Humpback whale diving in Tonga
Hi, I’m Lukasz an avid freediver, spearo and divemaster at The Dive Shack. I’ve been in the water since childhood and have developed an immense passion towards all things ocean. My aim through this series of posts is to enlighten, educate and answer some questions you may have or questions you never thought of asking. Covering topics from spearfishing tactics and methods, to freediving equipment and travel, this first post is an introductory story about a Leafy Seadragon or two that will hopefully lead to somewhat regular blog posts.
Let’s start with a little bit more about me (do I get bragging rights because this is my blog?). It wasn’t until I was 13 years old that I even knew that diving was a thing, my parents got me my junior open water course for xmas that year… it all went downhill from there, smashing out dive courses, getting into freediving followed by spearfishing all the way up to today where I want to do nothing else with my life but be in the water.
I’ve travelled to the standard Aussie destination (Bali), Borneo and good ol’ Great Barrier Reef, I’ve dived pretty well all the local sites around Adelaide and seen pretty much everything you could think of seeing in Adelaide, I’ve freedived in Kilsby’s Sinkhole in Mt Gambier and swum through crystal clear Ewens Ponds, I’ve built and fixed numerous guns and have tried and tested a lot of gear to find what works best in certain conditions.
Me with a Leafy Seadragon
Rosie With a Leafy Seadragon
Let’s kick it off with a bit of story time.
‘The day I lost my Leafy Seadragon virginity’
Believe it or not I hadn’t seen one of these South Australian icons until very recently when I went for a dive with my manager and fellow diver Rosie. We stacked eight cylinders in the boot of her Honda CR-V and made our (slow) journey to Rapid Bay where we met our customers. Upon arrival we were greeted by glassy water and crystal clear vis, we geared up and trekked down the jetty.
On descent at the jetty we immediately found a leafy seadragon on a seagrass bed. It almost seemed too easy. For the next 40 minutes not a sign of a single leafy seadragon. Upon surfacing we had a snack and geared up for round two. We spent 98 minutes underwater, majority of which was spent intensely searching for leafies. 20 mins in… nada, 30 mins in…. nada, 40 mins in…nothing, one hour in… still jack, I was beginning to think the first one was a bit of a shooting star. The ocean gods must have heard my prayers because we finally stumbled upon a leafy seadragon, oh look, another! Oh wait, here’s another one, all of a sudden a dragonless dive became almost too crowded with Leafy Seadragons. What a way to experience my very first Leafy Seadragon.
Check out my Instagram for more pics: https://www.instagram.com/lukasz.ocean/
– Lukasz
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