Pocketful of rainbows

Rumours, damn rumours and outright lies! Toni and Jay swore blind that pipehorses had been spotted through the week just off the mini wall. However hearsay and reality proved to be exclusive of each other today and there was no sign of them. I demand a refund.

Can I interest you in a photo?

But despite the erroneous information handed to us, as always there was still more than enough to keep us entertained for an hour or three. There was a lot of swell at the surface and poor viz below but it was gradually getting better as the morning went on.

Orange sided goby on a brain coral

And just like last week but even more so, it was turtle madness in the water, pun intended. Feeding turtles everywhere on the wall with their usual entourage of angelfish hoping to dart in for a quick nibble.

Feeding time!

Munch, munch, burp

Do I have anything on my face?

There were also some opportunities for some great macro shots, some of them proving to be quite challenging to get the camera into. Someone needs to invent an underwater endoscope.

Look very hard, a pair of squat anemone shrimp

Red stripe hermit on the prowl

And a relative hanging around on some coral

We also thought we had a boat cruising right over the top of us, it was that loud and noisy, but looking up it just turned out to be torrential rain pounding the surface. That's the good thing about diving, it dosn't matter if its raining, you're going to get wet anyway.

A rare shot of a honeycomb cowfish. Rare because it's almost facing the camera and not showing its arse to the lens like usual!

A young spotted drum almost stops for the camera

We still check the hardpan in the shallows on the way back just to make sure no seahorse have sneaked in whilst we weren't looking but they were a no show. I think it will probably be another couple of months before we start to see them again. It'll be worth the wait though.

The unfortunate peacock flounder. Face like a smacked arse

The colour of the sponges really "pop" under strobe light

A lovely little rough head blenny

 And to cap off the end of the dive I spotted the tiniest little thing I have seen in a while (no, it's not what you're thinking...) hiding at the bottom of a barrel sponge. It was about 3mm at best and I've no idea what it is as it's to small to Identify in any of my books. I think it may be a juvenile orange sided goby but I could be wrong.

Tiny, tiny, tiny little thing

If anyone out there wants to correct me then I'd be more than happy to hear from you. Until the next time, safe diving!