Category: Diving

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Five surprisingly good locations across SA & NSW

Author: Mrs A

To conclude our top 20 locations on our lap of Australia, our final 5 leave Western Australia and take us in to SA and NSW. These locations were surprising in that we had reasonably low expectations and were delighted by what we found there.

Again, these are in order of visiting rather than ranked in any way:

1. Streaky Bay – Eyre Peninsula, South AustraliaReason: This was our first stop after having crossed the Nullabor, and our first taste of oysters since leaving Sydney back in May. It was spring when we reached Streaky Bay, and the weather was not quite settled. We had some fabulously warm mornings, but the afternoons often whipped up with quite a blustery wind. Nevertheless it was a great location to introduce us back into semi-civilisation, with a 10km coastal cycleway to explore, and some interesting road trips to natural landmarks. Quite a unique location.

2. Port Lincoln – Eyre Peninsula, South AustraliaReason: We visited this location purely so I could go cage diving with Great White Sharks (a bucket list item and well worth the trip – I chose the ethical option with Adventure Bay Cruises). We originally booked in at the caravan park there for two nights, but loved it so much we stopped longer. Port Lincoln as a town has some great little restaurants, fabulous seafood and plenty of services. A short drive away is Lincoln National Park, home sea eagles, osprey and fur seals you can snorkel with, and numerous picturesque beaches. A flat cycleway follows the coast around into town and along to the marina (and possibly beyond), great exploring with plenty of birdlife. We really enjoyed our time here.

3. Clare Valley, South AustraliaReason: Anyone who knows us well (and our love of fine wine) will probably question why this fits as a surprising visit. Well the fact is we almost left on the first night due to the cold damp weather, but we were pleased we stuck around. The rail trail is a great drawcard here, relatively flat and guiding you to some fabulous tastings. The visitor information centre is award winning, and if you are there on a Friday night they do a wine tasting with $5 glasses of wine and $25 bottles and a cheese and nibbles plate – a brilliant way to meet your fellow campers and taste some local fare.

4. Tanunda – Barossa Valley, South AustraliaReason: Of course the wine was fabulous – we had some great fun cycling around the area which is pretty flat with some off road cycleways, and great tastings. Highlights were Artisans of Barossa, Izway and the Taste of Eden. It was also our first opportunity to taste Vietnamese food in a long while at FermentAsian – a restaurant with a veritable bible of wine on offer – more than 1000 bottles. We settled for one!

5. Cowra – New South WalesReason: Cowra is just an hour from Orange which we have visited on many occasions, but remained a blip on the map for more than 18 years. This time we picked up some literature about it while visiting Forbes, and thought it sounded lovely. As usual we laughed about what the differences were likely to be from the marketing material (often towns read like quaint French villages but disappoint horribly!). Cowra actually exceeds expectations! Surrounded by rolling hills (making the cycling a bit more of an effort than we’d been used to!), lots of interesting history surrounding the Japanese POW camp and some stunning gardens, Cowra also boasts a wine bar with fabulous selection of local beers and wine, and some great places to eat out. We loved the Indian restaurant – we’d put it up there among the best we’ve been to in Australia! The campsite was delightful too, grassy and shady, hosted by a lovely couple who became friends. Definitely worth a visit.

And that concludes our top 20 locations around Australia so far! We’ll be setting off again in two weeks, first to the Sapphire Coast, before doing an about turn and heading north through to pastures new. We’re looking forward to more (hopefully positive) surprises on our horizon…

Where can you find these locations?

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Day 163: 9 November – Great White Shark Cage Diving in the Neptune Islands

Author: Mrs A

Location: Port Lincoln & the North Neptune Islands

Distance: 60km as the crow flies – about 2.5 hours by boat

The day began early with a 5.45am alarm. Of course it had begun multiple times throughout the night, as is often the case when you’re excited and don’t want to miss waking up in time! Today Mr A and I went separate ways for the day as I was ticking off a bucket list item – cage diving with Great White Sharks.

A bus collected me from the campground at 6.15am and took me to the harbour where I met my fellow divers. We were provided with tea, juice and breakfast before boarding the Shark Warrier at 7am and heading off on our adventure.

Our wildlife spotting began early, as we were invited up on deck to see a pair of ospreys nesting on a barge in the harbour. This barge cannot be used now until the chicks have flown:

Osprey nesting

From here, it was a 2.5 hour journey out to the Neptune Islands – a group of islands at the entrance to the Spencer Gulf…

Doesn’t seem far on the map!
We were soon joined by dolphins which abandoned their fishing to ride the bow wave of our boat

A couple of hours later, we arrived at the islands, and selected a spot beside one where we could see plenty of fur seals (shark food) and also see some Great Whites on the radar, settled on the sea bed. The cage was lowered into the water, and we got changed in to our 7mm wetsuits, hoods, boots and gloves in anticipation of the 16 degrees centigrade water.

Not the most attractive look!

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The company I had chosen to dive with was Adventure Bay Charters. Unlike their competition, they do not entice the sharks with blood and fish berley (chopped up fish), rather they use vibrations from music and the slapping of ropes and rattles to mimic the sound of a distressed animal, piquing the shark’s curiosity. This has the result of keeping the interaction more natural, and doesn’t send the sharks into a frenzy – associating humans with food. 

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We jumped in to the water…16 degrees is rather fresh (much like the English Channel I am guessing!), and given you are moving very little in the cage, you can only last in there for about 20 minutes before you begin to feel numb. On my first dive, I saw lots of silver trevally fish, but unfortunately no sharks. We could still see the sharks on the radar, but clearly they had already filled up on a seal pup and were not feeling peckish.

Yes, these fish really look like this!

Our skipper continued working hard to try and entice them over, but to no avail. We settled down for a delicious lunch and the boat was moved over to another island to try again.

The afternoon warmed up and it got quite steamy in the wetsuit. I decided to go in for another dive in anticipation of success. Just as I was climbing into the cage, the cry went out – ‘shark!’. Usually this means get out of the water, but I sped up and climbed on in. And there he was. A three metre male, many nicks and scars, gracefully cruising around the cage, wondering how he could reach the tasty looking morsels inside. He was soon joined by a female. Incredible. Swimming along with their mouth open teeth always ready to chomp, they do look strangely serene and peaceful. You half forget they have the power to tear off a limb and end a life in seconds.

This shark is checking out one of the rattles, attracted by the splashing
What a rush, seeing this beauty approaching
Smile for the camera!
Imagine the adrenaline at seeing this magnificent creature coming towards you
Amazing!

I lost track of how long I was under water this time, but was ready for a hot shower by the time I climbed back out on to the boat. What a fantastic view of some incredible creatures. Apparently they have very poor eyesight and their only way of testing their food is with their teeth. They don’t actually eat humans once they have attacked. We are much too bony. They far prefer the fat and blubber of a seal.

Unlike in the movies, this is what a great white looks like cruising past a boat – just a dark huge shadow, no fin

Research has shown that the majority of taste-tests on humans have occurred when the light is weak – when it is overcast, at dawn and dusk. Few happen when the sun is bright and the water clear. So don’t go in the water at the high risk times, I say!

Once dry, everything was packed up and we set off on our way back to Port Lincoln, with a few diversions on the way. First of all, to Memory Bay in the Lincoln National Park where we called in on a New Zealand fur seal colony, their fur blending in nicely with the granite rock:

One eye watches us pass by
So tiring
Part seal, part rock

From there we continued around the coast, spotting a white breasted sea eagle nest and another osprey nest, both with chicks in.

We were joined by more bottlenosed dolphins as we headed back to the harbour – finishing off an amazing day out. 

It’s very hard to take photos of dolphins – a bit like photographing lightning or fireworks! 

The bus dropped me off at around 8pm – the end of a long but incredible day – Definitely worth doing if you are out this way.

Mr A had kindly prepared dinner for me too after his day of exploring the Port Lincoln area on bike. It doesn’t get much better than this! Awesome!

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Day 67: 4 August – Diving the Navy Pier…with sharks

Author: Mrs A

Dives undertaken: 2 plus 1 in a swimming pool

Water temperature: 21.5 degrees C (brrr)

Wetsuits worn: 2.5

Mr A and I went out separate ways for the day as I had booked a couple of dives on the Royal Australian Navy Pier, considered one of the top 10 dive sites in Australia. I haven’t dived in a few years, so I was picked up shortly after 8am to do a refresher dive in a swimming pool, remembering how to remove and replace my mask, weight belt and BCD and tank underwater, and how to do an equipment and buddy check.

I had a brief 40 minute break in between that and being collected again, where I quickly ate breakfast and collected some extra layers.

11am the bus returned to collect me plus a few others to do the dive proper. In total there were 15 people doing the two dives and we were paired up with a buddy with similar experience. I got paired with a very tall bearded Simon from Denmark, who had learned to dive in Danish waters, no warmer than 2 degrees!

There was a lot of briefing involved in order to prepare us for this dive. It is located on active Naval land so we had to hand fill out a form with our name, address and date of birth, ensuring it accurately matched our photo ID. It took the 15 of us three turns to fill in this form with no errors! We then had to drive to the Naval base for the key to the pier, and line up at the side of the road while a man in a bullet proof vest with a gun checked us off against the form. Once on Navy land, there was a no photography rule until we reached the pier…not that there was really anything to photograph…

As we arrived at the pier we were immediately entertained by three humpback whales swimming past, just 50 metres off shore – just magical, and a sign of things to come. We we-suited up and climbed carefully down two flights of metal steps (not soft underfoot when you are carrying a heavy tank on your back!) to the platform. 

The jump into the water from the platform is about 3 metres, and it looks much further. It’s important to keep a hold of your weight belt and mask to ensure they don’t get lost on the jump down. I took a big stride off the pier and I was in. They then lowered all the cameras down to us via a hook. There were a lot of cameras – almost every diver had one, and I watched with dismay as mine was accidentally unhooked and sank down to the bottom of the ocean! Oh no!

We descended down the line to almost 12 metres below the surface and began our exploration. The sea life was incredible, just like I would imagine swimming in an aquarium. Every surface of the pier’s structure is covered in sponges, corals and fish of every colour and shape imaginable, huge shoals of fish visible everywhere – above, below and beside you as you fly gently through the water.


The sounds are of clicking and crunching shells, as we see fish attacking clams for the sweet meat inside. All this time, however, I was also anxious for my camera, which we hadn’t seen once on the ocean bed. Before long, it was time to ascend for our shore break, and another workout as we carried our heavy tanks up a ladder out of the water, and back up the two flights to the top.

We had a cup of hot soup, connected our breathing devices to a new full oxygen tank, and got ready for dive two. I was handed my camera, to much relief, by another dive guide who had found it and carried it around with her during the first dive. I decided to not put it on the hook this time, and attached it firmly to my wrist and again stepped off the pier. This time I lost both my fins! I watched in dismay as they both sank to the bottom of the ocean. Swimming with no fins is not fun at all! Fortunately a replacement pair were found for me, and again we descended.

This time the dive was even better than the first. We explored much further, seeing groupers, a grey nurse shark, a white tipped reef shark, moray eel, octopus, lion fish, flat worms (sound uninteresting but are stunning)…the list was endless.


A brilliant dive site, mishaps aside, and much fun had by all. We ascended for our final time and packed away our gear. Out came a cry ‘Manta ray!’ And another, and we all rushed to see at least seven huge mantas swimming just below the pier. They were huge beautiful fish, swimming on the surface like giant black rippling birds. Just incredible.


It was impossible to capture the mantas on camera as it was into the sun, but believe me, it was wonderful.

I returned on a high to camp to find Mr A on the phone to the bank trying to organise new cards. This is how his whole day had transpired, after realising he had lost his wallet on yesterday’s boat trip – farewell Medicare card, drivers licence, the lot – probably also at the bottom of the ocean somewhere. A far less enjoyable day for Mr A.

We ended on a positive, however, enjoying a delicious meal out at a local restaurant; Whalers. Crocodile wontons and a smokey grilled kangaroo loin for me, soft shell crab tacos and a reef and beef for Mr A, thank you very much – delicious!

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