A few weeks back I noticed that I had not made any diving arrangements for the 25/26 August weekend. I quickly checked the tide table and checked a few boats and hey presto! So it’s off to the local island, Pulau Hantu in Singapore we go.
Each afternoon we had 10 divers and we all met at the Republic of Singapore Yacht Club (RSYC) at 1pm.
I managed to get Armand to dive with me
on Saturday before he flew back to France on Sunday. Also, I now have two new French PADI Dive Master Trainees (DMTs). Francios joined me on Sunday, his partner Elodie could make it on Sunday.
Saturday turned out to be fantastic despite the comments we heard from the divers that went to Hantu in the morning. It was so good, that one of our divers, Jeff came back on Sunday.
There was little to no current on both days. The visibility on Saturday was good at around 5 metres, Sunday it dropped a bit due to the rain and overcast conditions, but still an impressive 3-4 metres. I have experienced 20cm viz at Hantu in the past, so I was really enjoying myself, guiding a few folks and shooting photos a few fish and nudis.
Both days we dived the outside of the reef first and then a mid sized site that was a bunch of rocks with one large rock and a boat anchor wedged on it. Both very different sites which had a lot to offer.
JB and Alexis spotted the turtle at the reef and were surprised by its huge size. The reef was covered in blue dragon nudi’s and we managed to spot a couple of other colourful nudi’s cuttlefish, rabbit fish, coral fish and loads of flats worms, some small ones and some big one.
One point on the reef at 5 metres, I came across this huge anemone with about 4 clown fish. One was on steroids for sure. It was the biggest one I have ever seen at Hantu, either steroids or the effects from the nearby oil refinery.
The small rock site, which I have named Anchor Rock, was really good. It had more fish than the reef, schooling rabbit fish, that almost swam into me, some trevally, fusiliers and the big rock had a lot of damsel fish. There were a few nudi’s, but not as many as the other reef and some crabs too.
We also came across one of the local university’s science experiments. They are testing tanks. Of course I mentioned once we were back on the boat, not to move or consider them those tanks “rubbish or trash”. So everyone agreed not to include them in any future “clean-up expeditions”.
Not a bad way to spend the weekend and the 1pm start meant there was no rush to get to RSYC at 7.30am.
Cheers – Gary
Photos in this report were taken by Gary