For many years we had wanted to do an extended dive trip to Western Australia, and Busselton was always top of our list of places to dive. We finally got our act together in March this year and had a fantastic time. After flying across the country to Perth, we then jumped on a bus to Busselton, which ended up taking almost as long as the five hour flight from Brisbane!
The following morning dawned a perfect day with calms seas and light winds. We were booked to dive with The Dive Shed for the next few days and dropped into their shop on the main street of Busselton eager for our first dive, only to be told by the owner, Peter MacDonald, that we were at the wrong shop. Peter then informed as that they had recently opened another shop at the Busselton Marina and that was where the boat was departing. Fortunately for us Julie Sullivan, the other owner of The Dive Shed, came by to pick us up.
Peter and Julie have been operating The Dive Shed since 1997, but have had a long involvement with the local dive scene. They offer dive courses, including nitrox and resort dives on the Busselton Jetty, and run daily single and double dives to a range of dive sites around Busselton. They operate two 6m long sharkcats, surveyed for eight divers each, and for larger groups use Cape Cruisader, a 13.2m vessel owned and operated by Peter’s brother Ron.
We were on Cape Cruisader today, which is a very comfortable boat to dive from. Our first dive was to be on the HMAS Swan, the first warship to be sunk as a dive site in Australia. The HMAS Swan was a River Class Destroyer Escort, built in the Naval Dockyards in Williamston Victoria and launched in January 1970. She was and still is an impressive ship, at 113m long with a 12.5m wide beam. After an active service life around Australia and Asian the HMAS Swan was decommissioned in 1996 and scuttled in Geographic Bay on 14 December 1997.
We were looking forward to this dive, having done several dives on the more recently scuttled HMAS Brisbane, and were keen to compare the two ships. After tying up on the mooring line and following a dive briefing we were in the water and descending on the bow. With 15m visibility we could see the outline of the ship from the surface and as we got closer could see a massive cloud of freckled porcupine fish swarming around the bow.
Dropping onto the sand in front of the ship at 29m, we stared up at the HMAS Swan in awe, not only for her impressive size, but for the colours of growth adorning her hull. We were also surprised at how much beautiful reef surrounded the ship, lovely sponge gardens that would be worth a dive in itself.
As we swam along the port side the colours of the sponges, ascidians and especially soft corals were just stunning. We were also happy to see lots of unique Western Australian fish species we had only seen in fish guide books – footballer sweep, moonlighters, western talma, western blue gropers, western king wrasse,
western
fox fish and bright orange white barred boxfish.Entering the ship through the first access hole we found a lovely western blue devil propped up on the bottom. We got several photos of this dazzling fish before it disappeared deeper into the ship. We then explored a number of rooms and passageways, finding toilets and the Operations Room, which still has a radar station located in the centre of the room.
Unfortunately no guns remain on the HMAS Swan, unlike the HMAS Brisbane, but they did leave the bridge, which was cut off the HMAS Brisbane. Entering the bridge we were happy to see the captain’s chair still in place and in remarkably good condition, cleaned almost daily by divers bums when they sit in it posing for photos. Shining our torches around the walls in the interior of the ship we found them covered in a wallpaper of brightly coloured encrusting sponges. It was easy to get good photos inside the ship with this mosaic of colour.
Continuing down the side of the ship we passed under the massive mast where batfish, trevally and yellowtail were swarming. Amongst them we noticed a large fish and as we got closer we realised it was a huge samsonfish.
We had a brief look at the area behind the mast and funnel, and would have liked to continue to the stern, however our air and bottom time were running low. We spend the end of the dive on the mast with all the fish, trying to photograph a cheeky western blue groper and many of the other unique Western Australian fish. The HMAS Swan is a fantastic dive and the most colourful ship we have ever photographed.
After soup, bread rolls and a chance to warm up in the sun, we then headed over to the Busselton Jetty. Construction started on the jetty in 1865 and over time the structure was lengthened many times, reaching its current length of 1841m. It is the longest timber jetty in the Southern Hemisphere and is an impressive sight stretching into the calm waters of Geographic Bay. While it is possible to shore dive Busselton Jetty, the most colourful section with the most fish life is at the very end, so it is best dived from a boat, unless you enjoy a very long walk in scuba gear.
Plunging into the blue water, we swam across the sea grass beds towards the dark shape of the jetty. We knew this was going to be a brilliant dive, with the visibility over 15m and plenty of fish already darting around us. Then we saw it, masses of timber pylons rising from 9m to the jetty above, and each one covered in a kaleidoscope of colour. There is no way to adequately describe the beautiful sessile life on the
pylons
– sponges of every shape, size and colour, ascidians, algae, hard corals,
anemones, bryozoans and the most beautiful and abundant of all, the orange
telesto coral with their white polyps extended. We were in a fantasyland of
coloured pylons.Moving from pylon to pylon we quickly encountered a massive variety of fish species including representatives of the following families; boxfish, cowfish, scorpionfish, sea perch, globefish, wrasse, leatherjackets, goatfish, cardinalfish, morwong, sweep, trevally, bullseyes, scalyfin, grub fish, blennies, triplefins, moonlighters, sergeant baker, catfish, old wives, talma and many, many more. A massive school of yellowtail engulfed large sections of the jetty, and it was a lot of fun parting the fish like a shimmering curtain.
Invertebrate species were everywhere; octopus, flatworms, sea urchins, sea stars, featherstars, crabs, shrimps, sea cucumbers and especially nudibranchs. The most common are the short tailed nudibranchs, and being bright orange with blue spots they were not hard to miss. We also found a large cuttlefish hiding in the hollow end of a fallen pylon.
Heading back towards the boat we were side tracked by a huge school of old wives hovering between the pylons. We also spent a fair bit of time stalking a very curious white barred boxfish for a portrait, very difficult when the fish kept nipping at its reflection in the camera lens. After an hour we reluctantly left the water, not wanting to leave this amazing jetty.
Over the next few days we dived the jetty several more times and each time we saw something new, a large flathead, a shy john dory, a lovely pineapple fish and a weird looking eel which we are yet to identify.
There are many other fascinating dive sites off Busselton, including Four Mile Reef, Coral Gardens and the Artificial Reef. We were hoping to dive Four Mile Reef on our last day, however the wind blew up and we instead explored a site called Pine Tree.
The limestone reef at Pine Tree is only 5m deep, but was fascinating to explore with lots of ledges and crevasses. Each ledge was covered by soft corals, sponges, ascidians and some beautiful small gorgonians. There was an amazing amount of fish life to be seen, all the species we had seen under Busselton Jetty and also a long snouted boarfish and several western blue devils.
We also found a diverse range of invertebrate species to photograph, the highlights being the nudies, crayfish and several cuttlefish. We were also surprised to stumble across two large sea hares that appeared to be in the act of mating, one riding atop the other.
We had some brilliant diving off Busselton and found it well worth the effort crossing the country to dive two of the best artificial reefs in the world, Busselton’s old jetty and old warship.