Although I usually work on Saturday’s, I didn’t say no to the opportunity to go diving on Singapore’s Birthday, National Day.
A group of ten divers, keen to search for sea-horses and nudi branches dived Singapore’s southern island, Pulau Hantu on a beautiful sunny morning.
We all buddied up in pairs; Danny and I, Pablo and Max then Siew Chiun with Tun Lin.
Verlyn and Kuangying were newly certified Open Water divers, so we buddied Verlyn with PADI Instructor Julius and Kuangying with PADI Instructor Danielle.
Danielle was very excited. Like myself, she had the luxury of a day off and would do anything to have a break from teaching in a classroom on the weekend. She compared our local diving to that of Korea.
Sure, a little silty, but lots to see if you take it slow. She was most impressed that the coral was not broken and loved all the different types of feather stars and coral like the brain coral, green cup coral, bubbly honeycomb coral, harp coral, table coral and the small barrel sponge.
Well today was a 60cm to 1 metre viz day. And so green and murky that Danny and I played musical buddies during the first dive with Pablo and Max on The Outer Reef of Hantu. During this dive Danny and I saw some nudis, crocodile fish and the copperband butterflyfish. Danielle and Kuangying met the local cuttlefish together with some nudis and the clown fish.
On the second dive, we had the choice of diving along The Break Wall or The Inner Reef. Danny and I chose the Inner Reef. Towards the end of the dive we managed to do a shallow dive along the top of the reef on the sand. Rather pretty with fish hiding in the seaweed and the occasional pipefish who liked to camouflage themselves.
Despite the green water we all had fun and Pablo and Max were so surprised they agreed that they would return again to explore Singapore’s underwater world.
Cheers, Karen Savins (GS-Diving PADI DiveMaster)
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