SCUBA Diving with Shaahhks

Shaahhk: (noun) Australian for Shark.

Monday was a public holiday in Queensland, Labour Day. It wasn't a holiday in New South Wales because they don't work hard enough down there to need one.

Since NSW is just a short 2 hour trip south of us, we left the sunshine and crowds behind us on Monday and went for a SCUBA dive at Julian Rocks, near Byron Bay (NSW).

This was my first dive since the accident and it went great!

We saw a HUGE green turtle. It's difficult to get an idea of the sheer size of this guy from the picture but needless to say, it was the size of a coffee table.


We also swam along side a two-and-a-half meter spotted wobbegong shark. There were loads of other amazing tropical fish, blow-fish and giant angel-fish.

Thinking ahead and recognizing that I'm a twin-engine vehicle with one motor permanently in the shop, Lisa and I devised a way to give me back some of the propulsion I would be lacking.

We bought some webbed gloves for swimming which gave me some extra agility when required. My finger tips still poke up out of the open fingers of the webbed gloves meaning that I could still fiddle with my gages, BCD triggers, etc.

I also strapped a small snorkeling fin to the bottom of my leg inside the wet-suit giving me some extra propulsion.

All in all, the combination of the two worked really well and I didn't feel any different diving now that I would have before.


Lisa swimming like a fish.


Schools of these bright fish were everywhere.


Mike in full gear.