(A quick note from the shore-based team before we let you get to the blog from Alison: Well, it’s an exciting day but it’s a sad one too for followers of this blog – our intrepid team has had their final dive! Although this is their last dive and they are now heading for home they’ll be sending through some more updates over the weekend as they do a last sort through their specimens and share a couple more tales of the islands. It’s not all over – hoorah!)
A momentous day – our final dive for the expedition, at L’Esperance Rock, on day 15 of diving. The final day was the 100th station (or place) from which we have collected specimens on this trip. Some of the hundred are rotenone stations, others are places where the invertebrate team has collected material, while others are places we have line fished. Here is a view of divers in the tenders at the last dive site, taken by Peter high up above us on L’Esperance Rock.
A last look: the divers at their last dive site as seen from the nearby L’Esperance
The water at the surface was rough with quite big waves, but as soon as we sank beneath the surface we were in a calm quiet place with almost unlimited views (the visibility was over 40 metres, which is about as good as it gets). This is me, enjoying a good Kermadec dive!
Blogger extraordinaire: not content to observe from above, Alison has been diving in the Kermadecs too
Back on board boat, all of today’s specimens have been sorted and stored away for the trip home, and all the diving gear has been stashed in dive bins and stowed in the hold. Basically, everything mobile has been secured, and we’ll start heading south back to Tauranga later tonight.
Clinton would like to fish at Bengal Bank on the way, but with the way the weather map is looking that might not happen.
