a shark came along and took them. There were hundreds of bait fish in the area. Wasn't long before the kings turned up to have a go at them. Most of the kings were probably just over legal.

I spotted this boar fish at around 10m just sitting on the bottom so i dropped down right on top of it. Didn't even know i was there and shot straight through the top of its head

Simon Maddock

WAIRARAPA 12.01.12

 To matt, our report from our amazing coast down here,

12th
After some fine settled weather (for a change) we hit Cape Palliser with eagerness and orders for a feed for my birthday celebrations. On arrival we found it un-nervely calm and very little people present. The water looked clear except for a little fuzz in close that we would have to swim thru. On arriving at our spot x, we were created with near on 10-12m vis in most spots. After doing a few dives on the first reef things were rather quiet so we headed around the other side. Our first dive each resulted in a decent moki each (4kg & 5kg), also the site of a few blue cod eating the moki scales got us a little excited. After shooting a few non desireable fish to create a burley we soon had a good handfull of blue cod. We then decided to stop on the way back home for a quick paua cray dive to finish off the bag. We collected nearly our limit in 30 minutes in only 1-2m of water and also managed to pick up a couple of unlucky butters who swam past as were attaching our crays to their nooses.

13th
After the unreal day before experienced we made the decision to 'make hay will the sun shined' and head down again, plus all the extended families cleaned up everything from the day before so it was time to get some for ourselves. Heading down to spot x from the day before we were greeted with beautiful calm seas again, but once entering the water we realised the vis had deteriorated with a scum on the top metre. However once diving through that we were greeted with beautiful 8-10m vis in places. Our spot from the day before was dead so we headed in closer to around 2-3m depth. We were greeted with schools of big moki, in one school i counted nearly 30 legal fish. We quickly nailed a few of the bigger ones (the best going 6.1kg) We quickly grabbed a few cray and were out of there. An Amazing 2 days, leaving us waiting for the next time, however weather hasn't play balled yet. But now we have the catfish comp to look forward too and hopefully some more settled weather after that.

Chris Senior

BAY OF ISLANDS 23.11.2011

Hi Matt and Simon

Me and my mate got out again today for a BOI shorey. Absolutely primo conditions except for the crap vis. Was a hazy 4m most of the time but cleared up to around 6-7 at times. Algae bloom and salps everywhere.

We put in a decent 2.5k swim on empty stomachs and found the coast was infested with Porae.

My mate got his first which was awesome, But then his wishbone snapped so we had to share a gun for the rest of the dive.

We then found a nice weedline and on one of my drops I found 5 or so Porae...Hang on a minute, one of them looks a bit weird....Sweet! First Tarakihi!

Weedline was 20 meters to the sand and I had to hang around flicking up sand for a minute or so until he came in close....

Yeah, na.

Was about 7m and he came straight up to me.

Super happy to get one. Will definitely be heading back when the water is clearer. And I also got incinerated in my 7mil. Water is definitely getting warmer.

Cheers Sam.

MAYOR ISLAND 21.11.2011

Battson, Tom and I headed up to Mayor for the weekend and had an ‘interesting’ time.

Forecast was great at the start of last week but by Friday night it had deteriorated – funny how you justify to yourself it’ll still be good though ae.

We made the trip out there in a building sea. No swell but 20knt wind straight up our ass. Wasn’t too bad but got wet a few times in our 4.5m Stabi the ‘salty tackle’.

The plan was to stay a night on the island so we got there and unloaded excess gear and fuel and then were off for a dive. The rest of that day and night the wind picked up more and more. Sunday we were up before the sparrows and climbing to a high point on the island at first light to see if we could make an early run for land – NO LUCK. Wind had risen to a solid 30+knts and sea was not good. We were stuck and already envisaging Castaway type scenarios – talking to volleyballs - wilsonnnnn, and thinking who we would eat first (It definitely would’ve been Tom). A bit uncomforting too, the big ‘local’ joker who lives on the island is called BJ – we didn’t want to be left with him for a week and find out why...

Fortunately at the 11th hour on Sunday we made contact with a big launch that was on the island and making the trip home. They agreed it’d be ok for us to sit right up in their wake and that’s what we did. A slow but safe enough (albeit bloody wet) trip home (to the wrong harbour for us though....)

Real pain in the ass was the wind meant there was only one small bay on the whole island we could dive.

Everyone had a good time though. I had one good snapper rip off but managed another at 19lb. Spent the rest of my day stuffing up lots of snapper of all sizes – the joys of snapper snooping. Battson had a highlight of diving in a huge (and I mean f**ken huge) workup of kahawai, trevally and a few kingis.

Vis was a solid 15m and water temp 17.1. Kingis haven’t properly shown up yet based on what we saw and other reports.
Bring on summer

Josh

TE ARAI POINT 20.11.2011

Hi Matt

My mate and I went out to Te Arai for the first time today. Vis was very hazy, about 5m and bloomy. Water seemed really warm.

Shot out to those rocks further out and found schools of kahawai and yellowtail hanging in the current. Nothing much was happening so decided to start swimming in when I spotted a johnny. Broke the "death to all johnys" rule when I missed him.

A few minutes later saw this dark shape cruise under me, so shot from the surface nailing him through the back. Nothing vital hit so my mate did the old "second shot to the face" trick, which slowed him down (but not a lot). Still pulled me under a few times - definitely the most fun I have had pulling up a fish. Got him up and he was a little bigger than what I had thought in the crap vis.

Thanks a lot for the use of you scales. 18kg is a lot better than my previous wee rat!

Te Arai gets the thumbs up! Stoked!

Cheers, Sam.

BAY OF ISLANDS 20.11.2011

Headed up to the BOI for a little kayak mission with The Snapper Whisperer. Reid managed to "whisper" a couple of nice panny snappers with kina burleys, and thanks for the butterfish for my daughter - rule of thumb, don't save shooting butters for later, they will disappear. Long day, good time in the water. Enjoyed my new 5mm RA camo suit – warm and like the camo pattern. Found this boary parked in a channel on the sand. Plenty of trevs around up to 3kg I reckon and enjoyed the squid for dinner last night. 10m+ vis, distorted by saps in the water (time of year) and surge. Spooked snaps up to about 7kg, but being a Saturday plenty of boats and divers out. Smoking tyres on the way home on the gravel, punctured - new tyre required. Good times -

Dono

GREAT BARRIER, MOKOHINAU AND HEN AND CHICKS ISLANDS 15.11.2011

I’ve just returned from a great trip taking in most of the main dive spots around Auckland. Had a crew of 5 up from Christchurch with snapper and kingies as the main targets.

The boys were collected from the airport Weds afternoon and it was straight up to Whangarei to meet the good ship El Pescador. After loading up we slowly steamed out of the harbour to get a head start in the am.
Trev up anchored around 4am and we were off to the Barrier. There was a bit of wind and swell around and I guessed at our progress from my bunk and the rattle of waves against the hull. As we rounded Wellington Head it became obvious that there wasn’t going to be much diving on the inside as there was a bit too much westerly in the wind and the decision was made to park up for breakfast then punch around the top and into the hopefully calmer waters on the Eastern side. This proved to be the right decision and we were greeted with great vis and only a slight surge on an otherwise calm sea. The first snoops were reasonably productive producing a handful of snapper and a grunter packy for Grieg – we never got around to weighing it before it went back in but it’d have to have been around 5kg.

A bit more snooping and a few more pointers and the boys started pulling in the snaps. I managed an 8.5kg and a nice Johnny and Dave pulled in a 7kg doing its best 12kg impersonation. It was a mangy old bugger, blind in one eye, worn down fins, big bump on its nose. Would love to know how old it was. Grieg also managed a few good snaps – this was his first time diving in the North and seemed to have gotten the hang of the snapper thing straight off the bat.

The easterly surge was on the rise and after a bit of a pow wow it was decided to head back into the Broken Islands to take advantage of the Southerly wind change. Again a good decision. The next morning most of the boys wanted to continue on with the snoop but Rob had only kingies on his mind so after dropping the others around the coast we went looking for a kingy. It didn’t take long to find him a very beat up king hunkering under a ledge. He’d obviously had a very long night with big bite marks all over his body. The dawn hadn’t brought him any reprieve though and a quick shot through the head and it was all over.
The rest of the day was spent snooping and looking for more kings with success.

Rum and cigars for dinner.

Another very early morning and we were on our way to the Mokes. Unfortunately the swell snookered us a little and there was only a relatively small stretch not being battered by the surge. It was however a glorious stretch. Normal amazing mokes vis with huge numbers of snaps hanging on the walls. After swimming every inch of the sheltered patch twice there were some more great snaps on board but the kingies were conspicuously absent. Rather than dive the stretch a third time and have a rocky night we decided to head into the Chicks.

There was only time for a quick dive before dark with half the boys opting for another snoop, a couple flashing the points for a kingy and I went to bounce around on the weedlines. We all failed.

The last morning dawned clear and it was time for our last gasp snoop. A few more snaps on board and Grieg confirmed he had the hang of the snooping thing boating an 8.9kg snap. So close.



Overall a fantastic trip and a loop I look forward to doing again soon.

BALI & LOMBOK, INDONESIA 26.10.2011

Hi Matt

Just got back from the family-spearfishing holiday to Bali and Lombok.After the Kuta shop fest to keep wife and teenagers happy we headed up to the Northeast coast of Bali,met up with our regular jukung,outrigger canoe,skipper that I have used the past few years and headed down the coast to a spot that had produced some good fish for us over the years.It was sure nice dropping in to 26 to 28 degree water in a 3mill short suit instead instead of 14 degree and soon got into the swing of drifting with the current doing drops till you got to the headland where the current picks up serious speed and starts whirlpooling,all you can do is hang on for the ride till it eventually spits you out then get back in the jukung motor back up and do it again.

Saw a few doggys including one goody about 45 to 50kg,lay there waiting at 18mts as it cruised around me sussing me out at the edge of my guns range in the end had to try and swim towards it as was running out of gas,but they dont get big by been stupid.Only ended up with a barracuda and my son Mitchell got a small trev.

Went back the next day,same routine,picked up a puppy dog 6 or 7kg.Towards the end of the day Mitch shot a nice Bluefin trev 5kg and as it put up a good fight I dropped down out wide of his struggling fish and at 15 to 16 mts a nice dog approached,keeping my eyes of it and keeping as still as possible it closed the gap.I put a solid shot into it with my Andre 3 band 1.2 gun and watched as it headed for bottom,the power of the doggies never ceases to amaze me as it took a 15lt hard float and a 35lt hippo float down as well as giving Mitch a ride as his float line was caught around my floats.Ten minutes later I managed to grab its tail and ram the single flopper shaft back through as was now only hanging on by a bit of skin and flesh.Wasnt a monster but put up a great fight for a 35kg fish.Bintangs and sashimi tasted bloody great that night!

Next dive spot was an area at Lombok which I had not dived before,but my mate Andre in Bali said it is worth trying even though it is more well known as a top surf spot more than a spearo location.Always keen to try some where new we sorted out a piece of shit boat and headed out to a distant small island the size of an average two storey house with large swells from the Indian ocean sweeping around and over it making diving some what tricky at times.Water was a bit dirty but shot 3 small doggies,saw plenty more but left them to grow bigger,plus Bluefin trevs a Bludger trev 7kg and Mitch lost a very nice Golden trev.Would love to dive this place in better conditions as showed a lot of potential.

From there it was back to Bali to my regular dive spot of the past 10 years,met up with my good friend Nyoman who has been our jukung skipper,boatman,chef,and all round good guy over this time.We did plenty of dives there over the next week but things started going a bit pear shape for me with several missed chances mixed in with plain old bad luck.Still managed fish like bigeye,bluefin trevs jobfish mangrove jack small dogs and surgeons.Mitchell faired better getting a nice 10kg spanish mack,superb eating, bluefin trevs and surgeons as well.

Had my mate Q from Aussie join up for a few dives and he had a blast shootin plenty of nice fish including a nice GT at 32kg,we both saw some nice doggies up to 40kg but once again they proved very cagey and would hang out at max range, was pointless putting a hail mary shot into them as you will get smoked for sure.

Never got to dive Penida Matt swells were pumping out there and the water was a very 'cold' 17 to 18 degree when Andre dived it last.

Had a great trip all the same and anybody keen to go there and wants a few contacts let me know.

PS

That fulla that wrote the report on the monster king should of bloody been at work while I was away!!

Cheers

Andy G

LITTLE BARRIER ISLAND 26.10.2011

 I had a great day out at Little Barrier on Sunday.  Colin and son Rowan were looking for a bit of guidance after purchasing their new gear so after an introductory dive out at Goat Island we took their new boat out to Little B for their first spearfish.  The northern bays were a bit cloudy vis wise but both managed to secure their first fish and made great leaps with their freediving skills.  Next stop was the eastern side where we found much clearer water and a lot more fish action.  We got Rowan over a great butterfish rock and he proved he had his eye in with the gun.  All in all a great day out and it was fantastic to see to new guys getting into the sport and loving it.

Matt

CAVALLI ISLANDS 25.10.2011

Recently in the Bay of Islands there was a local fishing tournament included into the Bay of Islands IT festival, included in this was a spearfishing and freediving section which my work mates and I had entered in the previous year . This year how ever my usual dive mates were spearing in the tropics but another mate my cousin Adam was keen to join me so we met up at the competition briefing secured our tickets and got stuck into a bourbon or two and proceeded to give our other mates there a friendly bit of grief for we had a cunning plan under our belts. Another friend of ours had been fishing this spot a couple of days prior to the comp and had told us of the massive kings he had seen and hadn't been able to stop on his rod and reel and kindly donated the use of his inflatable for the cause .

Now if we had of read the rules as to competion zones we would have saved ourselves the disappointment but instead we charged ahead with our plan full of confidence leaving at 5 am for the couple of hour drive to Rangiputa just in time for the competion start . Arriving at our destination we were greeted with a beautiful 25 to 30 knot so'west wind blowing strait up the guts of the harbour which had in turn stirred up the bottom rendering the place undivable.  Now if we had of read the rules we would known we were about an hours drive north of the dive zone so with deflated spirits we headed back toward the bay devising a new plan .We knew that the kingfish would be the hardest target for us to find with even the local charter fishermen struggling to get them and us being in the little 10 foot inflatable we were restricted to the distance we could travel but on the way back toward the bay the Cavelli Island group lay and that would provide us an accessible place for our small craft with a sheltered beach launch.

Adam and I suited up on the beach and gave his partner Krystal a couple of warm jackets to put on for she was to be our boatman for the day and no sooner had we rounded the headland than we were greeted with that wind again in turn soaking Krystal.  Lucky for us she's a good hearted kiwi girl and could see the funny side of her being drenched and us not being worried in our suits.  Now we have both only dived this spot a couple of times and always approached it from a totally different direction so we knew what it looked like just not quite which island it lay behind. Taking the long and scenic route we practically circumnavigated the whole island group to find the place. Finally there things started to take a turn for the better as the tide had started to pick up pace and the place was alive with school fish and bird life.  We made sure the boat held fast on the anchor and handed Krystal a dry jersey we had stashed in the chilly bin and got our float lines in the water keen to get into it. I quickly made my way to the first lone rock.  This was where the school fish were the most heavily concentrated, the current pouring around the side made for slow progress but had eased up in front were I could catch my breath.  A dense school of kahawai moved through engulfing me with the thought of predatory fish following the school I made my descent and levelled off at about the 8meter mark where I could see in the gloom something cutting a hole in the school . At this point in time I'm thinking "great, the first shark of summer" and then it was there.  It had arced around out of sight and then materialising out of nowhere it presented itself broadside.   Estimating the kingi to be around the 40lb mark I extended my gun and placed my shaft just in front of its pectoral fin almost in slow motion.  With the flopper firmly engaged and resting against it gill plate I headed for the surface.

The fish lay stunned with blood pouring out its gills and I thought I'd practically stoned it.  It started to react slowly at first opening and closing its mouth like it was trying to bring up a bait and then violently shaking its head not liking the pressure I was starting to apply trying to lead it into deeper water. Making its first run I realised I had severely underestimated its weight.  I held my float line firm but the bungee had stretched to full capacity now and I'm heading down with it and having to give up some line I had already won back trying all I can to keep it off the reef . Fatigued and loosing blood the king rolled onto its back where I wasted little time in closing the gap of distance between me and my fish getting it to the surface where I could grab hold of it, wrapping my legs around it and slipping my hand around its gills reaching for my knife to end it.  Krystal had been watching the whole time and wondering what was happening when she saw its mammoth head break the surface and thrash round for the last time losing sight of me in a mass of white water.  She alerted Adam that I had got one holding her hands apart the size of a decent snapper.  He laughed and thought I had shot a rat when she asked him to come over to help me get it into the boat.  Being a good mate he came back to the boat and got the shock of his life.

We have shot plenty of kingfish before but hadn't seen anything of this size.  We looked for another fish for him but didn't get another opportunity so we ended our dive and headed the not so long but very wet way back to the beach where I gilled and gutted it before we went to the weigh in. My only regret was not getting a weight before it was gutted but I was more than happy when the scales went to 35 kg.

Mike Kendall

GREAT BARRIER ISLAND 10.10.2011

About 9 months previous to our departure the trip had been meticulously planned by all round good bastard, Jason ‘Uncle Jake’ Craig. To be honest I’d basically forgotten all about it and then all of a sudden the excited emails started getting thrown around and next thing I knew I was packed and ready for the three day excursion to the big island to our right, Great Barrier.

As luck would have it we had a crappy forecast of forty bastards of westerly wind, most trips would’ve been canned, but our skipper, Red, is another all-round good bastard and took pity on the lads who were coming up from Wellington and decided she was all go. After a rough, rolly overnight trip in the 85 foot boat, RedQuarters, we pulled into a sheltered bay on the south eastern corner. The anchor finally hit the rocky bottom twenty five fathoms below just prior to daybreak. A beautiful sunrise was not seen due to us being on the wrong side of the island, however once it was light enough Long John, Pat and I got the HMS Whio on the plane and headed north.

Our first spot was a ‘secret’ location called Warm-up Point - the traditional warm-up spot of the Mercury Bay Club. Pat, having more experience than John and I put together, times 100, jumped in and began what he calls a ‘warm-up’ dive. John and I looked at each other in confusion, unsure how a ‘warm-up dive’ differs from a normal dive, but soon followed suit. The rules seemed simple, as it was a warm-up, you weren’t allowed to go beyond the boundaries of ‘Warm-up Point’ and you most certainly weren’t allowed to shoot fish. I saw a couple of snapper at Warm-up Point, but rules are rules.
Warming-up time was soon over, thank god because it was pretty boring and I’d started to get cold, by the time I packed it in John had warmed up enough and gone snooping southwards, towards Snapper Bay. We motored over to him where he informed us that there were lots of snapper, Pat then announced that he’d take ANY fish we got- living in New Plymouth good diving days are a rarity, and his freezer stocks were running low. Pat and I then took the Whio a thousand metres south, closer to Snapper Bay, where I kicked him overboard, and then I took the blue beauty another thousand metres south, right on the edge of Snapper Bay. I threw the pick over and began snooping.

I’d literally gone 30 metres from the boat when I spotted a snapper. It bolted. I then spotted another, but I was behind cover so he died. 15 metres further along I shot another. Then another. Snapper Bay was goin’ off. There were fish everywhere. I swam about 500 metres and shot and landed 6 snapper, and lost 3, one was pretty big too, over 8kg. Towing 6 snapper really sucks, especially in surge, and I was doing exactly that. I decided that 6 was plenty for now, especially with the calibre of the other two divers I was sure they’d have slayed it and that there wasn’t even going to be room on Whio for me, let alone me and 6 snapper.
I climbed on a rock and allowed my hangover start, I even had a little sleep on the rocks. My slumber was broken some time later by the familiar drone of 30 Japanese horses pushing a small blue boat. The Whio had come to collect me.
The lads asked me ‘you doing a poo?’ ‘Nah chaps, I just got sick of towing fish around’
I was surprised to see an empty floor when I flopped into the boat, and the others were equally surprised to see my laden floatline when I pulled it onboard. Both of them said that their stretches of coast had bugger all fish. Turns out I’d got lucky and got onto a really good patch.

It was nearing lunch time by now, so we decided to make our way back to RedQuarters, with a quick dive at a spot John had dived with Besty and Ronaldo during Christmas last year. I was first in and swam 50 metres and shot a snapper. Swam another 50 metres and shot another, then over the next rock I looked down as I was reloading and saw a really dumb snapper hovering mid-water directly below me. I smacked him in the swede and that brought my tally to 9, four of them were over 12 pounds.
We then headed back to the mother ship for a beer and a filleting session. Well, I did, John and Pat took off again to investigate the coast south of RedQuarters, coming back a few hours later with tarakihi and trevally.

While filleting the snapper 5 of the 9 had octopus in their guts, also while filleting Tim and I kept an eye on a large workup about 500 metres from us, as soon as filleting was done we went out on a tender with a fishing rod, a sinker, a hook a vague idea of how to tie knots and an octopus tentacle and promptly caught a barracouta, then it got a bit too scary with some waves breaking over the gunwale so we retreated to the safety of the mother ship and had a beer and a feed.
As the afternoon wore on the 25 divers slowly started returning, there were some pretty good catches too. A lot of guys had speared their first snapper, some had even got their first, second and third. The average size was fairly decent too, with a few new PBs established. John had got one that was a bit over 8 kilos which proved to be the biggest snapper of the trip

The second day started much the same as the first- with a cold and wet trip north. However, this time John put his foot down and told Pat to stick Warm-Up Point up his arse as we zoomed past it. We kept going north, past beaches, points and reefs until we found shelter and good looking territory somewhere between Arid and the Needles. We were a long way from anywhere, and we liked it. John dumped Pat and me in at the same spot, with me swimming one way and Pat the other and John took the boat to the next point north.
Once again, without doing anything special I was bumping into fish left right and centre. Once again I’d been dumped on an infested piece of coast. The first one was pretty awesome and I’ll remember it for a while, I was creeping along a horseshoe shaped wall that was probably 12 metres vertical, making a small bay that had a pocket of clear water in it. It was really shady except for a 3 metre radius beam of sunlight that shone at a 45 degree angle out into the middle of the bay. I looked at it and thought it looked like a beaut spot for a snapper to park up in and warm up. Just then I saw him sloooooooooowly cruise into the middle of the beam and stop. It looked like a Broadway performer with a spotlight on it. With the sun behind me I sank directly at it following the angle of the sun, got within range and stopped sinking to see what it’d do. Answer= it did nothing. I was hovering about 3 metres above it in open water and it had no idea I was even there. I hung there for a long time just watching it. Breath started getting pretty low so I popped it and bolted for the surface. (7.4kg)
After a few hundred metres I had four snapper on my float and they kept getting caught on rocks and twisting up which was slowing my progress something chronic, so I pulled myself up on a bommie, stood up in knee deep water and began to pull my floatline in. I then noticed a bit of movement below me, so I lowered my head so my face was in the water, more or less the same position you'd be in if you were semi-flexible and were tying your shoe laces. Guess what, the movement was from a nice snapper checking me out. With all of me out of the water except for my face and my legs from the knees down I pushed my gun out and popped him in the melon. He rolled over dead and later weighed in at 7.6 kg.
This was ridiculous. I swam another 50 metres and found a John Dory parked up in 2 metres of water, I popped him and then caught two Spanish lobsters, then called it a day and climbed a rock and had a nap.

When I was picked up we decided to go look around Arid Island. I’ve never been to Arid but have heard a lot about it, so I was quite happy with this decision. As it turned out I never actually got to dive Arid itself, but I did get to have a look at a couple of pins seaward of it. Bloody hell they’re isolated bits of reef! I jumped in on a substantial workup which was predominantly trevs, however there were a lot of huge koheru underneath. I shot a kohie, which promptly brought in a kingy, so I hauled it in, it tore off, then tried to load up in 2 seconds which resulted in the mono tying itself in a mean little granny knot around my wishbone and the kingy getting bored and swimming away. I persisted and saw a few other kingies up to maybe 25kg, but they were cagey and I really was hoping for a barracouta so I wasn’t trying very hard.
That was more or less it as far as diving went, when we got back to the boat a decision had been made to steam overnight back into the inner gulf and find shelter. Fair enough too because the forecast was rubbish, and this way we had the option of a Noises dive, as opposed to no dive if we’d stayed at Barrier the night. We awoke in the shelter of Rakino, and the Welly boys took off in search of fish, scallops and mussels. They got all three.

All in all it was a terrific trip, good lads, good fish and good banter all weekend. What more could you really ask for?

BAY OF ISLANDS 30.09.2010

Chris Blain sent in this pic of him with the 24lb snap he shot on a recent trip up to the Bay of Islands.  He reckons when he went to reload rubber snapped - probably just as well for the local snapper population!

NUKU'A'LOFA 23.09.2011

Kiwi diver Paul Spence has just sent through this pic of a massive 9.2kg long nose emporer that he shot out of Nuku'a'lofa in Tonga.  It has just been ratified by the IUSA as a new World Record.  These fish are incredibly flighty and to land one of any size is a huge achievement so this is a very prestigious record to hold.  Well done Paul and I can't wait to get back up there next year.

WELLINGTON 22.09.2011

Diving The Student Way

Having been at Wellington University for 2 years and many would have thought we would know how to manage our money better by now.
However being a Saturday and the fridge empty - except for 2litres of milk and a box of weetbix, me and my flat mate Jason realised we only had a combined total of $45 for the night and the next three days food!!

We wrote a list of priorities that went something like

1. Beers for tonight...
2. Food for next three days...

from this we established a plan.

We quickly checked the weather to find Wellingtons south coast was 'do able'. Off to the petrol station we went and $5 was put in the tank, just enough to get to Moa point and back , a very well known dive spot. We arrived at Moa to be greeted with 2m vis and a a 1m swell. It was looking very very average but do able.

We began swimming out swallowing gallons of salt water from the swell and having to use weed to hold our selves still on the bottom. Around 200m offshore we came over a small reef where I spotted a fish tail with a small cut slowing making its way through the kelp, suspecting a big butter-fish from the size of the tail.

Not being able to see the fish as it moved just out of the available visibility, I took a guessed shot from the surface as to where I thought it would be. Bingo! my spear took off and I dived down to wrestle the fish grabbing it just in time before the spear fell out. It was a monster weighing in at 3kg it was just what we were after for our dinner!

With high spirits and our main meals sorted we decided to look for an entrée. Using a bit of Braille we found a likely looking spot for crayfish. Hoping no congor eels were inhabiting the holes Jason put his hand in for a feel and after a quick 15sec fight he pulled out a nice 1.5kg cray and also his 1kg mate! We had food!

Feeling pretty chuffed with ourselves, but not having quite got our priorities right we knew we would have to change the route we took home. Utilising the neutral position on the gears to save gas we stopped in at the local liquor store. Having a quick look around we decided the Double Brown 18beers for $20 bucks was the best option and grabbed one each.

It was the perfect weekend! Food beers and economical driving meant we had an extra litre of fuel and could report back to the olds that we were eating well and managing our money wisely.

James Barclay

LITTLE BARRIER ISLAND 4.09.2011

Well, make your self a cup of tea, I'm about to bore you senseless....
We went out today and despite the forecast being pretty good, in reality the conditions sucked, so we stuck to Little B, not the Mokes.
We all spread out along a section of coast and we all had mixed sightings and results.
Tim and Mike saw nothing, sounds like their pieces of coast sucked.
I saw one school of maybe 20 snapper from 2kg up in a really tricky and surgey spot. The approach was virtually a suicide mission, my bommie only just broke the surface, only way to get to it was to get washed on top of the rock with one wave, hold on tight and breathe up as it subsided (leaving me high and dry) then commit to it and dive when the next wave washed you over.
It didn't work very well.
The big smart ones soon figured out what was going on and left, but I managed to shoot a panny of about 2.5kg, cut my losses and left. My piece of coast was OK.
When we picked up Chains, his float was struggling to stay afloat. We worked out that a bunch of nice fish up to ~4.5kg were the problem. He told us of lots of fish in his area and all good size, including one 'mussel cracker' (pretty bloody big one). His piece of coast rulz.
We had a yarn and decided that because of the wind limiting us as to where we could effectively work, that we'd park up near a bunch of rocks that had plenty of area for us all and do a bit of a burley sesh.
I wanted to burley a bommie that broke 20 meters seaward of the furtherest point. It was in the right place, lots of current, not far from deep water....
When I say 'not far from deep water' I actually mean my bommie came out of deep water with near vertical sides. When I got to it I realised that it was far from ideal burley territory. I stubbornly decided to burley there anyway. Dunno why, it could've very easily sucked.
Anyway.....
So I found the best bit of the bad burley territory and set a pretty half arsed one, maybe 20 kina and the shredded carcass of a mowie. To get to my vantage/shooting spot required swimming straight down almost inside a crack, under the ecklonia fronds, past a big moray, to a small ecklonia covered dome bending in an L shape and leaning forward to look under an overhang (underhang?) where I'd set it. If I stuffed up my approach I would be in plain view. It was so dumb.
After five minutes there were a bunch of snaps feeding away, I decided that at least one of them was as good as dead so left them feeding. I swam away to a rock, climbed on to it, sat down for ten minutes enjoying the brief burst of sunshine, when the clouds rolled between me and the sun again I took that as my cue to flop back in the water and check my burley again. As I slid down the fissure in the rock my moray was out a bit further than before so I had to adjust my descent a bit to avoid it and as I did I noticed something in the kelp far below. It looked like a big tail, and I was pretty sure it wasn't a drummer because I'd looked bloody hard for one to use as burley and couldn't find any. I kept sinking. I got to the dome, bent in an L shape and looked over at the smorgasboard I'd laid out below.
Yeah good. A big snapper waddled out fom under the overhang (underhang?) and started feasting. As luck would have it his face was behind a tiny tuft of ecklonia, obscuring its view of me, so I reached out and put the spear against his head, then remembered my spear was a bit blunt so thought I should go for a body shot, aimed back a bit and shot it through the shoulder and out the pectoral fin on the other side. Pulled him in, stabbed his head, and swam back to the boat where Mike was sleeping.
Under the boat were a few drummers so I shot one, swam back and put it on the burley which promptly brought in the smaller fish again. Then a whopping big SCUBA charter boat motored friggin close, did a U-turn, motored past again and then dropped anchor. For some reason I didn't see any more snapper after he did that. Not my ocean I guess, but it was pretty rude.
Next stop was the goldie pin, no current= no fish.
Next stop was a weedline, on current = no fish.
Next stop was a scallop bed, the ground was raked clean in neat rows, may or may not be from commercial dredging and the scallops were very few and far between. Hopefully its just an isolated part of the bed, not the whole thing, need to check it out some more on a cleaner day.
My snapping fish weighed 9.8kg.