Macro dives in Asia Pacific

It has been a while since I last went for a dive. The last one was back in July 07. *gosh*. I guess I need to submerge myself in the sea soon. Seriously. Anyway, I bought the 2nd volume of the Australasia ScubaDiver magazine – mainly coz of humpback whales and sharks and mantas and all the big sea creatures.

This volume features macro dive. I think I’ve always prefered macro dives as opposed to micro dives. Although I must say, some of the small sea creatures are really cool; I am dying to see a pygmy seahorse, all the beautiful nudibranches, crabs, prawns, etc. However, I think I have eyesight problem. It could have been my contact lenses not working well enough behind my mask. Or maybe I’m just not good at catching small stuff. Hence with big stuff, it would be very difficult for me to miss them.

I would loveeeeeee to meet macro sea creatures. I’ve seen Manta Rays gliding by, above me, below me and around me. It is magnificent. And after that dive, I have been dying to see more of these big fishes. From a certain angel, it would also appear that the manta ray is smiling at you. No joke. It’s just lovely.

Manta Ray – gliding

Asia Pacific is one of the world’s greatest place to catch all these fishes. Here are some of the featured places where you can go find big fishes – here, I’ll just write a few; well, at least the ones I want to see *teehee*. And I bet they are expensive too. But anywayyyyyy…here are some of the featured places.

Tonga – HUMPBACK WHALES! According to the magazine, there aren’t a lot of places in the world where you can jump into the water with a humpback whale and Tonga is definitely one of the places. Because of the whole issue against whaling activities (but some countries like Japan who is still into it – argh), rules and regulations have been implemented. (Read more about whaling activities – International Whaling Commission). But I’m dying to dive with one of these whales. They are HUGE! And you know how they say when you are underwater, everything is so much bigger – which makes it extra cool I bet.

Humpback whales

Queensland, Australia – well, Great Barrier Reef. Need I say more? It is definitely one of the top diving spots in the world. Here, you would get to see tiger sharks, turtles definitely, but the one that interests me is the dwarf minke whale. Cute…

Dwarf Minke Whale surfacing the water

South Australia, Australia – There are 2 featured sea creatures in South Australia; Sea lions in Hopkins Island and Great White sharks in Neptune Islands. I would love to see sea lions. Just by looking at the pictures, they look absolutely adorable and I bet they would be fun to dive with.

Sea lions – cute!

Diving with great white sharks…not too keen about it. I do know of a person who did that and he say it is just so adrenaline pumping he didn’t really want to look at the shark. You would be diving in a cage of coz…but still. I think I’m not exactly ready to have the great white charging at me. They are one of the world’s most dangerous predator around.

There’s the cage with you in it…

…and there’s the shark. (nope, don’t think I can do this)

Nusa Penida, Indonesia – Mola-mola! Well, Bali (that’s where I see the Manta Rays) is also one of the world class dive site ppl go to and it’s one of the few places where you get to see this oceanic sunfish. It is the world’s biggest bone fish and the time to go see them is from August through October. Some say they are ugly, I just think they are wayyyy cute. I didn’t get to see them the last time coz it’s not the season, but I’m hoping as I plan a dive trip to Bali, I’ll be able to catch the sight of them.

Mola-mola

There are a lot of other featured places in this magazine. You can also check out the website for ScubaDiver.

Well, these are all great stuff. I haven’t got a lot of money to do all this yet…but I’ll be working smarter to earn more. If you are into diving as well, you would know how tempting it is to just wish you can fly to all these dives sites, and dive to see all these beautiful sea creatures. Lovely. Absolutely lovely.

P/S: MAN U WON! WOOHOOO! I’m all excited now! YAY! May they get the title! 2 TITLES! YAY! For those anti-Man U ppl – BOOYAAA!