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Published: June 14th 2008
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Well, after about 6 months of planning, I finally made it over to Ningaloo. Where? I hear you ask, well, effectively find Perth on a map and then look north up the coast to the little pointy bit before the coast heads north east to Broome. Yes, you're right. It's remote.
Anyway, the reason for going there was two-fold - whale sharks and diving. Ok, so they're related, but still separate. And it was the first 'proper' holiday that I've had this year! Well, it was the first time I'd taken 3 days off work. We (that is Trish, Matt and Chris and I) flew out at some horrible time on Wednesday to Perth, sat around in Perth for a couple of hours and got a regional flight to Learmonth. On arriving, it was like a real holiday - getting off the plane and discovering it was a toasty 29 degrees! Yay!
Exmouth is really a country town - there really is little to do if you're not into snorkelling, diving, snorkelling erm......there are 2 pubs and a couple of pubs, but nothing really to write home about. And accommodation is a bit hit and miss. Anyway, thats about
all I have to say about the town....
We'd booked a full itinerary of things in the few days we were there. First stop the dive shop - Ningaloo Reef Dreaming. Quick confirmation of what time we were being picked up and off again. Next stop, the pub....well....did you expect anything else?
Thursday was whale shark day. The logic being that if they didn't show, we could arrange to go out again before we left. So, bright and early (7:30am on holiday!) we were picked up and driven the half hour to the boat, Darling Isabelle which was moored on the west of the cape at Tantabiddi. Once we were all onto the boat, we were introduced to our crew, Wayne, Jo, Ian, Marcus and Ricky. Top guys. The boat were sailed down the coast, parallel with the National Park. After a quick snorkelling stop where we saw a reef shark and several turtles, we sailed further south and our spotter plane was airborne (NRD are the only boat that use their own plane - more about why later). We floated for a couple of hours.....would we get our whale shark? Then, the shout went up from skipper
Ian - the plane had sighted one and we were off. Whale shark swimmings are tightly controlled and its a first come first served - so whereas NRD have their own plane, the other operators have a plane between them, so first come first served is a bit of a fight. See the advantage of your own plane?!
Yes, we had a whale shark, and the swimmers were split into 2 groups (max of 10 swimmers on the shark at any one time) and the first group were kitted out and into the water. All of a suddem it was our turn - spotter in, and then swimmers in. Looking down it was a mass of legs, bubbles and frantic swimming. Then, down to my right was the most serene fish - a 7.5m whale shark, just swimming along. The next hour was spent in and out of the water, spotting the shark, swimming alongside until it dived or swam too fast and swapping places with the other group. See the piccies I've attached for what I was sooooo excited about. It was an awesome experience and we were really lucky to have spent so much time in the
Here he is...
a 7.5m mature male whale shark water with the creature.
Needless to say we were all pretty exhausted after that, and as we were to get up at 5 the next morning, it was an early night....
Yes, 5am is still dark. And the only reason we did it was because we'd booked to dive the Navy Pier. This site is continually recommended as one of the top 10 in the world and is located in an operating Navy site. So we were up, dressed, and briefed by 6:30. As this dive is tidal, we had to be in the water by 7:30....so after passing the security check at the entrance to the base, we were minutes away.....alas, the best laid plans are made to be amended and after arriving at the site and seeing waves that would be ideal if we were surfing, the dive leaders cancelled the dive for safety reasons. Gutted is not the word I'd use....but, back in town we rebooked for 2 days later hoping that the weather would improve by then. Left with an entire day to do something, we hired a car and headed down through the National Park, stopping to admire beautiful beaches, snorkel, eat and
doze in the sunshine. It was a reasonable substitute for the dive, but not quite what we'd wanted.
The Saturday was to be the day diving at the Murion Islands. Again, another highly recommended site. But, again, the weather was too bad to take the boat north east, so we went west and dived on the reef. The three dives were good, but I think hampered by the weather conditions. As the boys were air pigs, Trish and I buddied up for exteneded dives, leaving the boys to surface. The highlight was immediately after descending on the second dive, when, doing my usual looking aroud, I looked up and saw a reasonable size tiger shark. Mind, it also saw us and headed in the opposite direction - shame, they're proper sharks!
The Navy Pier dive was cancelled again on the Sunday, so I spent it slightly grumpy in the sun by the pool, reading the paper and sleeping. There really is little else to do and I didn't fancy the drive down the coast again.
As for Exmouth, well, its a small place - 2 pubs, both of which are generally quiet, but The Pub goes off
on a Friday night when everyone turns up and parties til 3am. Eating out is quite pricey - generally $25 for a main, and don't think too much about other activities such as movies.....a couple of my evenings were spent at the side of the pub watching the racing and having fun bets on which horse would win. The diving is really the reason you'd go....but fingers crossed for good weather.
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