Poor Knight Islands 11th-13th April

The Poor Knight Islands are a land and marine reserve 20 km out into the Pacific Ocean from the east coast. They are reputedly one of the top ten dive sites in the world. What makes it special is the warm current that comes from East Australia (the EAC as the turtles call it in Finding Nemo). It means you see tropical fish in really cold water. Supposedly it's the only place in the world (apart from the Galapagos) you can see turtles and fur seals at the same time.

Do we look fat dressed in black ? This place is awesome. We went diving through Blue Mao Mao arch - the best dive I think I have ever done. We've got underwater photos of it - but we didn't take them. They're from a screen saver which we bought in a shop afterwards. Jacques Cousteau labelled this place one of the top ten dive sites in the world and when you're underwater you can see why. You swim through this incredible underwater landscape. The highlight is going through this 40 metre long arch. It gets dark as you go in but the sunlight from the entrance and the exit provide sufficient light so you can see everything that's going on. On our second dive we saw a sting ray as big as the gravel circle in our back garden. At least it looked that big through the water. This is one place we have to come back to.