Guess where!

Fairy Bower (do I ever go anywhere else?) looked very promising when I arrived at around 11:30am on Saturday. JCJ was walking down to the waters edge and he got there as a diver emerged from the water to tell us that it was very ordinary today, the vis being poor and green. Ah well, what can you do. We went to gear up and join the Chad, who would be joining us today. Despite the diver's green report I was still holding highy hopes for our dive. The sky was clear blue, it was warm, the water looked flat and inviting.

We had the usual piss-taking banter as we geared up, plenty directed at the Chad who was in his semi-dry suit and chunky jet fins while JCJ and I had our spearo suits and long free dive fins. JCJ took some about his camo pants, I took some because my fins are a bit shit. With the unpleasantries taken care of we headed to the water. I should not have taken the piss out of JCJ - he'd been good enough to buy me some neoprene socks as a belated birthday present that, as it turned out, were a spectacular success.

The Chad, of course, could hardly stay under water, clad as he was in enough neoprene to raise a small wreck. This was not going to be a great handicap because our diver mate was right; the water was green. We headed towards Shelly Beach so we could fail to find sharks in the spot where I had - eventually - succeeded last week. From there we headed out over the sand to fail there as well, and then headed for the rocky reef so we'd at least see a load of fish.

We saw a load of fish. I made a few dives so I could up through the schools of yellowtail and bigeyes, passing a couple of grouper and a school of mullet, a few old wives; the usual suspects. It was already starting to dawn upon me that I was not getting cold. The week before, upon getting out of the water after a mere 30minutes, I'd started losing feeling in my yellowing fingers and my bare feet became so cold that walking was somewhat uncomfortable. So those socks were working a treat.

After a short while with the fish I decided to head out over the sand again, determined to find the sharks. Determined or not I could not find them. I swam a reasonable distance from shore and started heading back towards the Shelly Beach end of the dive. I did a few dives down to the sand, finding a small thermocline and also pushing my comfort zone a little. Once or twice I could not see the sandy bottom until a couple of kicks into the dive and then, when I reached the bottom I could not see the surface. It was an eerily pleasant experience to kick for the surface, see it come into faint view, then see the ripples and then break back through into the sunlight. I liked it. Good job I liked the experience because, apart from a fiddler ray (he was very cool) there were no fish to be found.

Chad, as I discovered later, had got out of the water to look for me when I made my way out over the sand and both he and JCJ stayed over the rocks. On his way back into the water he had a shout and scream at JCJ, mistaking his neoprened head for mine. Of all the people to kop a strop about someone going walkabout Chad has the shakiest grasp of the moral highground. He is notorious for drifting away from his scuba buddies and adopting a lax attitude to buddy separation protocol. Ah well, no one got hurt and we all made it back to shore for a nice cup of tea.

I did, eventually, find one shark. Not too far out but not too close in, a small one of maybe 3ft that did not hang around for very long. I spent a little more time out over the sand and the edge of the reef, but one was all I was going to see. Still, my record of seeing sharks (well, shark) every time I have free dived The Bower is intact.

All up we spent around 90minutes in the water and when we got out we all agreed we could have stayed in for far longer. Sure it was green, sure I saw far less than I have before...but it was another lovely dive. I am getting more comfortable on a single breath and the extra freedom of movement is marvellous. Will I ever take a tank back to The Bower?