The plan was to head to the outside of Moreton Island and dive Cherub’s Cave and Henderson Rock as part of the grey nurse shark survey for ‘Shark Week’. You need calm winter conditions to dive these sites, and that is exactly what we got.
The dive group first met up at Aqua X-treme dive shop at Tingalpa, that had booked Deep Explorer for the day. After all the dive gear was organised it was down the road to Manly Boat Harbour to load up the dive gear.
Deep Explorer is a 7.6m sharkcat, owned and operated by Dave McArthur. The boat is surveyed for 12 passengers and two crew, and has side tank racks, padded seats and gear storage under the seats. Since purchasing the boat in May, Dave has fitted twin 200HP Suzuki, allowing for a cruising speed of 20 to 24 knots and a top speed of 32 knots.
Deep Explorer has been available for charters since June, taking divers to the best sites off North Stradbroke Island and Moreton Island.
After loading the dive gear, and a safety briefing, we had plenty of time to relax and enjoy the scenery as we crossed Moreton Bay. It was a glorious day to be on the bay with hardly a ripple. We were soon across the Straddy bar and motoring up the outside of Moreton Island.
Usually it takes around an hour and a half to reach Cherub’s Cave, but we got slightly delayed by a few whales. As we headed up the coast we had to keep slowing down because of all the humpback whales. At one stage we stopped completely as four huge whales turned towards the boat. With the water clear and blue we could see the outline of the whales underwater as they were only a few metres away from the boat. We then got a big surprise when two of the whales surface right beside the boat and sprayed us from their blowholes.
We finally anchored up at Ch
erub’s
Cave and couldn’t wait to get into that lovely blue water. Cherub’s Cave is
one of the best dive sites off Brisbane. A rocky reef riddled with caves,
ledges, gutters and canyons. The reef rises from 35m to 15m and is dominated by
one large mushroom shaped rock, undercut by Cherub’s Cave.We headed around the eastern side of the rock and in the 25m visibility could see our first grey nurse shark, a large 2.5m long female. We stayed close to the rock as she swam toward us, however she was a little shy, turning away and departing.
We slowly followed her to the gutters at the northern end of the rock to find four grey nurse on patrol. Before us were two males and two pregnant females, their stomachs quite large, all between 2.2m and 2.5m long. I took a couple of photos as they slowly swam up and down the gutters. We watched the sharks for a few minutes, but they were quite wary and finally moved onto other parts of the reef.
With my focus now off the sharks I stared to notice some of the other marine life that makes Cherub’s Cave such a special dive site. Above us a school of twenty barracuda were hovering, while all around us were masses of tropical reef fish.
We slowly explored the rocky reef, looking under ledges we found gropers, squirrelfish, shrimps, clown triggerfish and many crayfish. The reef is decorated with lovely soft corals, sponges, tubstra corals, hard corals and many black coral trees. It is also one of the few sites of Brisbane that gets kelp.
As we investigated more of the reef we also found turtles, surgeonfish, wrasse, bullseyes, yellowtail, angelfish and lots of wobbegongs. Some of the wobbies at this site are huge, over 2m long.
I stuck my head into a number of caves and even explored one long swim-thru, but ran out of time to venture into Cherub’s Cave itself. During the entire dive we could hear whales singing and groaning. I found myself constantly scanning the surface for the whales without luck, however a few of the divers did see a dolphin.
There is just so much to see at this dive site, I was glad to know it is protected as a marine sanctuary to help conserve our dwindling grey nurse shark population.
Between dives we enjoyed a hearty lunch of bread rolls, ham and salads, plus coffee, tea, hot chocolate and biscuits, provided as part of the charter. Soaking up the sunshine and getting gently rocked by the slight seas, we were entertained by several pods of whales swimming past the boat. There was even one spectacular breach only 100m from the boat. This was one of the best whale watching days I had ever experienced, and of course I had forgot my land camera.
Our second dive was at Henderson Rock, another grey nurse shark protected site. Henderson Rock is another rocky reef with ledges, caves and gutters in depths from 30m to 8m. There were no grey nurse to be seen today, but plenty of other wonderful marine life. Several turtles were observed, including a very cute hawksbill turtle. Wobbies were again everywhere, as were crayfish, reef fish and invertebrate species.
The reef here is just as colourful as Cherub’s, with numerous black coral trees and pretty soft corals. During the dive we encountered a lone spotted eagle ray, a large Queensland groper and schools of trevally, goatfish, bullseyes and kingfish.
The entire dive was accompanied by the sounds of humpbacks singing, and upon surfacing we were told that two whales swam almost over the top of our bubbles.